A woman whose son ended his own life is reaching out to others and forming a support group for those who have lost a loved one to suicide.

Fran Morrison says she will never be the same after losing her 21-year-old son Eric three years ago.

“Losing a child is probably the hardest thing you can go through in this life,” says Morrison. “Losing a child by suicide is, is beyond description.”

Since Eric’s death, Morrison has been travelling to Halifax once a month to attend support group meetings for people who have lost a loved one to suicide.

She says it’s a place where she can talk openly about the feelings that she has kept inside.

“Oh, the guilt, the what-ifs, the ‘I should have done this, I shouldn’t have done that,’” says Morrison.

She says sharing her grief with others who have suffered a similar loss is helping her to heal. Now, she is reaching out to Cape Bretoners dealing with suicide by forming a support group called SOS – Survivors of Suicide.

“All of these people understand exactly where you are and they can give you that hope to put one foot in front of the other and keep walking,” says Morrison.

The meetings will be held on George Street in Sydney. The first one will be held the evening of September 23.

The SOS group is being formed with support from Bereaved Families of Cape Breton. Board member Dan MacNeil says the new group will fill a much-needed void in the community.

“We’ve had lots of situations where we’ve had people who needed guidance, they needed assistance in varieties of ways and they’ve had to leave our area,” says MacNeil.

Morrison says connecting with other survivors who have been dealing with loss for longer than she has is giving her the strength to move forward.

“One breath at a time and talk about it, with whomever you are comfortable with, because if you keep it bottled up, it’s going to make you physically ill,” says Morrison.

Anyone interested in joining can simply show up to a meeting.

With files from CTV Atlantic's Ryan MacDonald