after two years of grieving

the tragic and sudden loss of her husband, Shannan Stanke reflected on her journey. “Although our/my story is public, the insights I’ve gained are not,” she says. “I’ve learned not to fight the process of grief, and I’m learning to face the fears and the tears.”

Stanke’s story began in the typical way. She and her husband, Greg, met at MSUM while both were pursuing degrees in exercise science. They got married and became the proud parents of three daughters. They started a moving business in 1998. His focus was on making it successful, while she helped part-time, homeschooled their daughters, and worked in the fitness industry. His athletic hobbies, from playing football in college, to cowboy mounted shooting as an adult, were physically demanding. What Stanke didn’t recognize was the reason for Greg’s “mid-life crisis” that started in about 2012.

“We always sent out Christmas pictures,” she recalls, “but the camera roll in 2014 had only one photo of Greg not looking angry — so everything else had to be photoshopped.” Stanke recalled him saying that he felt frustrated and often reacting in anger to slight things. Greg’s escalating insensitivity and lack of empathy resulted in regular visits with a marriage counselor. He began working out at the gym twice a day to counter the slump he was in, focusing on his hobbies while neglecting home and family.

A serious horse accident in May of 2018 resulted in Greg losing consciousness, and the changes in Greg’s personality came faster. He became forgetful, erratic and impulsive, often unable to de-escalate from states of anger and frustration.

Stanke says simply, “It was scary. But I never once considered brain injuries as an explanation.” A lifetime of competitive sports resulted in numerous head traumas: playing defensive and offensive line in football, the multiple times he’d hit the ground while training a horse or competing. Greg was living with an undiagnosed brain disease. He took his own life two years ago in September.