When I read the Star Phoenix today, I was surprised to see my grandmother's former next-door neighbours on the front page. Several years ago, the Kennedy's oldest daughter, Brianne, committed suicide. Now, her younger sisters, Callie and Jaclyn, are telling their sister's story to educate teens about depression and suicide. When I used to spend the summers with my grandma to work at the local Dairy Queen, these girls would have been no more than three or four years old. I am inspired by their choice to honour their sister's memory through fundraising and advocacy work.


Twin sisters Callie (left) and Jaclyn Kennedy
talk to students about depression and suicide prevention
after their sister, Brianne, took her life.
Photograph by : Dave Stobbe - StarPheonix
SISTERS SHARE PAIN OF LOSS

Brianne Kennedy suffered from depression.
She never hid that from the family.
But even they didn't know the depth of her despair, how raw the hurt.

Bob Florence, The StarPhoenix
Published: Tuesday, October 17, 2006

KINDERSLEY -- On the east side of town, where Kindersley ends and just before the wheat fields begin, there is a small park with wild brush and prairie grass and a great big sky. Brianne Kennedy had her Grade 12 graduation portrait done there.

Dressed in a grad gown so blue it would make the sky jealous and smiling that classic Brianne smile -- a smile that could make a stubble field spontaneously combust -- her portrait hangs on a wall just inside the front door of the Kennedy family home. Allan and Patti Kennedy had the house built six years ago. The arched, two-storey window in the living room looks straight across the street to the park on the edge of town.

The Kennedys have four daughters: Shalyn, 7, twins Callie and Jaclyn, 15, and Brianne, their oldest.

Brianne made the honour roll at Kindersley Composite High School, a whiz kid in algebra. She was on the Student Rep Council, a member of the Kindersley Composite Kobras cheerleading team. Graduating in 2003, she went on to the University of Saskatchewan.

She was studying commerce, had no definite career plans, but was in no hurry to decide, either. At 18, she'd only begun.

She ended her life at 19.

It was Aug. 31, a Tuesday, with the summer of 2004 over and a new school year about to start.

Why Brianne took her life that night is a question that Allan and Patti will always ask, knowing there is no definitive or comforting answer.

Brianne suffered from depression. She never hid that from the family. But even they didn't know the depth of her despair, how raw the hurt.

In a stanza from a memorial poem to their big sister, Callie and Jaclyn wrote:

We didn't know she was so broken inside
Pain was her secret she could no longer hide

Callie and Jaclyn both spoke at Brianne's funeral.

Thirteen years old then, 15 now, the twins continue to deal with their private grief in a very public way.

When they were assigned an oral presentation in their Grade 9 lifestyles class last spring, Callie and Jaclyn decided to speak on depression and suicide.

They stood at the front of Leanne Lomax's class and for a full hour they talked not just about what they'd learned in the course of their library research, but they also spoke from the heart, sharing their experience.

Encouraged by the response of the students, they later talked to three other classes at Kindersley Composite.

The Kindersley Clarion profiled Jaclyn and Callie in the paper six weeks ago, prompting invitations from Lloydminster and Marengo and Medicine Hat, asking if the sisters would come and speak to their students, too.

Yes, Jaclyn and Callie said. Absolutely yes.

They're a tag-team with a powerful message, a 1-2 combo with ambitious plans of going class to class and school to school to promote awareness of depression. Two Grade 10 students, they've become front-line educators on suicide prevention.

"A lot of people tell us we're strong," Jaclyn said.

"They say 'How can you do that, telling your personal story?' Someone has to do it. We need to talk about this."

Said Callie: "By talking about it, maybe another family won't go through what we have."

In addition to the speaking engagements, Callie and Jaclyn do fundraising. They ordered custom made rubber wristbands through a website and donate the proceeds from the sales -- the bands are $4 each -- to the Saskatchewan chapter of the Canadian Mental Health Association for suicide prevention.

The message on the wristband reads "life is worth living." Between two white hearts on the bracelet are the initials B.C.K., for Brianne Carol Kennedy. Everyone in the Kennedy family wears a wristband.

"The loss wasn't only ours, the whole town felt it," said Patti Kennedy. "A lot of kids looked up to Brianne."

Said Jaclyn: "She wasn't judgmental. She wasn't into gossip."

Jaclyn paused. "She'd come home with her boyfriend and just hang out with us. How many big sisters are going to do that? She was cool with that."

Said Callie: "Nintendo was our thing. She liked playing Nintendo; always beat me." Callie laughed.

"What I miss," Callie said, "is just the everyday things. Like dinner; our family was always together then. Now she's not there."

Confusion. Anger. Grief. Losing Brianne has been all that and more for the Kennedys.

"I've forgiven her," Jaclyn said. "It just hurts to think how much she hurt; that she felt this was the only option." Jaclyn and Callie want to speak to more classes.

Though it's sometimes painful for the two of them, it's healing as well. Inspiring, even.

Standing in front of a class and talking about suicide and depression, taking those subjects out of the shadow and into the light, the two sisters become three.

Brianne -- that's where Callie and Jaclyn get their strength.

"She'd be glad we're doing this," Callie said.

Said Jaclyn: "We do this in honour of her. It makes me happy doing this for her."

bflorence@sp.canwest.com

© The StarPhoenix (Saskatoon) 2006