The Heart Tree Story: A Journey Through Grief and Healing

July 31, 2025

AnneMoss Rogers, Author & Mental Health and Suicide Prevention Speaker

Tom O’Connor, Editor & Publisher

According to the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), one in five adults in the United States experiences mental illness each year. Even more alarming, suicide is the second leading cause of death among youth ages 10–14 and young adults ages 25–34. For many, it doesn’t take long to think of someone who has faced these struggles.

The Impact of Child Loss

The death of a child is a traumatic event that can have long-term effects on the lives of parents. Each year, approximately 7,000 deaths in the age group 10-24 account for 14% of all suicides in the US. Suicide is the second leading cause of death for children in this age group. Approximately 2 million adolescents attempt suicide each year. Youth suicide rates have increased significantly in recent years.

Losing a child is one of the most painful events that an adult can experience. It often leads to complicated grief reactions. For parents, the dissolution of the attachment relationship with the child elicits severe anxiety and other negative emotions associated with loss. Losing a child to suicide complicates the grieving process even further. It involves intention—a factor that often adds layers of guilt, anguish, and unanswered questions.

AnneMoss Rogers: A Voice for Change

Author AnneMoss Rogers is one of the top Mental Health Keynote Speakers and Suicide Prevention speakers. In 2019, AnneMoss published her award-winning memoir, Diary of a Broken Mind. In 2020, she co-wrote the bestseller Emotionally Naked: A Teacher’s Guide to Preventing Suicide with Dr. Kimberly O’Brien. AnneMoss is a graduate of UNC-Chapel Hill and lives in Richmond, Virginia.

Anne Moss Rogers is a writer, professional mental health keynote speaker, and founder of the blog Emotionally Naked. Here, she shares powerful stories that capture hearts and inspire hope. Her journey into mental health advocacy began in 2010 as a board member for a youth mental health organization. She later served as Executive Director before transitioning into a speaker and trainer. A passionate voice for suicide prevention and emotional wellness, Anne Moss was honored with the YWCA Pat Asch Fellowship for Social Justice in 2019, a fellowship that awarded $17k to acquire the training for pursuing a worthy cause.

Reflections on Grief

According to AnneMoss Rogers:

• It has been a decade since we lost our 20-year-old son, Charles, to suicide on June 5, 2015. He struggled with anxiety, depression, and ultimately an opioid addiction. Has it really been ten years? Why does the longing in this tenth year feel more intense than in years 7, 8, or 9?

  
  

• It feels like there is more distance between his living existence and mine. It’s as if he’s fading into the background. Of course, time moves forward. I don’t have the luxury of pausing, slowing down, or stopping because of my tragedy. While I haven’t forgotten Charles, it feels like others have. It would be ridiculous for someone to say, “So, how is Charles doing these days?”

  
  

• This year, instead of having all of his buddies over for a get-together, Charles’s best friend and his wife will celebrate their daughter Aubrey’s third birthday. They named her after Charles. Plans are to go to her party and see all his friends there.

  
  

The Heart Tree: A Symbol of Resilience

I see my grief process reflected in a story about a tree that was damaged. After a storm in June 2016, my cousin and I spotted a grove of trees near Byrd Park in Richmond, Virginia. One tree caught our attention. It had been devastated by a lightning strike, while its grove mates were virtually untouched.

The tree looked dead, singed black, resembling a matchstick with no branches or leaves. But at the top, there was something extraordinary—a heart-shaped formation. I couldn’t imagine how lightning had carved such a sculpture. Two years later, my husband and I walked through that park to a festival. We took a detour to check on the tree. At first, I couldn’t spot it. Had it died? Been cut down? Among a grove of leafy trees, I finally saw it. Its singed trunk was still partially visible when I peeked under. And at the top? The heart that had captured my attention.

Although ragged and asymmetrical, that tree was flourishing. It had survived, even though the wound remained hidden beneath layers of new growth.

Just like that tree, you can come back after adversity. It’s not easy or fast. Some form of a scar will always remain, but healing is possible. New life will surround it. This little human, named after my son Charles Aubrey Rogers, is that new life. She is proof that he is not forgotten. That love, even in the face of loss, continues to grow and evolve.

Clinicians Mourning in Isolation

When it comes to loss, we usually think of grief-stricken families and friends. But clinicians often stand at the periphery, mourning in isolation. After a patient dies by suicide, I hear the same anguished refrain: “Wasn’t I supposed to prevent this?” The spiral of coulda, woulda, and shouldas is woven into every suicide loss.

Even clinicians fixate on the one life they couldn’t save and overlook the dozens they unknowingly did. Some colleagues have even lost their children to suicide or overdose, despite equipping them with the coping skills they teach others. I ask you, how many times have you helped someone choose life without knowing it? Why do we hyper-focus on the 5% we do imperfectly, as human therapists or as parents, and ignore the 95% we do right?

Honor your grief, and grant yourself the compassion you give others. You didn’t enter this profession to fund your passion for yachting; you chose it because you care. We can’t do it for another. All you can do is try to help someone save their own life.

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AnneMoss Rogers is a mental health speaker and suicide education expert. AnneMoss published her award-winning memoir, Diary of a Broken Mind. She also co-wrote the bestseller Emotionally Naked: A Teacher’s Guide to Preventing Suicide with Dr. Kimberly O’Brien, which has been translated into three languages.

Anne Moss, a TEDx speaker, has been featured in The New York Times and Variety Magazine. She was interviewed by CNN’s Erin Burnett on teen mental health at the Allen & Company Sun Valley Conference. She was the first non-clinician to speak on suicide at the National Institute of Mental Health and is an editor of the American Academy of Pediatrics Blueprint for Youth Suicide Prevention. Anne Moss graduated from UNC-Chapel Hill and resides with her husband in Richmond, Virginia.

You can reach her at https://mentalhealthawarenesseducation.com/

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