KANSAS CITY, Mo. — The last post on Melinda Coleman's Facebook page Sunday was full of family photos, a walk down a happy memory lane.
A photo of herself with her only daughter, Daisy, and several others of Daisy as a young girl, dancing on stage. A couple of old photos showed her late husband, Dr. Michael Wayne Coleman, who died in a car crash in 2007, smiling, with their babies. They had four children.
Coleman's words, though, held no joy, and there had been little happiness for her since Aug. 4, the summer night Daisy took her life.
Daisy had became a celebrated and passionate advocate for victims of sexual violence after she accused a high school classmate in Maryville, Missouri, of sexual assault in 2012. She was 14 at the time and fought to rid herself of the demons haunting her.
Her mother struggled too.
"There aren't enough I love yous I could have said when I was holding your cold, broken, dead body," Daisy's mother posted Sunday. "I held you like a baby anyway, my baby. The baby I held when you first came into this world. It has always been my greatest honor and joy to be your mother and best friend. Mama bear!"
Coleman, who lived in the Independence area, died by suicide apparently within hours of writing that, her family said.
Daisy's story was the centerpiece of the 2016 Netflix documentary "Audrie & Daisy," a gut-wrenching look at teenage sexual assault, cyberbullying and suicide that won a prestigious Peabody Award.
She went on to help create the advocacy group SafeBAE — Safe Before Anyone Else. The news that Daisy's mother was gone, too, sent a shock wave through the group.
Shael Norris, the group's executive director, found out in a phone call from Daisy's brother Charlie Coleman, who lives in the Northland.
"I wish I could say it was entirely unexpected, but it wasn't," said Norris, who watched Melinda Coleman struggle with the grief of losing her daughter.
"This is the collateral damage of sexual violence. It's so much further-reaching than anyone has even begun to look at.
"But we have to face it for what it is, which is the profound and decadeslong impact of what happens when people 'boys-be-boys' this s---, and make it out like it's not something that destroys entire families."
Just days earlier, Norris had asked Coleman to speak to students during a Zoom meeting run by SafeBAE, a national peer-to-peer group working to stop sexual assault among middle and high school students.
Norris thought it would help Coleman see the fruits of her daughter's work.
"So she jumped on the call and talked to all the kids, and the thing she texted me was how beautiful that was to just be able to see it herself," said Norris.
"She just said thank you for giving me that, and I love you. And that was her last text."
That night, SafeBAE posted about the death on both Facebook and Instagram:
"We are in shock and disbelief to share with our SafeBAE family, that we lost Melinda Coleman to suicide this evening. The bottomless grief of losing her husband, Tristan, and Daisy was more than she could face on most days."
Coleman's 19-year-old son Tristan died in June 2018 while he was driving back to Missouri after helping Daisy move to Colorado. It was a one-vehicle crash on Interstate 70 in western Kansas. His mother was a passenger.
Melinda Coleman was a gifted veterinarian, devoted mother and wife and talented body builder, the SafeBAE statement said.
"More than anything, she loved and believed in her children," SafeBAE said. "It is no accident that she created some of the most gifted, passionate, and resilient children. Our hearts are forever with Logan & Charlie."
Norris has set up a GoFundMe page to raise money for Coleman's funeral expenses.
"There are no words for our sadness, only that if you are struggling with trauma or depression, you are not alone," SafeBAE said in its posts. "There is always help and support available. We are with you."
