I Shot My Parents

You have to understand that homicide, murder,

is a completely different kind of criminal act.

Very few humans are actually capable of committing the act of murder

or attempting to commit the act of murder.

Everybody was in their own world, in their own thoughts.

It was almost beyond comprehension.

Tonight, chilling 911 calls reveal Nathon Brooks' parents

had no idea who pulled the trigger.

I walked into the bedroom.

I stood at the foot of their bed,

I raised the gun and, before I had realised that I had done it,

I had pulled the trigger.

I fired again, three times in my mom...

..and then I swung over to my dad

and that is when it really clicked what I had done.

I fired at him three times.

I just remember thinking, gone.

Just them being away.

This case is a nightmare on every level.

There is no manual for what has happened to us.

You just feel...

That's all you do.

It is not just what happened to them,

but who did it and what it did to their family.

We were just doing our normal deal, it was a normal night, it was quiet.

Nothing was going on and then the radio clicked up and...

..the call came over that shots were fired.

DIALLING

PHONE RINGS

'911, what's the address of the emergency?'

HE REPEATS THE ADDRESS

OK, tell me exactly what happened.

'Reports of shots fired.'

I woke up, I have no idea why I woke up.

As I woke up, I saw...

someone standing by the doorway into our bedroom.

The next thing I remember

is being on the floor.

Face down on the floor, beside my bed.

I could tell something's wrong. I don't know...

I don't really know what happened.

The blood was running down over my face and into my eyes

and I couldn't see.

I was wiping my face and then flicking it off my hands

or wiping it on the bed.

I kept a Glock pistol under the mattress on my side of the bed.

All I knew is I had to get it,

and then I don't remember anything.

Nathon poked his head into the room.

I told him to come in and I had him come in and got him behind me,

so I'm on my knees with my gun pointing at

the entrance to the bedroom,

both my kids are behind me in the corner

and my wife is laying on the bed.

She's not really moving. She's just laying there.

I kept wiping my face and wiping my face.

I could hear the sirens finally show up out front.

'The police are there.

'I need somebody to go outside without a gun.'

When I arrived, I saw a young man and I said,

"Can you come down and unlock the door and let us in?"

He unlocked the door, let us in.

He was a juvenile, probably 14 or 15 years old.

I didn't think much more of him at that point.

Once you get to the top of the stairs

there's a hallway, and I could hear somebody yelling,

a male voice yelling, "We're up here, we're up here, come help."

When we entered that bedroom, the master bedroom,

you could see blood -

blood on the floor, blood on the bed,

blood covering the pillows.

There was so much blood, it was surreal.

Beth Brooks, the mom,

she had been shot underneath her eye, her eye had collapsed.

She had been shot multiple times.

She kept repeating, almost catatonic,

but repeating the same things over and over again.

"Why? Why did this happen? What did I do wrong?"

And then the gentleman, Jonathan Brooks, he said,

"Where do you have Nathon?"

What has happened, what we've dealt with,

what we've gone through,

is complicated beyond words.

I was shot in the face here

and I think in through the finger and at the edge of the ear.

I think it was six shots.

And then it was either the second or third

hit me on the forehead and then...

-It hit here.

-Mm-hm.

Bone and bullet fragments in there.

Right there.

It damaged my eye, so I only have so much vision out of one eye

and it ruined my hearing, so...

pretty much deaf in that ear.

And memory.

Oh, and I'm still numb.

My neurologist said I was the first one he had ever encountered.

Nobody has ever come out of that.

As well as I was, walking and talking, that was new for him.

Beth looked at him and said,

"Why am I alive?"

and he actually paused in his tracks,

turned around and looked at her and said, "None of us know."

We were both diagnosed with PTSD.

I think Beth's condition was greater than mine.

Many, many, many, many sleepless nights.

Nightmares.

Lots of issues to overcome.

The hardest thing with this is depth perception...

..cos you'll go along and you'll think you're close

and you're not.

You hit too soon or not soon enough and it just buggers it basically,

burns a hole, so that's interesting.

I don't know, two years after all this chaos

I just had to have something to do.

I couldn't sit and think about that stuff all the time.

It kind of makes you crazy.

So, we've been here about a year and a half.

Part of it is that's the house that everything happened in,

so we were actually living in the same house,

sleeping in the same bedroom that we were shot in

and it was never the same.

There was lots of...

Lots of reasons to change.

Some of them very little, very subtle, but...

..this seems more like a home.

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten...

It looks like 14.

This is Beth's.

This is her...

it's her muzzle-loader, or black powder gun.

We use that for hunting.

This was it.

It's not like the gun did it, but it was that gun.

It was locked.

I just don't know that it was locked well or good enough, obviously.

I have to tell you, when he was born...

..he was wonderful.

Nathon was cuddly.

He wanted to be with you.

He did better if he was snuggled.

And he just... I don't know.

I just fell for that little guy.

Hey!

Say, "Hi!"

Hi. GIRL LAUGHS

'There is absolutely nothing like'

being a grandparent.

It's a wonderful chance to really enjoy a childhood.

We have his deer head. The deer he got.

Beth and John had it mounted.

They chose a skeleton mount

as opposed to a full face fur mount.

Most of the hunters remember their first deer and how they felt,

so it was a big day for all the hunters.

His mom was 12 years old when she got her first deer.

It's hunting, not killing.

It's a way of life.

It's what we were raised with.

Nathon, he's...

He's a wonderful, wonderful kid.

He really is. He...

I don't know what happened. I don't know why...

..what happened happened,

but it was totally out of character for him.

MUFFLED SPEECH

Just hospital clothes here, but better than nothing.

Just throw them on over what you've got on.

Just so you know, there's a video camera in here.

I've just got to let you know that. You're being recorded.

Tell me what went on down at your folks' house tonight.

-From beginning to end?

-Yeah.

-OK.

So I was asleep and I woke up and there was, I don't know,

a few gunshots

and I heard screaming, but it was more like yelling.

I could hear my dad yelling.

And I ran downstairs because I heard them upstairs,

so I figured the best place to go would be downstairs.

So I ran downstairs and I hid over in the library area of our house.

I sat there and I hid in that little corner...

..and this guy came down.

He's a little taller than me.

I'm guessing, three, four, maybe even five inches taller than me,

he was a pretty big guy. But he loaded it back up.

You could hear the, like, tink, tink, tink,

but it was, like, one by one.

It sounded like he ran back up the stairs,

he was up there for a little bit,

and then he ran back down the stairs,

opened up our rear slider door and ran out the door.

And that's the last I saw him.

By the time I arrived at the home, obviously, Nathon was not there.

The scene was secure.

You walk through the home...

..and it was any other home in America.

His room was any other teenage boy's room in America.

What was different about his home...

..was that the security cameras in the home were not on the outside,

looking out, they were on the inside, looking in.

I've never seen that before

and nobody I know has ever seen that before.

So here's the deal, Nathon,

and I'll be pretty blunt with you,

I've known you for at least a few years.

Do you know that your dad

moved one of the video cameras inside the house?

-No.

-He did.

OK.

You know what the video camera showed?

-Hm.

-Why don't you tell me what the video camera showed?

What went on tonight? I'm giving you a chance to be honest with me

because you haven't been to this point.

When you watch the video...

..you see...

..Nathon running through the house, or moving through the house,

in his underwear, carrying a revolver.

It was the kind of evidence you don't get in every case.

It's powerful and it's undeniable.

-You need to be honest with me, son.

-You know what I've done.

CRYING: I don't even know what I was thinking.

Look, man, we make mistakes.

Now is the time to talk about it, and...

-Not like this though.

-Don't...

-Don't...

-Kids don't just pull a gun on their parents.

Tell me what happened, man.

Nathon, you're a good kid.

Apparently not.

I almost killed my parents.

-I don't even know if they're dead. They might be.

-They're not.

NATHON SNIFFS

I was mad. Everything just shut off.

I don't... I don't even remember really what happened exactly.

It just...

..went blank.

The next thing I know I've got a gun and it's empty...

..and my dad's bleeding, and so is my mom.

Let's take it back a step.

Where did you get the gun from?

The case. In the fourth bedroom.

You can pry the doors open.

What kind of gun is it?

It's a 22 revolver, Smith and Wesson, it's my grandpa's.

And what were you trying to do when you pulled the trigger?

What a gun does.

-Which is?

-Kill.

So your goal when you walked in there was to kill both your parents?

Yes.

I'm so stupid.

HE CRIES

Now I have to go to jail. It's attempted murder.

Where did you put the gun afterwards?

I threw it in the pool.

-NATHON'S MOTHER:

-This was his favourite.

I've got to hold this one.

OK, don't laugh.

I still do that. Don't make fun of me.

It's the first time I probably enjoyed the sweat. You know,

you go in their room and their socks are nasty.

It always stinks in there.

But then when you don't get that every day, you do find yourself,

and I will admit, I like the smell.

These are neat.

And they still send us these,

printouts of his grades,

classes he's taking, just like a report card mailed to you,

so that's nice.

I still get to call him up and say,

"Hey, what are you doing? "Pay attention. Do your schoolwork."

So that's very, very nice.

Auto mechanics, A-.

Let's see, robotics, A-.

I believe he starts this month for college courses.

But he only gets to take one at a time

because we have to pay for it, so...

That's a pillow case I made him. I love that.

This is an album I'm going to start.

Basically, I'm just going to start putting pictures in it for him...

..of

just Christmas, graduation, birthdays.

I keep... What do you call that?

..a running record of stuff going on for him.

Things for him and things for us, so...

he'll have those.

That's him jumping the four wheeler.

I love that picture. I forget how old he is

but, boy, he had fun on it.

But it just gets closed. It never goes away.

Nathon never goes away...

..and I'm grateful for that.

It might not be the best place for the next 13 years, but...

..he's around and I get to talk to him.

I'd rather double-check than get over there

and realise I don't have something.

These are visiting slips that we have to fill out every time

we go to visit.

It's basic information, you know - who you are, your relationship,

where you live, those kind of things.

I think I view it from my mind, like he's at school,

at college or university,

and I just view it that way.

Knowing obviously that's not true,

but you go with that because it works for me.

And we're hitting the espresso stand.

-Yay.

-Just saying.

At the very beginning of everything, there was so many questions.

Basically, you know,

"What the heck was he thinking?"

You know...

"What's going on? I don't understand."

-DOG WHINES

-You have to wait here.

That's his nervous goodbye.

'It would have been very easy to get extremely angry.

'To go to dark places with this.

'But I think'

that total disbelief and shock...

..protected us.

I think that...

I think it was good for us.

Is it starting to snow?

-Are you ready for this?

-Yes.

Well, no, but we'll go!

-Whoa! Whoa!

-Can't do that one yet.

Oh, the whiplash is real!

You picked the worst time to record!

So what do you have to say for yourself?

I... I think about him probably ten times a day.

I wish that... I wish that he was here because...

..you know, my best friend.

Agh!

Pretty much like your brother getting taken away.

Your best friend, everything that...

..you loved is pretty...

Well, pretty much gone. You know, it's hard.

Going to do a one-hit wonder!

'I really like his personality.

'He's...super, super funny guy.'

Geez, we would crack up and laugh at just about everything.

We could look at something and say something about it

and just start cracking up.

Have you started recording yet?

Look at this lazy slob!

-Fuck you!

-Look at me!

No, fuck you!

MUFFLED SPEECH

Whoa!

He was huge at the school.

You know, everybody knew Nathon.

Sports, he... On top.

He was well liked by everybody in the school - everybody.

He had all the girls, that's for sure!

But he was just always a guy that included everybody,

even if they were,

I guess, the nerd of the school,

he would still treat everybody the same.

That's what probably just made him so awesome.

It has been very difficult, very, very difficult.

It's... It's been hard.

What was kind of going through this kid's mind, to...

..to do that, to do something, like, this crazy?

You know, there was no signs of anything

when I was with him, like...

There was nothing, like,

unordinary with him.

You just never ever in a million years saw it coming.

The worst part is to find out that...

..you know, he emptied the gun.

Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom.

All I remember is...

..seeing somebody there, and, no offence,

it definitely wasn't my son. That's not who I saw.

But, yeah,

when you come to it and they tell you that, it just...

..I figured I was dreaming.

I figured I was having truly a nightmare

because that wasn't him.

I think the fact that...

..Nathon was the one that shot us,

I don't know that I'll ever be able to process that.

I was shot and John was shot, but I had no idea who it was.

All I remember is...

..seeing somebody in a black, like, a down coat that's stitched.

And I remember trying to do that to look into the light.

I thought I saw a person, other than my son, I thought I saw a guy.

Kind of middle height, kind of heavier set,

kind of a little puffier.

He saw the same thing - somebody in one of those black puffy coats.

We had been trying to live with it for weeks and now, here it is,

it's fresh with her.

She was going through everything that we had already gone through.

Everybody says,

"Oh, you guys just made that person up who was in your room.

"You knew it was your son."

I couldn't believe it.

I honestly thought I was dreaming and they were lying to me.

I'm extremely good at bottling up emotions.

HE CHUCKLES

It's one of the crutches that I used

a lot during this process. I still use it today.

There's emotions, there's heartache, there's sorrow, there's...

..more emotional pain than I can begin to explain.

And I don't know whether I'm man enough to process it,

so the best way I can deal with it is bottle it up and put it away.

Deal with it later. I don't have time to deal with it now,

I don't want to deal with it now.

If I did deal with it now...

..it could have repercussions

and I don't want to take those on yet.

Maybe someday, but not now.

You don't have a boy that...

..likes to play basketball...

This kid, with a good heart, wanted to help.

Whoever was in that room that night and pulled the trigger...

..was someone else other than Nathon.

I walked in into the bedroom and I stood at the foot of their bed

and I remember I raised the gun and I aimed it at my mother first.

I don't know why.

And then I remember, like, having these really quick thoughts of,

"You don't have to do it."

But they were like so quick and suddenly gone

that I didn't really have a chance to really think about it.

And before I'd realised that I'd done it,

I'd pulled the trigger and the gun had gone off.

I fired again and then I fired again three times at my mom.

And then I sprung over to my dad.

I fired again, I fired at him three times.

I ran down the hallway, I sat down on the stairs,

and that's when it like really clicked what I'd done.

And I just remember feeling

so much guilt and remorse and hearing my mom trying...

She was like trying to talk, she was trying to yell for help.

It just sounded...

It just wasn't human.

I don't remember ever thinking...

..death or murder or anything like that.

I just remember thinking, gone.

Just them being away.

No-one deserves to ever go through what my family went through.

I think my parents probably have a lot of questions.

They didn't do anything wrong, and they didn't see anything wrong,

so then you get back to the original question of why?

I remember spending a lot of time thinking about it.

The number one thing was always why?

Why would someone that was raised in a good family

and very happy and go lucky, I mean,

I appeared to be happy and go lucky and athletic,

and always doing all of these activities, all of a sudden blow up?

To sit there and think and not know why was terrible.

And be stuck and knowing that you'd caused so much pain

and emotional pain and suffering, and it's just...

Not having the answer was very, very, very difficult.

I felt really guilty about it

because how could I do such a thing and not even know why?

Immediately the human brain goes to worst-case scenarios.

My number one fear

and the one thing that I remember thinking about

and, kind of, honestly being in denial about is

thinking maybe I was insane.

I remember looking up stuff and they said,

"You know, most people that are clinically insane

"don't know they're insane."

I just don't... I just don't know,

I just remember being mad and frustrated.

What was it you said you got in trouble for?

-I'm sorry, you told me that.

-I was late to class.

And so you got detention, that would have been...Thursday?

Tell me what happened when you got home.

My mom picked me up because she got off work early.

She said, "Get a snack, you have chores to do.

"So sweep all the tile in the entire house and then mop it for me."

I said, "OK."

So I swept and mopped the whole house.

Then she goes, "OK, now, vacuum all the carpets."

and I said, "OK, I'll vacuum the carpets."

She goes, "Go into the back yard and scoop the dog poop,

"and fill in the holes."

But I've been grounded from my phone and the Xbox and TV -

electronics, pretty much.

-Since how long?

-Yesterday.

-OK.

All right.

He would tell me multiple times actually

that his parents were a little strict on him.

If he didn't do the most simplest things,

he would be grounded for a long, long, long time.

Got back from school and my dad had me doing chores.

I'd already been grounded, so there was another...

my grounding had been extended.

My dad comes in, my mom doesn't come in, which is weird,

because normally she comes in, too.

I said, "Where's Mom?"

And he said, "She's downstairs, she's kind of frustrated right now."

And then on his way out I remember him saying,

"Get some sleep because you've got a lot of work to do,

"but you're not going to be playing in the game."

And it was like, he said... He said, "You got a lot of work to do."

And then there was a pause. And then he says,

"And you're not playing in the game."

So I was like, "The tournament?" And he said, "Yeah."

And it's like... That was kind of like the click.

I mean, that was like two or three hours before.

What probably went on in his mind that night was, you know,

"What do I really have to lose?

"I'm sitting here and I don't have any social life,"

and he convinced himself that,

you know, if he...

got rid of his parents that...

..he would be able to just go and...

..do things that were...

That the other kids would be able to do.

But of course, you know, that...

That's not the right thing to do, you know, ever.

Based on all the evidence we had

it was pretty clear that this was a very strong case against Nathon

for two counts of attempted murder in the first degree.

What was slightly less obvious was whether or not

he needed to be prosecuted as an adult.

The public safety component weighed very heavily on me.

If he was prosecuted as a juvenile,

that would have guaranteed that at the age 21...

he would be released from all supervision and incarceration

and be free to go anywhere and do anything.

When I first met Nathon, he was...

I was very impressed with him, he was articulate and bright.

I believe Nathon is a good person.

I think he has a good set of values and knows...

right from wrong.

He had time to think about what was right and what was wrong and

what he should do and what he shouldn't do.

And he went into the room and he stood over them

and he spent time to contemplate his actions...

..and then he determined who he would shoot first.

You know, ultimately, with Nathon Brooks,

there wasn't much question that

what was alleged to have happened happened.

The question was - what do we do with him now?

Can the community be safe if we let him out at 21 or before?

That's the big question.

Is it right to give up on an individual,

throw someone away?

He was looking at a minimum of 40 years in prison...

..up to about 50 years.

When the prosecutors were talking 50 years for Nathon Brooks,

essentially what they were saying is that is a life to throw away.

I don't agree with that, not in Nathon Brooks' case.

This is Nathon's room.

This is where he...

..slept and...

studied the 13 months that he was here with us.

It's not much, but I think he liked it and was happy.

Getting him out on bail was important.

It was a sad time, but it was a special time.

You know, I talked to Nathon before and he says,

"These people are afraid of me. I'm not going to hurt anybody."

He says, "I just can't believe it.

"I'm not going to do any harm to anybody."

Was it an act of mercy?

I mean, it ended up being that way.

He asked me if I was afraid of him.

And I told him that

I was uncertain of him, and he told me, he says,

"Granny, if you're afraid of me, I won't go."

And that was good enough.

Because I know that he wanted to get out,

but he wouldn't do it if I was afraid of him.

So...

..that made my decision.

There was a few reservations, I think, at first.

When he came home, of course,

we had to get all the guns out of the house,

so we were talking about that.

And I said it was really...

..kind of inconsequential because, you know,

there was a whole rack full of knives

but that if he ever cut my throat, I'd haunt him!

So, yeah,

that kind of broke the ice.

My wife and I were stuck in a very odd position.

The prosecutor's office wouldn't talk to us because

we were the parents of the accused.

The defence attorneys wouldn't really talk to us because

we're the victims.

So we didn't really know what was going on with the case.

But we felt Nathon did need to be punished for what he had done.

We came to the realisation

we couldn't provide the treatment that Nathon needed.

The court could provide that.

To go up there and say,

"Yes, my son needs to be put in jail for what he did."

That was difficult to come to.

That took lots of conversations, lots of heartache.

Prosecution wanted us to go all-out, and we said,

"No, because he's our son."

So we were just kind of left out

because we were parents and we still loved him and...

we didn't...

want to help with his sentencing.

To try to convince someone that

ten years was an appropriate length of time,

it was like you were bargaining with somebody's life...

..because at the end of the day, that's what we were doing.

That process - I was angry about that.

I wasn't good enough at it, I guess.

This case is not a whodunnit.

It's a "whydunnit".

Why did he do it?

When you prosecute people who are in a gang

and they commit a gang murder, you know why they did it -

they did it because it was part of the rules of the gang.

There is a motive.

Why would someone go and try to shoot their parents?

I know at least when I was involved with him

it was a big question in his mind is,

"Man, how did that happen? That doesn't seem like me."

Did you ask him why?

We did, yeah...

..and he didn't have an answer.

If there is no answer to the question why,

if there is no reason why he did what he did...

..that's maybe the most troubling outcome there could possibly be.

Nathon was kind of a high-profile case, though,

so we all kind of had heard about it before, you know,

just on the news and stuff.

Nathon is very much an introvert, he keeps everything inside,

and I'm sure he probably grew up that way

because that's generally how they are.

He does keep a lot inside and, you know,

just watching him and talking to him,

he doesn't even have a lot of facial expression when he talks.

But it's all in there

and when you get to know him more,

you notice little smiles and little smirks, or...

Even though he appears like he might be unemotional,

he is probably one of the more emotional kids

I get to deal with.

We've been able to watch him for a few years.

We haven't seen any personality disorders.

There's been no antisocial traits with him.

I don't see any piece of him that...

..would give anybody the cause to believe that he was psychotic.

We haven't seen anything that would lead anybody to believe

that he's not of normal, average intelligence,

with normal, average abilities for things.

He's a very smart, very kind person.

He loves his family, he's very close to them,

it's obvious when you see them together

that they are very, very bonded.

We want to know, you know, as a community, we want to know,

why did this happen?

And we want to be able to blame it on, you know,

socioeconomic background, abuse at home.

Was Nathon being abused?

It just doesn't appear any of that was there.

Nathon's diagnosis when he first arrived,

it was oppositional defiant disorder, ADHD and possible bipolar.

The psychiatrist, he never takes what he's given as the final word.

He wants to do his own diagnosis.

And so he worked with Nathon on coming off his medications

to see really what symptoms he had.

After he was taken off his ADHD medication,

he was doing great in school,

he was getting good grades, he was focusing,

he was doing what he needed to.

He was following the rules, he was being appropriate,

so we determined he didn't need that ADHD medication.

But he had some pretty severe depression.

I mean, he was a pretty severely depressed guy.

So he ended up with the diagnosis of major depressive disorder.

This time now it is in remission.

He's feeling good, he's stable.

There's been quite a few different medication changes

to figure out what works with him.

I was diagnosed with major depressive disorder.

It's just...

It's a relief to know that something else wasn't seriously wrong,

and that I could get help.

I mean, I'm not crazy or an animal or anything like that.

A lot of times, in younger people,

the depression comes out as irritability or anger.

You feel worthless, hopeless,

extremely down, extremely depressed.

This goes on for a few week period of time.

Some of the things that Nathon indicated were harsh punishments

in other households are chores.

You know, in many homes, that's part of the duties of home.

But in Nathon's mind, it was harsh punishment,

and what was in his mind was the key.

The diagnosis has brought a lot of things to light.

I mean, it helps me to really understand why I did what I did.

There was aggression and depression and...

there just wasn't any way for me to deal with it.

I didn't understand, I didn't know why and I was lost.

Oh, I look back daily on whether or not I was too tough on him

and, no, I don't think I was.

Honest, he was my child

and he was loved dearly. That never changed.

I had no idea of what he was going through

or he thought differently of it.

Honest to goodness, I had no idea and I don't know that Nathon did.

I understand the medical side.

But the fact at the end of the day,

he still chose to do what he did.

That I... I struggle with.

I'm still confused by that.

I still don't...

I don't understand how someone would do that.

I don't know, I don't think that's something I'll...

..ever truly, fully understand.

It's just, maybe it's beyond my ability to get.

I just think it's really great that he still has them in his life

and they welcome him back with open arms

and they have been able to work on that relationship.

Look at that!

Is he going for the Santa Claus look?

-Hey, buddy.

-How's it going?

-Good.

-Yay!

Oh, God, I miss you.

So...

..when does the beard-shaving month end?

It was supposed to be tomorrow.

Supposed to be? That sounds like...

-I'm deciding.

-Ah.

I'm deciding on whether or not I still want to do it.

That is mighty scruffy.

It's a lot of work to shave all that off, I'm telling you.

So, how are your teeth?

How's the pulled one?

-Pulled...

-Pulled area?

-Where they pulled the molar?

Or the wisdom teeth?

They pulled both of them.

They did both?

-Did it hurt on both sides?

-I got holes on both sides.

I think they're both gone. I don't remember.

Whatever they gave me was like for a gorilla.

So, let me see.

-Wow!

-Does it look like it's missing?

Yeah.

Well, be darned. Looks good.

-You brushing?

-No.

-No.

I need to brush more.

You saw that? I don't know what it is.

What happened?

I don't know. It just showed up.

-Oh, but you didn't get hurt or anything?

-No.

-OK.

No, it just showed up.

'I... I remember...

'the very first meeting,

'and that's when I repetitively told them that it wasn't their fault'

cos I was really worried that my parents took too much blame

for what happened, and they blamed themselves.

And they'd said several times that they should've noticed

and they should've known that I had a mental illness.

And I just remember telling them...

.."I didn't know, so how could they?"

The fact is, it is my brain, only I will...

I'll know before everyone else will.

My biggest fear was that they blamed themselves way too much.

They made it way too hard on each other and...

I personally feel like that had, I mean, some effect on the marriage.

I mean, that was really the hardest part was to prevent that

from tearing the family apart and to work towards keeping it together

long enough to where I could receive treatment and...

I mean, just become a family again.

-All righty.

-Give me a hug, son.

Hey! Where'd she go?

It's going to be a really long healing process.

I don't know how someone would ever heal from that.

I know that it helps that his parents love him unconditionally.

-Love you, Dad.

-Love you, buddy.

-Love you.

-Love you too, son.

But I still also don't think that...

..that him and the family have openly talked about it a lot, either.

It's kind of like to the side right now

and maybe at some point when people are stronger,

when their emotions are stronger,

they'll be able to talk about it more.

-Love you.

-Love you too, sweetheart.

-NATHON'S GRANDMOTHER:

-'I can't...

'I really can't explain it.

'I can't explain how you can...

'..love your daughter so much...'

..and yet love the person that shot her so much.

I can't explain it, except...

..how can you not love your grandson?

You know, you just, you just do.

He was always a good kid, and you cannot just turn the love off...

..for the boy that you've always known.

It just doesn't work that way.

There's no manual for handling what's happened to us,

you just feel.

That's all you do.

It could be so much worse.

You can look at it as, some parents have lost their children.

So we are blessed as parents by, we still have our children.

I'm glad that we didn't die just for Nathon,

so that Nathon never has to carry that.

Mm-hm. Exactly.