Gwen LaCroix

“My name is Gwen, I was raised in England, but live in Michigan. I was a paramedic for the City of Detroit for 6 years, and am now a Psychiatric Nurse Practitioner, a role I became interested in because of my son’s struggle with mental health. 

On October 19th, 2016, my first born, 6’2” beautiful, National Honor Society student, who loved basketball and drawing, who could talk a mean streak, who ate cereal out of serving bowls, and helped the pastor at the local Baptist church youth group, who was attending an early college program and coming out of his shell in the diversity that offered, killed himself with an unsecured firearm one month after his 17th birthday. Jonah had suffered from suicidal thoughts since the age of 8, and I had begged his father to lock up his weapons, followed him around to ask where they were being stored, provided articles and statistics, and bought him two lock boxes to safely store them in. Jonah, however, knew what I did not, which is that his Dad had lied when he told me all of his guns were locked up, and my son, who had a photographic memory, knew there was a pistol in the closet of the hallway where he was found after removing his glasses, laying on the carpet, and shooting himself in the right temple.

I truly believe his death would never have happened without access to that firearm. We owe our remaining children to continue fighting.”