Looking For Calm

September 18, 2020

Seven years ago this weekend, a dear friend of our family’s took her life at 24 after a long battle with Depression. I remember exactly where I was when I received the phone call from my mom. I was about to teach a PE class at Horace Mann and my co-teacher, Azuree knew that the news on the other end of the phone was not good. She enveloped me in a bear hug as I made my way home.

Mary Lacey is pictured above in between her two sisters, Lindsay and Annabelle. This family holds a special spot in my heart. Our moms met when the Gilbride girls were quite young. My mom took an annual photograph of the girls for their Christmas card and the rest, as they say, is history. Lindsay, Mary Lacey and Annabelle were in our wedding as flower girls. I can still remember Mary Lacey ambling in her Adidas soccer flats and her fancy white dress to the church. I always had a bit of a soft spot for Mary Lacey – she was a bit of a kindred spirit. I loved her tenacity.

Our family carried the gifts to the altar when Lindsay and Morley were married. And we watched with such love and delight as they established their union. Not too long after Annabelle and Stephen were married and the love, joy that enveloped the Gilbride family at both of those celebrations was palpable and hard to describe really. There was so much love in those spaces! I remember looking around the dance floor and thinking the room might explode because of the love that filled the room.

It seems difficult to imagine that it has been 7 years. But the spirit of Mary Lacey, that Father Jim spoke about when he described this amazing young woman, remains. Her light lives on in Anne, Scott, Lindsay, Annabelle, her aunts, uncles, cousins, her niece, Brennan and the many friends who were connected to her.

The words delivered at her funeral have stayed with me to this day and I know they will always.

“The most consistent lament I have heard these past few days about Mary Lacey’s death are not mended with easy answers, but only with truthful ones.

Like cancer, certain kinds of emotional depression are terminal-when remissions get shorter and shorter. For some people challenged with depression it can be treated with medicine and added support from others-the person is then able to manage the depression and feel healed or even cured. Many live with the disease emotional illness for a whole lifetime. But in some cases, just like so many cancers, an emotional disease is untreatable and so overpowering- no intervention by anyone or anything can stop its advance. Eventually it kills the person and there is nothing anyone can do. Mary Lacey’s depression was of that kind, the terminal kind. Hers was a medical problem not a moral one.

In a world where we can live to be 60,70,80, or 90 is is easy to let things slide, to let things go until tomorrow. Mary Lacey teaches us in her short life of 24 years that we need to live today for all its worth. Not to dwell on what ifs but to live in the moment of what now.

What is worthy is not the length of life, what is important is the substance of life: the things for which we are willing to live and die; the people whom we love and love us; the values which guide our way on earth; our willingness to help others and allow others to help us. These are the things that count! Not the length of our lives or the length of our resume.”

Mary Lacey, despite her disease, lived life to the fullest and loved with her whole heart. Let’s celebrate her life, and the lives of those who have struggled, and those that continue to, with depression and other emotional illnesses.”

It is important never to forget that we do not always know the struggle that those in front of us are living with and that sometimes getting through each day is hard. I am thankful that more people today are openly speaking about mental health, anxiety, depression and struggle. I believe that by continuing to share the truth about mental health, individuals that are suffering can hopefully get the support they need and not feel so alone.

Anne, Scott, Lindsay and Annabelle may you feel the love of God, family and friends today and every day. Your courage, example, faith and love serve as an inspiration, and we remain grateful that you are in our lives. Mary Lacey will never be forgotten. Her smile lit up an entire room and the sound of that laugh filled it up. We will continue to celebrate Mary Lacey, to share stories and memories of her. We must try, as she would want, to live each day filled with gratitude, love, hope, grace and peace.