Suzi Evans connects rural families affected by suicide

After losing her only son to suicide, this South Australian woman is working to raise mental health awareness and create support networks for other grieving families.

Suzi Evans of Mantung, South Australia, wants to create a support network for rural and remote families who have lost loved ones to suicide. Picture: Supplied.

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A MANTUNG mother is honouring her son’s memory by creating a space for people to deal with their loss and breaking the stigma surrounding suicide.

Suzi Evans lost her only son, Murray, in 2018, when he took his own life.

Now she is on the South Australia-Western Australia joint committee for Suicide Prevention Australia, while also working on her own project to connect people in similar situations.

“Muzza’s happy hour is to get people together where people can come together and feel like they belong for an hour,” she said.

“I don’t know the answer to suicide, my son was 29 and he’d struggled with depression. Our lack of resources here is why we wanted to help people.

“We wanted to stop people going through this if we could.”

The idea for the initiative came from an encounter she had in her local pub at Mantung, population 21, with a mother who had also lost her son.

“To look into the eyes of another parent that has lost a child is daunting, but also healing. You just don’t know until you’ve been through it,” she said.

Her family was dealt another blow in 2019 when her husband, Mick, spent six months in the hospital and had to learn to walk again after he was diagnosed with Guillain-Barre Syndrome.

While COVID has slowed their plans for a national rollout of the happy hour project, Suzi keeps her community informed via a social media page.

“My longtime future goal is to create a website to support those networks and to break the stigma and get the information out there,” she said.

“On the grassroots level we can do more by educating groups and it becomes part of their daily conservation.”

Last year she was South Australia’s sole representative to the National Rural Women’s Coalition event, which ranks high on her list of biggest achievements, second only to being a mother.

“Being Muzza’s mum, is my greatest achievement,” she said.

On top of all of this, Suzi is a huge advocate for her small town, she runs a business support business online, has a 6000ha, 1500 head Merino sheep farm and has been involved in restoring and maintaining their local community hall.

“I’m very community-minded and think it’s a shame that a lot of the small country towns are getting smaller … we have a lot to offer,” she said.

She hopes her involvement in this cause will make the ultimate difference for families.

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