“We Don’t Waste Good Livers”

A farewell to stigma, in honor of my late sister, Alison Muir Decker.

Alison Muir Decker died at 53 years old. She was my sister. That was 15 years after her first and second suicide attempt. I haven’t talked about this before publicly, and it’s about time. Because I loved her, and it’s part of “why” I do what I do. We should not have as much of a problem with that as we do.

My parents, Vita West Muir and Arthur Joseph Muir, Jr., became her parents. My father, in all fairness, was her biological father. My mother adopted her when she and my dad married. Alison was 14 years old at the time. Her biological mother—my father’s first wife—I still don’t know her name. She’s not dead. She just didn’t want this particular daughter any more. My sister posted, bitterly, about it, on her Facebook thusly: