reaching out

“My heart aches for widows of suicide,” Stanke says. “The loss, grief and shame, confusion, self-blame — the list is so long. Being a widow is hard and stuff is heavy!” Stanke now visits area widows of suicide and brings them a purple wagon from A to Z Moving. The “widow wagons” fold up like a suitcase and are designed to help carry little children as well as groceries or anything else that needs to be moved. “When I lost Greg, I lost my person with all the muscles: the guy who carried the heavy things. Hopefully these wagons will help carry more than just physical things — it will remind widows they aren’t alone when life feels heavy.” A to Z Moving also volunteers a crew to remove and install furniture when it would be traumatic for the widow.

Stanke is now helping others fight the battle. Stanke and her family are involved with Concussion Legacy Foundation (CLF) as a Legacy Donor Family and the CLF family council, which gives them access to leading research and opportunities to connect with others who have lost a loved one to CTE (Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy). “Only one in six concussions are diagnosed,” she says. Most people who have CTE don’t know they have a degenerative brain disease, she explains. CTE is usually found in athletes, military veterans, and others with a history of repetitive brain trauma. As she discovered with Greg, the many hits during football and riding contributed to the development of this significant, life-altering brain disease.

“Everyday people are walking around with CTE, thinking it’s depression, bipolar disorder or anxiety,” she says. “Often there are no outside indicators, and people just try to ‘muscle through.’ But suicide, especially for people in early stages of CTE, is the leading cause of death. The repetitive, sub-concussive hits (not as severe as a diagnosed concussion) are damaging. “When it comes to brain injuries, misdiagnosis and wrong treatment is just as deadly as no diagnosis and no treatment. Talking about and accounting for every little hit is a life-saving conversation if it leads to a healing protocol.”

As Stanke has reached out to others, she has also developed a creative way to explain the loss of “Papa” to their young granddaughter. “I needed a way to tell her the whole story about why Papa is gone that emphasized the brain injury taking him from us versus the suicide,” Stanke says. “So I wrote about a Viking/linebacker/cowboy named Greg the Great, in a children’s book, ‘Bumped his Head and Went to Bed.’” The story, with illustrations by Scott Monaco of the company QuietYell in Dallas, helps share more of Greg’s story in a way a child can understand. The children’s book, which will be out in November, also underscores the connection between head injuries and personality changes leading to a not-so-happy ending. “I added a short self-assessment in the back,” she explains, “with information on how to contact Concussion Legacy Foundation’s help line.”

“The trauma didn’t stop with Greg’s death. I felt like I was gone too, with the loss of our friends, my roles, my place in society, my identity, selfworth and literal safety,” Stanke notes.

“But occasionally, this strange overwhelming feeling of gratitude would show up and I’d feel like I had a pulse. Gratitude is the key to feeling alive again,” she reminds. “I still struggle with a sense of purpose, but I know that I want to honor Greg’s memory and tell the world about the connection between brain injuries and suicide.”

“I used to tell my kids and clients to look for “miracle moments” and to savor magic moments in life because they don’t jump out and announce themselves,” she says. “I get to experience a miracle moment every time I hear that Greg’s story has given someone insight into their own situation, and sent them looking for brain recovery options instead of giving up and giving in to the voices in their broken brain.”