Remembering Tyler: Alyssa on how her brother’s kindness lives on

After losing her brother to suicide, Alyssa is learning to live with grief, complicated memories, and the many ways her brother’s kindness lives on.

One Saturday night, not long before her brother died, Alyssa visited him at his woodworking shop.

Tyler had built a wooden frame for a piece of stained glass, and he needed an extra set of hands. 

For Alyssa, it was a rare opportunity to see her older brother doing something he loved.

Tyler showed her around the shop and some of the things he’d been teaching his woodworking students. 

He seemed happy and confident. At ease.

“It was the first time I kind of saw him in his element,” Alyssa recalls. “It’s one of the few adult memories that I have of him that were joyful. We had a good time that night.”

In January 2026, Tyler died by suicide. He was 35.

For Alyssa, the memory of that Saturday night has become especially precious. It was a glimpse of the brother she loved, at a moment when the struggles that had shaped so much of his adult life seemed, briefly, to recede.

“I always knew that he was so talented,” she said.

Growing up in New Jersey, Tyler was the energetic, mischievous middle child of three siblings.

He was funny, always running around, always getting into something. Alyssa, five years younger, remembers being close to him when they were little.

But things began to change when Tyler started high school.

He struggled with his mental health, and survived a suicide attempt. 

As they grew older, Alyssa and Tyler weren’t always as close as they were as children.

Tyler continued to struggle with his mental health, and Alyssa sometimes found it difficult to know how best to help him.

Work in the mountains

One of Tyler’s happiest places was a house in the Pocono Mountains of Pennsylvania.

It belonged to his best friend’s family, and together they spent weekends working on it.

He had accumulated a storage unit full of machinery and equipment. He and his father were preparing to go into business together, with plans to launch the week after Tyler died.

At first, there was shock. As the months passed, the reality of Tyler’s death began to settle in.

“There’s no rule book,” Alyssa said. “And there’s no crystal ball to know how you’re going to feel.”

When Alyssa talks about Tyler now, she wants people to know how much he cared about others.

He loved to create things for people. He remembered them in small, thoughtful ways, even when he was going through difficult times himself.

“He was so kind. He really was,” she said. “He thought of other people first a lot.”

There’s a cutting board Tyler made for Alyssa, packed away in a box from her recent move. She looks forward to unpacking it.

Alyssa shared her family’s story as part of JED’s International Survivors of Suicide Loss Day campaign. You can read more stories, access resources, and share a memory of your own here.

If you or someone you know is in crisis or needs support right now, text, call, or chat 988, or text HOME (or HOLA) to 741-741 to reach the Crisis Text Line.