That afternoon/evening my husband and I were going into town Christmas shopping. Tiffany agreed to stay home and watch her brother who had a cold. Things went normally as we left for town. We passed out kisses and hugs and said “I LOVE YOU” to each of the kids and off we went.

I received a page from Gabe (Tiffany’s brother) at around 6:30 p.m. or so wanting to know WHEN we were going to be home. I called and talked to him and told him it would be “soon”. I did not talk to Tiffany when I called home though this was not an unusual occurrence.

At around 7 p.m. I received another page from Gabe. My husband called home and talked with Gabe to see what was up. As he talked on the phone, my husband had a look of horror come over his face. He said “come on, we have to go home, something has happened”. I asked what and he wouldn’t tell me, …. We literally ran out of the mall and got to the car.

I asked again, “what is wrong?”. He said “Gabe thinks that Tiffany has shot herself”…….NO! It could NOT BE! It must be a mistake of some sort…. I immediately called Gabe on the cell phone and talked to him all the way home. Telling him it must be a mistake that he must have heard something other than a shotgun blast go off in the house. Gabe kept saying that he wished the song would go away…. asking me to make it stop...(Tiffany had set her CD player to repeatedly play a song by Mariah Carey).

I asked Gabe to call out to Tiffany to see if she would answer, he had done so with no results.

This trip was the longest 15 minutes I have ever had to endure. When we arrived home we looked in the dining room window and there on the living floor lay Tiffany. I was still sure she would be “ok”. My husband ran the block and a half to the local volunteer fire department where they were having a monthly meeting. The rescue/emergency squad came immediately to the house. One member, went into the house and brought Gabe out of his room. It seemed as if there were hundreds of people in and out of the house in those seemingly eternal minutes that followed. They of course had the police, along with the rescue team, running in and out of the house. I watched and waited,... and watched and waited. Soon, they wheeled Tiffany out on a gurney and into a waiting ambulance. . . still I had hope that she was “ok” that it was a mistake…..They were not working on her when they wheeled her out so surely she was “ok”….

I watched as the county police officer carried out a 12 gauge shotgun and put it into his car………still, she had to be ok, didn’t she?….she was only 14 and my baby girl and it must be a mistake.

The ambulance finally left our house and met up with an ambulance from a local hospital. We were following them and when they met up they blocked the road so we headed on to the hospital. In the meantime, on the way there I began trying to contact family members to let them know that something was going on.

We arrived at the hospital and still I was hoping and praying that it was a mistake, that Tiffany was really “ok”…… unfortunately this was not to be…. We were taken into a small private waiting room…. And after what seemed like an eternity the emergency room physician came in to talk to me….telling me “I am so sorry, we could not save her”…….he explained to me that Tiffany had shot herself in the chest. That she had fired a “perfect shot” and hit the entire left side of her heart and her left lung. He said she had died before she ever fell to the floor. She did not suffer. She felt no pain. But my pain was only beginning. I went into what I call “shock mode”. I had made multiple phone calls and my family and friends were filling not only the small private waiting room but also the front waiting room/lobby, the emergency room waiting room…..Asking questions to which I had no answers. We ended up staying at the hospital till nearly 2 a.m. not wanting to leave Tiffany and not knowing where to go. . .

We were all allowed to go in to see Tiffany after they had her “ready”. She appeared to be sleeping. She was covered to her chin with a hospital blanket but unfortunately did not appear “at peace”. She had the angriest look on her face that I had ever seen in my life. It was not one of pain, but one of anger…….I stayed with her for a very long time. I went in with others who wanted to visit her. Oh my gosh, this can’t be happening, will someone please WAKE ME UP!!!!! But then it was time for where she should be taken. Which funeral home? What to do? These were things that I should not have to decide for my 14-year-old baby girl. . . but the decisions were made and eventually we left the hospital.

The police contacted me over the next few days and asked many, many questions; they had to interview Tiffany’s brother, as he was home alone with her when she took her life. (Thankfully she had put him in his room and put a chair in front of his door so that he could not get out.) The police informed me that she had “set the scene”. That she had placed an ELEVEN PAGE note in front of her boom box and had the CD player set to play the song, “One Sweet Day” by Mariah Carey over and over and over……….after much investigation they decided that the only way Tiffany could have pulled the trigger was to use “something” as it was too far for her to reach…………her HAIRBRUSH….it had been laying on the floor by her feet and we had thought she had brushed her hair …before….. The police retrieved the hairbrush and concluded that was what she had used in order to be able to trip the trigger……………the case was closed as far as the police were concerned however….. It was only the beginning for me ……..The WHY’S began…..WHY did she do such a thing? WHY didn’t she ever one time threaten so that I would know how troubled she was? WHY didn’t she tell the therapist or psychiatrist? WHY couldn’t I turn back time and make this horrible event disappear?….

I continued in my “shock mode” …. Through making the arrangements at the funeral home…..Through the visitation on Saturday…….which started at 2 p.m. and continued through till well past 9 p.m. ……. Through the funeral (funeral? For my baby girl? It mustn’t be so………yet it was…..) Through the burial…….

And so……..I continue, more than four years later to be in “shock mode”….”Emotionally shut down”….”Emotionally unavailable”……..Afraid to “feel” more than I “must” because if I do, I might “lose it” for sure and never return. . . I continue for Gabe…. As I know he still needs me to be his “mom”….

And waiting in the Heavens is my own precious “Guardian Angel ~Tiffany~”… yes, I know where she is … she is at peace with her Heavenly Father… though I am selfish, I wanted to keep her here with me, God saw that this cruel world was more than my little girl could continue to endure…so he took her home to be with him, as his Special Angel…and watch over those who need watching over… and I know she is waiting there for me……..and watching over me until I can hold her again………..

~*...a message from Tiffany Lane's Mommy...~I will attempt to add more to this page as I am able...Please visit again...February 2, 2001. . .