My friend and kids' teacher commits suicide...

prayer, and stay strong strong for those kids!!! and offer help to his family perhaps.

I'm sorry to hear of this ... it's never good. True, you'll never know his deepest motivations, but you can know they weren't good or positive because of his ultimate act of self-destruction. Knowing that will tell you that those who suvive him will ALWAYS attach every sort of emotion and 'deduction' to that act no matter how the person lived thier life. It's almost as if thier life meant nothing at all becuase of the WAY it ended. Most of us don't relate to the horror of such an act, and almost always seem to attach a self-blame like, "If only I would have......." but we'll never know because of the finality of the whole situation. Really, the only thing that you CAN do right now is to let his survivors know that they're not alone and you're (faithriver) ready and available to help, talk, share, give, take, etc. You know, one thing that I've noticed as a common thread among folks like do that is thier propensity to FEEL ALONE. Depression and such has such a way of sinking a persons thought processes into a state of solitude that is always viewed as 'unique' to thier siuation. "Nobody knows....", "Nobody cares....", "Nobody likes....", "Nobody has....", it always seems to possess such a tragic air of preventable, doesn't it, & I think that's part of the reason why we seem to have a tendency of self-blame. What I've found to be the most beneficial to the well-being of the survivors is the KNOWLEDGE of a sypathetic ear just a phone call away or across town, even if it's never utilized. To be specifically invited to an uplifting or fun activity after everything settles down is always good to send a message 'We've not forgotten about you'. You get the idea! I believe the WORST thing you can do IS NOTHING! You'll see them almost immediately respond toward the direction of self-loathing and self-blame that is so common to suvivors ....... especially if they're treated like they've got the plague around town later. Lotsa folks have a natural tendency to do that because they don't know WHAT to say, so they say nothing ....... DON'T do that! Love, affection, affinty, kinship, are all good medicine for a such horrible sentence. Guide your actions toward those things which are COUNTER TO the sentence. You'll likely not be able to say "I know how you feel", because you've never been in thier shoes, so don't say that either. Rather, you might say something along the line of, "I can't imagine how you must feel, but I know that I love you and I'm here for you." I've known since a very young age that some of the worst crimes are 'doing nothing' and 'silence'.

Try to take solace in the fact that he is happier now, or at least no longer suffering.

This is a very difficult thing to deal with. I will pray for the family. Sometimes we can't see these things coming, the line between just being depressed and at the point where you would do this can be so thin at times that its hard for people to see he has crossed it. I think it is very oppropriate to send the family a card. Especially since you said they had seperated I think it would be very good for them to be reassured that he did love them. All I can say for your family is talk about it with your kids help them with it and if they seem to be having a hard time with it still in a few weeks maybe get them some counseling, especialy if he was a teacher they looked up to, it can be very difficult to understand for them. Good luck to you all.