Finding the right words to support or uplift friends and family after losing a loved one to suicide isn’t easy. Often, the heartbreak is too overwhelming to know what to say or how to say it.
Jump ahead to these sections:
- Sad Quotes About Losing a Loved One to Suicide
- Inspirational Quotes About Losing a Loved One to Suicide
- Quotes About Losing a Loved One to Suicide to Share on Social Media
Apart from sending your deepest condolences to friends and family members, scroll below for some quotes that you can add to a card, text, or social media post. Be sure to choose one that’s appropriate for the recipient and the mode of delivery.
Sad Quotes About Losing a Loved One to Suicide
Many of the authors below have experienced the loss of a loved one through suicide. Each has captured the sadness and pain well in the following quotes about grief.
1. “A person never truly gets over a suicide loss. You get through it. Day by day. Sometimes it’s moment by moment.” – Holly Kohler
Holly Kohler’s quote will work if you know someone struggling with loss or perhaps another who is trying to rush through the grieving process.
2. “Grief is like a long valley, a winding valley where any bend may reveal a totally new landscape.” – C. S. Lewis
Grief is long and unpredictable.
3. “Sometimes only one person is missing, and the whole world feels depopulated.” – Alphonse de Lamartine
Losing a precious loved one to suicide can make you feel many things, including wholly misunderstood and entirely alone.
4. “It’s so much darker when a light goes out than it would have been if it had never shone.” – John Steinbeck
When the warmth of the sun shines on you, and then all of a sudden goes dim, the absence is unbearable.
5. “The whole notion of pain, and how every individual experiences pain, is up for debate. We don't know how another person experiences pain—physical pain or psychic pain. Some of these clinics where assisted suicide or euthanasia is practiced, they call it 'weariness of life.'” – Miriam Toews
If your friend keeps asking why or seeking answers to the “not knowing” part, share this quote with them.
6. “Perhaps the saddest irony of depression is that suicide happens when the patient gets a little better and can again function sufficiently.” – David Cavett
There’s equal truth in sadness and sadness in truth, especially when both are presented in a measured reality.
7. “That's the thing about suicide. Try as you might to remember how a person lived his life, you always end up thinking about how he ended it.” – Anderson Cooper
Cooper’s observation about suicide is spot-on, and it’s also something survivors need to work through if they want to process their grief well.
8. “Grief is like the ocean; it comes on waves ebbing and flowing. Sometimes the water is calm, and sometimes it is overwhelming. All we can do is learn to swim.” – Vicki Harrison
The churning ocean is an excellent metaphor for grief, mainly because no two waves are the same.
9. “One day, you’ll wake up and things won’t hurt as bad. You’ll be able to remember the good things about your friend and not just the end. For me, that’s when I knew I was finally able to move on.” – Kristin Svinth
This quote is both sad and inspirational, depending on the stage of grief your friend or loved one is experiencing.
Inspirational Quotes About Losing a Loved One to Suicide
The quotes below are suitable for private reading and reflection or sent to support a friend or loved one.
If you've lost a loved one to suicide, it's essential to focus on suicide awareness through original suicide quotes highlighting the silent struggle they lost. Provide comfort and healing to family members and friends by sharing these suicide awareness quotes.
10. “Talk about them. Be proud of them. Losing a courageous battle doesn't make you weak.” – Jennifer Betts
If you have a friend who’s feeling ashamed or too embarrassed to talk about their loss, send them this note—their loss is not shameful.
11. “Know it wasn’t your fault. Know someday you may take comfort in educating people about suicide.” – Sue Mahlburg
Sue Mahlburg’s quote doubles as grief’s light at the end of the tunnel stage.
12. “One thing I learned is however I decided to grieve is the right way for me. Everyone’s different.” – Ron Prickett
Terrible advice comes from others who push you to grieve in a way that makes them feel more comfortable about your grief.
13. “If you’ve lost a loved one to suicide—even if you, yourself, have dealt with depression and suicidal ideation—you may often wonder why. And that’s okay. Allow yourself that space.” – Karen Espenshade
Elenshade’s quote suggests that not knowing, understanding, or having the answers to tough questions is okay.
14. “At the blueness of the skies and in the warmth of summer, we remember them.” – Sylvan Kamens & Rabbi Jack Reimer
This quote makes you happy for the day to turn blue instead of dark with night.
15. “Loss from suicide is like no other loss, and there’s no time limit for grieving. Allow yourself that time to process. And then talk to someone, anyone.” – Deenie Bagley
Grief is not one size fits all but also shouldn’t be bottled up inside.
16. “The best piece of advice I got was, ‘Once you accept that many, if not most, of your questions will never be answered, you can start to move forward.’” – Michele Starbeck
Starbeck’s quote offers that once you’ve accepted that suicide’s suddenness will leave you answerless, you’ve finally rounded the hill.
17. “Should you shield the valleys from the windstorms, you would never see the beauty of their canyons.” – Elizabeth Kubler Ross
Ross suggests that even in darkness, there is beauty.
18. “Continue to live your life, know that it’s OK to smile again. Don’t ever be ashamed or let anyone make you feel ashamed.” – Jackie Burson
When the time comes to smile again, Burson offers that you have the right to do so no matter others’ opinions.
19. “The ‘ton of bricks’ that are thrust upon your shoulders by a loved one’s suicide never goes away. But you do get stronger shoulders.” – Frank Kaufman
Strength, Kaufman writes, is through adversity.
20. “Be patient with yourself. One day you’ll be able to celebrate the life and not focus on the method of death. Please, please, just be patient” – Judi Swenson
Swenson’s quote will work for that friend or loved one agonizing over the inability to separate the person from their death.
Quotes About Losing a Loved One to Suicide to Share on Social Media
If you’d like to post something on your loved one’s timeline or chat with others who are grieving, check out these quotes and tips for online condolence etiquette.
21. “Though you left this world behind that day, you still live on through your place in my heart.” – Jennifer Betts
Share this quote with a particular image of the two of you. Get permission from anyone else in the photograph before you share that person’s image anywhere online.
22. “A shattered soul loses pieces every time it's glued back together.” – Jennifer Betts
Some words give you a visual of internal struggles, creating pictures to understand the pain.
23. “Suicide isn't losing a battle to live. It's losing the epic fight against a mind that begs you to die.” – Jennifer Betts
Here’s a quote that puts suicide into another perspective, one that exposes the strength one needs to overcome adversity for so long.
24. “Living each day is one of the most extraordinary acts of courage.” – Jennifer Betts
Courage is not often associated with suicide, but it supports how deep one must muster to live with debilitating depression.
25. “Suicide is one moment of weakness in a courageous fight for life.” – Jennifer Betts
Betts’ quote gives a name to the disease while offering encouragement by defining a loved one’s overall character.
26. “Everyone must leave something behind when he dies, my grandfather said. A child or a book or a painting or a house or a wall built of a pair of shoes made. Or a garden planted. Something your hand touches some way, so your soul has somewhere to go when you die, and when people look at that tree or that flower you planted, you’re there.” – Ray Bradbury
This quote works for anyone grasping or stretching to find their loved one in the world. It lets them know they’re potentially everywhere.
27. “Though they fought to live, the world was just too much to bear.” – Jennifer Betts
A quote like this may be better in a personal, conversational stream and without an accompanying photograph. Otherwise, you might invite unwanted responses.
28. “Though you had to let go of this world to find peace, we hold on to your memory in our hearts, so you live forever.” – Jennifer Betts
Pair this quote with a photo of your lost friend or loved one. Post an appropriate image that others would appreciate seeing.
29. “Please reach out. Speak up. The worst thing you could do is to stay silent, like I did for so many years.” – Kelsey Elizabeth Oney
Keep an open-door policy for family and friends experiencing loss from suicide, but don’t advertise online anyone who takes you up on the offer.
30. “The pain you hid overtook you like the darkness overtakes the sun. But I comfort myself in knowing that even on the darkest night, stars still shine.” – Jennifer Betts
Here’s a quote that would work for your loved one’s social media wall or remembrance page.
Suicide and Loss
If you or a loved one has lost someone to suicide, traveling the path through grief and recovery is an individual process.
When you need support, don’t be afraid to reach out and accept help from people and professionals.
Sources:
- Brainy Quote, Brainy Quote, 2021, www.brainyquote.com
- Good Reads, Good Reads, 2021, www.goodreads.com
- The Mighty, The Mighty, 2021, www.themighty.com
- Mort, Johanna. “21 Absolutely Heartwrenching Quotes On Loss And Grief.” Thought Catalog, Thought Catalog, 28 May 2015, thoughtcatalog.com/johanna-mort/2015/05/21-absolutely-heartwrenching-quotes-on-loss-and-grief/
- Todd, Carolyn. “7 Things to Say When a Friend’s Loved One Dies by Suicide (and 3 to Avoid).” Self, Self, 5 February 2019, www.self.com/story/help-friend-suicide-loss-survivor