Maddison Caldwell woke up on Dec. 19, 2019, with a plan for the ultimate act of finality. Death by her own hand.
For those who know Maddison, it’s difficult to understand why she attempted suicide. But a young girl with limited vision could see no other options.
“Nobody else planted that seed,” Maddison says. “It’s an illness. It happened all within my head. I could probably read about it and do research on it all day long, and I’ll still never understand why I made that choice.”
The Anxiety Monster
As the oldest child in the Caldwell family, Maddison believed she needed to have it all together, work the hardest, earn straight As and make people proud. She grew up on a show cattle operation in Elmwood, Ill., and exhibited cattle and pigs at shows across the country. She learned many great life lessons from showing livestock, but admits she also felt tremendous pressure to win and succeed.
“Looking back, I see how I struggled with anxiety for a very long time and didn’t know it,” she says. “Maybe it’s an oldest child thing, but I felt like I was up on a pedestal at times. Things had to be a certain way. I had to be perfect. It was exhausting.”
The red flags began appearing during Maddison’s freshman year of college in the fall of 2016 when she took a mandatory psychology class. For the first time in her life, she started learning about mental health.
“A lot of the things my teacher talked about resonated with me and with things that were going on in my life,” she says. “One day I talked to my teacher after class and she told me it was normal to have feelings of anxiety, but that counseling may be helpful.”
Appointments and prescriptions followed. Maddison knew something was missing, though, and before she knew it, she was maxed out on medication.
“I remember leaving the doctor’s office thinking, ‘what if things get bad again?’ My doctor basically gave me no other options,” Maddison recalls after that appointment in August of 2019. “I didn’t know where I would turn next.”
In September, Maddison’s family celebrated the one-year anniversary of her grandma’s heart transplant. And that’s when the dominoes began to fall.
“I’ve always been really sensitive to death,” she says. “I don’t handle grief well. I remember thinking here we were, living our best lives with Grandma and her new heart. Meanwhile someone is grieving the loss of their daughter or mom today. We were celebrating a year of life and they were grieving a year of death. That was hard for me to grasp.”
Depression set in for the first time in her life. Suicide crossed her mind, but she didn’t tell anyone. She just put a smile on her face and went on about life. But inside, the questions got bigger, and the hurt took up more space in her heart.
By Dec. 18, her meds weren’t enough. Her feelings were all-consuming.
A Paper Gown
The next morning Maddison grabbed a handful of pills collected from around the house, tossed out false claims of a migraine to her mother, Kim Caldwell, and crawled back into bed, determined to cross the darkest line of no return.
“I remember feeling so relieved in that moment, like, ‘Wow. It’s over,” she recalls. “At the same time, I remember thinking that was the last time I’ll see my mom and sit down to breakfast with my family. They had no idea what was going on in my mind that day. I hadn’t even discussed my depression.”
Maddison fell asleep and was subsequently found approximately four hours later—alive, but in a fading stupor. At the hospital, she was denied a stomach pump procedure due to her consecutive hours of sleep.
“I know from a medical standpoint, she should not be here,” says Kim, a registered nurse. “The number of pills she took, the four hours before we knew, she should have never woken up. I can tell you that with 25 years of nursing knowledge.”
Miraculously, Maddison lived.
She was committed to a psychiatric unit per Illinois law because she attempted suicide. It took three long days to be placed into a unit. During this time, Maddison’s anger grew.
“I was so mad I was still alive,” she says. “Looking back, I can’t even believe the way I behaved. I didn’t even tell my family goodbye when I finally left the hospital.”
They took her by police car to a psychiatric unit where she was only allowed to bring shampoo, conditioner and a toothbrush. She was stripped down and searched before being given paper scrubs to wear.
“It sure wasn’t like the movies where you are greeted and welcomed in,” she says. “I was on my own. About 90% of the people in this facility were there for drug abuse. I didn’t fit in, and it was not helpful for me to be there.”
She was released on Christmas morning after doing everything in her power to prove she was ready to go back home. During her stay in the facility, she was put on five or six medications morning, noon and night.
“That was it,” she says. “I wasn’t given any therapy while I was there.”
Maddison returned home feeling like she had nowhere else to turn, with full intentions of finishing what she started.
Dangerous Deception
The next three months went by quickly. Maddison didn’t return to college in person but chose to go virtual her final semester from home. For Todd Caldwell, Maddison’s father, it was hard to understand how his daughter was feeling.
“The first time it happened, I kept scratching my head thinking, ‘How?’ In the livestock industry, there are ups and downs. The ups are really, really good and the downs are really, really bad. But I can honestly say, no matter how bad things have gotten, that has never been an option to me.”
Although he can’t pinpoint anything that would make him think his daughter would attempt suicide again, he says he didn’t see anything in her that made him think she wouldn’t.
“She was so damn good at hiding how she was feeling. All I could think was, ‘How can you look like she looks? Have a brain like she’s got? Have the success she’s had in whatever she chose to at this point?” Todd says. “Then I am thinking, ‘Dang Maddie, don’t you have any backbone? You are going through a bad stage. Your life has not gone exactly as you planned it to this point. But that’s just life.”
He knows those thoughts won’t win him a popularity contest. But as a father, he admits those hard, conflicting feelings ran rampant in his mind as he tried to understand what his daughter was experiencing.
Perhaps it was fear and those conflicting feelings that never allowed him to feel at ease.
On April 1, 2020, Maddison called Todd to see if he wanted her to grab lunch for him, her grandpa and her brother who were out working on the farm. Todd vividly remembers lots of laughing and joking while they ate lunch together.
“Never in a million years did I think she was in a bad place mentally that day,” Todd says.
A few hours later, his phone rang. It was a number he didn’t recognize, but he answered the phone. She had tried again.
No Going Back
Maddison did not want anyone to know what she was thinking. “I really thought everyone would be better off without me,” she says.
Determined to finish what she had started, Maddison went to the special drawer she was forbidden to open and took out a cattle drug she knew was dangerous for humans. She thought it would kill her quickly. After having lunch with her dad, she drove out to a hill at one of their farms and injected 2 ccs of this livestock antibiotic in each of her thighs.
“I thought it would be fairly instant,” Maddison recalls. “I sat in my car waiting and waiting.”
Time passed so slowly. She considered a few options of what to do next when the medication didn’t kill her. She ended up driving to her best friend’s house and called her friend’s mom to come outside and sit with her.
“She had no idea what I had done or how dangerous that medication was,” Maddison says. “She called my dad immediately.”
All Todd could think about on his drive was that there was no way his daughter was going to be alive when he got there. But she was clinging on.
It took the ambulance 25 minutes to arrive. As Maddison was being put into the ambulance, she remembers looking out the door and seeing her dad standing in the middle of the road.
“I remember thinking, ‘What have I done?’ as I saw my dad standing there so helpless and angry,” she says. “He kept yelling, ‘What did you do? Why have you done this?’”
Maddison heard her dad telling the paramedic about his 250-pound friend who got residue from that medication on his finger, put some chewing tobacco into his mouth, and minutes later, had to be rushed to the hospital.
“‘She’s gone,’ my dad said to the paramedics. ‘You guys can drive as fast as you want, but there’s no going back,’” Maddison recalls.
Todd was scared and furious. That’s not going to be popular either, he says, but it was his truth in that moment.
“I was so mad at her,” Todd says as he watched helplessly. “I said a lot of things I shouldn’t have. I said, ‘Why didn’t you talk to me? You just ate lunch with me.’ She was dozing in and out and wasn’t listening to me anyway. The town policeman was there, and he finally grabbed me and hugged me and said, ‘You have to stop.’”
Due to COVID-19, they wouldn’t let Todd ride in the ambulance. He called Kim, who was working that day, and told her Maddison wasn’t going to make it.
During the 30-minute drive to the hospital, Maddison had three seizures.
“I remember trying to open my eyes when I was seizing – my eyes were open, but it was black, and I couldn’t see anything. I also remember the catheter hurting when they put it in, but I couldn’t say anything,” she says.
Two days later she woke up in the intensive care unit. She remembers a window with blinds and looking over to see a man covered in tubes.
“The pandemic had just started, and I remember asking the nurse if he had COVID-19,” Maddison says. “He did. I remember thinking, ‘I am never doing this again.’ That guy has no choice of being here. And here I am. I had the choice to get better.”
Turning Point
At that crucible moment, the guilt set in. But it was a necessary turning point.
When she was well enough to leave the hospital, her parents sent her to a rehab facility near Chicago. Maddison says it was a much different experience than the first one she was in.
“If I can attribute anything throughout this entire journey, it was my stay there,” she says. “I would do anything to go back and hug them.”
While she was at the facility, she was surrounded by people going through similar struggles. For the first time, she realized she was not alone. Everyone was there to get help, she explains. This encouraged her to not go back to the mental state she was in before.
When it was time to leave, Maddison recalls being so excited to see her parents. But the reception she received was not what she expected.
“My mom talked to me on the way home, but my dad didn’t,” she says. “I couldn’t blame him. I broke his trust. After my first attempt, my dad and I got tattoos together and I promised him I would not do it again. Anyone who knows my dad knows that once you betray his trust, it’s very hard to get it back.”
Todd was upset that his daughter blatantly lied to him. He also just wanted to get her help, he says. He wanted to fix things. He also struggled with guilt.
“I made such a big deal about this drug with the kids and Kim – to never touch it ever,” Todd says. “I kept thinking, maybe I told her too much. If it weren’t for me, she wouldn’t know that drug could kill her. I felt like such a dummy. I was trying to protect my children but gave her a weapon against herself.”
Fight the Stigma in Agriculture
Since that day, Maddison has discovered she isn’t alone in her feelings of depression and anxiety. She also realized she wouldn’t be stuck feeling that way forever. She has stayed true to therapy and has maintained a close relationship with a counselor and a psychiatrist.
“I’ve told a lot of people it’s really hard to remember back to that time because I was in such a different headspace than I am now,” she says. “It’s hard to believe that was even me thinking that way.”
But that is part of the reason she wants to share her story.
“Mental health was not even brought up to me until college,” she says. “No one ever asked me how I was feeling – not on the outside, but on the inside.
“As an ag family, you do your chores, you come in and eat dinner and you go to bed. You don’t talk about your feelings and how things affect you. You’re tough.”
But being tough isn’t worth it, Maddison says. It kept friends and family at bay. She wants to share her story because she knows she’s not the only one who has felt this way. If her transparency can help one person, it’s worth it.
“I suffered silently for too long because I thought that it was a normal thing to feel,” she says.
Perhaps what surprised her most were how many people reached out to her after she began sharing her story publicly on social media.
“I remember when she did her initial post on Facebook,” Kim says. “It would blow your mind the number of adults that reached out and said, ‘Maddie, I’ve been in your shoes.’ And I’m thinking ‘Oh my God, why haven’t you spoken up?’”
Todd says his phone started blowing up one day while he was blow-drying a show calf. He had no idea Maddison was going to share her story on social media.
“I answered the phone and one of my friends was sobbing,” Todd says. “He told me it was so good that Maddie was not afraid to put it out there. That’s when I thought to myself, ‘If an old timer like Bob thinks what she did was okay, it’s got to be okay.’”
However, some people don’t agree that topics like suicide should be talked about, he says.
“I was overwhelmed by the number of people who reached out – close friends and people I’ve known my whole life – with a story of their own,” Todd says. “I mean we’re not talking six people, I could make a list of 30 who called me.”
Maddison thinks one of the reasons people in agriculture don’t speak up is because they take pride in being tough and handling stress. Working with farmers over the years, she sees the challenges they encounter. She says many farmers struggle with anxiety and depression and don’t even know it because they don’t have the resources or a way to get the help they need.
“I think what scares people most about being more vocal in regard to their mental health is their fear of looking weak,” Maddison explains. “The life of an agriculturalist isn’t easy – in fact, it’s far from it. It is one of the most manually intensive professions and for generations, it has been a job that focuses more on the wellbeing of others – whether that be people or animals – than themselves.”
Change the Norm
Though it took a long time and many different doctors’ offices, Maddison was able to find an excellent psychiatrist and counselor who helped her overcome a variety of situations that would have previously thrown her off course, she says.
“When Maddie started to share her story, we had a lot of people say they were so scared to admit they needed help, that they didn’t know where to go or how to start,” Kim says. “I hope through her message, people realize you may look normal on the outside but it’s totally okay not to feel normal on the inside.”
Looking back on her journey so far, Maddison offers these important reminders.
- It’s perfectly okay to feel like you aren’t okay.
- There is always a way to get help.
- Don’t stop therapy completely if you do not find the right counselor. Keep searching until you find the perfect fit.
- Balancing medications is an incredibly hard task. Don’t be afraid to ask more questions if something doesn’t feel right.
- Surround yourself with people who are willing to learn about mental health with you.
“I don’t know the solution. But I know people need to tell their stories and have more opportunities, whether that be workgroups or a community group, to talk about the struggles they’re going through instead of it being such a hush-hush thing,” Maddison says.
The Hard Truth
Science and logic say Maddison Caldwell, now 24 years old, shouldn’t be here today. Her parents know it. Her sister knows it. Her brother knows it. But for some reason, her life was spared.
“I don’t know how I survived it,” she says. “I wish I could talk to God and ask him why. How did he stop it? Talking with the doctors, I should not have the brain capacity that I do right now. One of my seizures was more than three minutes long.”
Putting the unanswerable questions aside, Maddison is determined to make the most of the life she’s been given. She recently started a new role with Elanco as a pet-health sales representative in Northwest Ohio, but still makes the trip back home to the farm in Illinois often.
“I hope I can help another person who is struggling realize that it’s okay. I hope I can encourage parents who don’t want to talk about mental illness to start talking about it. I hope telling my story opens the door for someone else to discuss theirs,” she says. “It isn’t the ‘norm’ to focus on your own health and wellbeing, so we simply don’t do it. I’d like to help change that.”
Read what Todd and Kim Caldwell have learned as parents through this journey with their daughter.
Editor’s Note:
Suicide is a growing public health problem that affects all ages. Suicide is preventable and everyone has a role to play to save lives and create healthy and strong individuals, families and communities. You can find numerous online resources on how to prevent suicide from the CDC or by calling the U.S. National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 800-273-8255.
January is Mental Health Wellness Month. By focusing every day on improving mental wellness, you can increase resilience, help manage stress and build your overall sense of well-being. Find out how to recognize the warning signs of stress, practical ways to deal with tough times and 3 tips to get your health on track in Farm Journal’s PORK’s e-book, “Your Guide to Mental Health.”
Click here to download the eBook.
More Resources on Mental Health Wellness:
Pay Attention to Warning Signs of Stress
Toxic Grit: Is Our Greatest Strength Our Greatest Weakness on the Farm?
Farmers, Ranchers Have Ways to Manage Stress
Suicide Prevention: Your Worth Isn’t Measured By The Markets
Connect With Farmers In-Person On Mental Health
Pay Attention to Warning Signs of Stress
Watch for Signs of Suicidal Risk on Your Farm
