ABC star James Longman said it felt like a “bomb going off” when his father and grandfather committed suicide as he revealed his family’s struggles with mental health.
Longman, 37, from London, lost his father John, who suffered from schizophrenia, when he was just nine years old. According to the newspaper, his father, an artist, had set fire to his apartment and jumped out of the window The I paper.
He learned of his father’s death while at a boarding school in England, where he was left with five other boys and no explanation as to why his father was away or what caused the fire.
This wasn’t the first suicide the Longman family had experienced, as the ABC News journalist also lost his grandfather, Jimmy, to suicide.
“When someone dies by suicide, it’s like a bomb goes off. It kills the person and it injures everyone else,” he says told his GMA colleagues Tuesday ahead of the release of his book.
Longman began researching his father’s illness, as well as his family history, to understand his parents and “find” him beyond death.
“When someone takes their own life, that is the one thing that someone remembers and that defines them,” he said. ‘There was so much withholding, so much secrecy. So it’s a journey to find him and who he was, away from illness.”
The chief international correspondent tracked down people from his father’s life, including one of his caregivers who lived just 20 minutes away. He also pored over 120 pages of his father’s medical records to find answers.
ABC star James Longman said it felt like a “bomb going off” when his father and grandfather committed suicide as he revealed his family’s struggles with mental health.
Longman lost his father John, who suffered from schizophrenia, when he was just nine. His father, an artist, had set fire to his apartment and jumped out of the window. He learned of his father’s death while he was in boarding school in England and never understood why his father died until he started researching his book.
This wasn’t the first suicide the Longman family had experienced, as the ABC News journalist also lost his grandfather, Jimmy, to suicide. His uncle Tony also suffered from schizophrenia and his mother, Ann, has depression
Longman’s father had been institutionalized before his birth, and during his investigation he discovered that John had undergone electroconvulsive therapy, also known as ECT, and was taking antipsychotic medications, which he used irregularly.
After his parents separated when Longman was just three, his father continued to go in and out of psychiatric hospitals and be cared for by professionals.
“His caregiver told me, ‘I took your father to your school once because he said he wanted to be near you.’ When I think about it now it makes me cry because I knew I was loved, but I didn’t (I didn’t know if my dad wanted me),” he told The I Paper.
“But to know that he asked her to take him to my school that day, it makes me so warm to think about it. He wanted to be near me. That was the most amazing thing I discovered.”
Another discovery he made during his research was that his father – who had attempted suicide before his birth – had been cared for.
‘My father’s life always made me think he wasn’t being cared for. And actually I found that he was very caring,” he told the British newspaper. ‘He had a day center where he could go, a day hospital and art therapy classes. If he needed a psychiatrist, it would be done within a week.
“And now all of that is no longer available.”
Longman’s father and grandfather were not the only ones in his family to suffer from mental illness, as his uncle Tony also suffered from schizophrenia and his mother, Ann, suffered from depression.
Longman (right) also suffers from depression and considers his husband, Alex Brannan (left), his “savior.” He said: ‘Community is so powerful’
The British-born journalist also admitted to GMA that he has suffered from a “deep sadness” in the past.
Ann often describes the family’s mental health issues as “The Longman Curse,” he told The I Paper.
This prompted Longman to investigate genetics and how it interacts with the development of mental illness.
He spoke with geneticists, neuroscientists and mental health experts to gain a deeper understanding and explore how trauma can be passed down genetically from generation to generation.
‘You cannot change your genetic composition, but you can strengthen your predisposition or not. You can inherit trauma, but you can also inherit healing,” he told The I Paper.
He also believes that his mother’s distancing from his father may have saved him from suffering from schizophrenia, which is common in people before the age of twenty.
“There’s a good chance she saved me from schizophrenia, I think,” he told the British newspaper.
Longman, who is married to Alex Brannan, also spoke about how important community is in life and having a support system.
Longman also spoke with scientists and mental health experts to find out how genetics affects a person’s mental health for his book The Inherited Mind, released Tuesday.
“The community is so powerful,” he said. “When people in these families have these diseases, they are often cut off.
‘Alex has actually been my savior for me. He’s just the most beautiful person and if you find people in your life that can help you get through it, then that’s what you need.”
Longman himself has suffered from suicidal thoughts in the past and credits his husband with keeping him on this earth when they resurfaced in 2022.
He described his own depression as a ‘deep sense of doom, of meaninglessness. I’m emotionless.’
“It’s not that I get upset, it’s that I can’t find joy,” he said. He also thinks his depression is related to his anxiety, overthinking, and exhaustion.
Ultimately, Longman is aware of the stigma surrounding mental health and hopes his half-memoir, half-research book will help others who are struggling.
“The purpose of the book is to give people hope,” Longman said. “There’s so much shame associated with these issues, and the idea is to break through that shame and tell people there is a way forward.”