19-Year-Old Parkland Survivor Commits Suicide After Battling Survivor's Guilt and PTSD

By Alex Parker | 12:30 PM on March 23, 2019

The opinions expressed by contributors are their own and do not necessarily represent the views of RedState.com.

19-year-old Parkland mass shooting survivor Sydney Aiello died Sunday at her own hand.

The former Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School student was reportedly suffering from “survivor’s guilt.”

According to her mother, Cara, she’d been diagnosed with PTSD. Her fear of the classroom had made college a difficult undertaking.

One of Sydney’s close friends, Meadow Pollack, was among the 17 students and faculty killed during the Valentine’s Day 2018 atrocity.

A little more than a year after this photo was taken, both are gone.

In February, Meadow was killed in the Parkland shooting. This week, Sydney took her own life.

Please consider donating to her family to help cover some of the funeral costs. https://t.co/qxeUeFLhx1 pic.twitter.com/xSnMPAU0bD

— Kenneth Preston (@kennethrpreston) March 21, 2019

Meadow’s brother, Hunter, took to social media to bring attention to Sydney’s suicide, asking for donations to offset funeral expenses via a GoFundMe:

https://twitter.com/PollackHunter/status/1108521170654109696

Ryan Petty — who lost his daughter, Alaina, in the shooting — told CBS 4 Miami he fears other teens may be in a state of trauma similar to Sydney’s:

“It breaks my heart that we’ve lost yet another student from Stoneman Douglas. My advice to parents is to ask questions, don’t wait.”

It seems to me the heartbreak of the Parkland murders was never aired out nationally. The media didn’t allow it. Rather, they took naive teenagers and made them believe they could change the world. They couldn’t. They didn’t. They were merely used as pawns to push a narrative. At the end of the news cycle, they were discarded.

Hopefully, others in Sydney Aiello’s shoes can get the help they need, before it’s too late.

-Alex

See 3 more pieces from me: Women’s March death blow, the dim fire strikes back, and the Christian persecution of Chris Pratt.

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