My Girls One Week After

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This isn’t fun for me to share. But it’s reality. I want people to see this. So i took a small video of it. This went on for a half hour yesterday at nap time. And this happens several times throughout the day. This is absolutely not normal for either of my children. I don’t think I’ve ever seen Winnie this upset at any time and now it happens on and off all day long. In the past few days she has taken chunks of skin out of my face from scratching me cause she’s mad. She has actually hurt the baby by hitting her (she has never ever ever intentionally hurt the baby before this last 11 ish days and is always so sweet to her). She has thrown things at visitors and been so mean when she is usually everyone’s bestie. Her face has broken out in acne (she’s 3 guys). If you can’t tell, Winnie is crying and screaming so much that she is hyperventilating. She kept telling me she couldn’t breathe so I held her and sang to her and helped her calm down. But after a few minutes she’d be right back at it. THIS IS WHAT SUICIDE DOES. Denny thought we’d be better off without him and he took his life as an unselfish act in his mind. Me and my babies are grieving. They are struggling so so so much. It’s scary. They are broken like I am. And these little girls are trying to make sense of their entire life changing with one split second choice that Denny made. We need him. I need him. These girls need him. This is so scary. This is why I need to find routine these next few months and get them stable. I’m trying everything I can. And here’s the thing: THIS IS A NORMAL REACTION. Although this is not their normal, this is a very normal way for babies of their age to react when losing a parent, especially a very involved and loving parent. Don’t do this. Don’t do this to your family or your loved ones. You don’t think you are needed or loved and you feel you are a burden. Don’t let those thoughts overpower you. It is not true. I will never be mad at Denny because I think he did something selfish. It’s the opposite in his mind. But I am so so sad that he couldn’t see how much we loved and needed him. I wish he would have reached out and expressed to me that inner turmoil that he was struggling with. But he was ashamed. Let’s change this. Please help me change this.

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Denny’s Obituary

Dennis George Bates II 1983 ~ 2019 Dennis “Denny” George Bates II unexpectedly took his own life on March 23rd, 2019. He was born in Ames, Iowa on October 14, 1983, to Esther Bates-Baker and Dennis Bates. Denny was raised in the small town of Mount Pleasant where everyone knew him and his funny, eccentric personality. He had six siblings who adored him, just as he adored them. As the eldest brother, he took it upon himself to tease and annoy these siblings as much as possible, but he would loyally protect them from anyone else. Growing up, Denny played the trombone, was on student government, and was the life of every party. He sang in the top choirs in school, played soccer for a season, and was an Eagle Scout and a Seminary graduate. He began college at Iowa Wesleyan University, then moved out to Utah and completed his Business degree at Utah Valley University. Denny spent the last 15 years here in Utah, making friends everywhere he went. He was someon...

Friday to Saturday

It was weird how soon I knew something was off. Denny was never late to anything. He would always say, “If you’re not ten minutes early, then you’re late.” He would even get annoyed when we were first dating if I would show up late (which I did frequently) and would try to hide his frustration. He didn’t hide it well. Fun fact: I was 45 minutes late to our outdoor wedding. Not kidding, one reason I was so confident in marrying him that day is because he was still so excited and happy when I got there. He wasn’t even kind of annoyed. He was just so excited to be married to me. But on that Friday, I knew by 8:01am something was off. Actually, I remember him leaving early in the morning, but he told me on Thursday that he was going to the gym the next morning. So I woke up just as he was leaving and rolled back over and went back to sleep. When Winnie woke me up with a Diet Coke (the only good thing about that day was her running in with a can yelling “Good Morning”) at 745...

Friday

4 weeks ago, at this moment, I was trying to remain calm. I had driven all over Utah County and asked places Denny frequented if they had seen him(Denny is hard to miss unless he’s in a crowd of tall people, then you can’t even see his head). I called his best friend, his mom, and his brother. I called his boss and a secretary from his work to tell them he may be late and to let me know the second he gets there. Earlier that week he’d shown some signs of stress. But, if you know Denny, he gets stressed out all of the time. He would have a less than average month at work and threaten to quit (though he never actually followed through and we had this conversation 40,000 times). His best friend and I always teased him about being a bit of a Drama Queen. 95% of the time he was even keeled. But then he had that 5% that was over the top. Stressed out Denny was a familiar one. The stress from work came because all Denny ever wanted was to protect and provide for his fami...

Dani Bates

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