’Legacy of love’: Mum continues son’s message after his suicide

When Trish Evelyn received the call that her 21-year-old son had ended his life, she thought her own heart would stop beating. Then she dedicated her life to spreading his message.

When Trish Evelyn received the call that her son had ended his life she said she thought her “heart would stop beating with his”.

“I was with him the night before,” the 52-year-old told The Advertiser.

Actor, poet and former Rostrevor deputy head prefect Alex Cusack was only 21 years old when he died by suicide on April 15 2021.

Since her son’s death, Trish began The Big AL Foundation in honour of The Hunting actor’s death — a charity promoting emotional and nervous system regulation for kids and teens using breathing techniques.

“The very thing Alex took from himself, the breath, he has given back to me as a tool … for his generation,” Trish said.

Alex Cusack lost his life to suicide on April 15 2021.

Trish Evelyn, mum of Alex and CEO Founder of The Big AL Foundation. Picture: Russell Millard Photography

The night before Alex died he was experiencing a broken heart, having had issues in a romantic relationship among other mental health struggles, he decided to call his mum for support.

“He was really crying and quite upset, it was late-ish, eight o’clock and I said I would come over,” Trish said.

“We talked and we shared music, because music was our love language … he shared his favourite song at the time.

“He didn’t know where to fit, everyone had said to him to go out and drink and do all the things that you do, be the man, sleep around … go drink, so he was doing that to a degree but it wasn’t really him, he wasn’t a drinker, he wasn’t anything like that, he didn’t do what other kids, young boys his age did.

“He just said to me, tears in his eyes, he said, ‘will it always be like this? Where do I fit? I can’t be who I am, I can’t be who everybody else tells me to be, where do I fit?’

“And I said, ‘Alex, you’re not meant to, that’s the point’.”

Asher Keddie (Simone) in The Hunting, with Alex Cusack, playing Andy. Supplied by SBS.

Trish said her “beautiful and gentle” son struggled to find his place in the world.

Before he died Alex said to his mum: “I want to live in a world where emotions are not right or wrong, black or white, male or female, they are simply part of being human”.

The Lightsview woman knew she was destined to carry on her son’s legacy and create a world where society “normalised emotions” especially for men.

Trish said The Big AL Foundation is a “legacy of love”. Picture: Supplied by family

“A collective belief has been handed down … men do not cry, men do not feel and silence is strength,” Trish said.

“None of those things are scientifically true.”

The Big AL Foundation runs emotional fitness programs for the next generation, teaching them that it is normal to feel their emotions, through regulating their breath.

Alex Cusack poses for a picture with his second-hand boat in West Beach, before spending 48 hours off the coast of Adelaide with limited food, water and supplies to draw attention to the global refugee crisis, Thursday, April 19, 2018. (AAP Image/MATT LOXTON)

Trish said her son was intelligent, well read and “deeply human”.

“There was something incredible about him, he was down to earth and action orientated, if something mattered to him, he did something about it, he didn’t just sit silently,” she said.

She remembered a time he sat in a rickety boat for hours, for charity despite vomiting from sea sickness or how he spent every holiday volunteering on camps for underprivileged people.

Now, Alex, or Big Al as Trish calls him, is “the guiding light” for Trish and the foundation is his “legacy of love”.

If you want to donate to The Big AL Foundation or get involved, you can here.

Originally published as ’Legacy of love’: Mum continues son’s message after his suicide