11-Year-old ‘My Little Pony’ fan attempts suicide; Bronies rally
By Eric Larson From Mashable
Shannon Suttle, 36, stands in the parking lot of a hospital in Zebulon, N.C. His stepson, Michael Morones, just underwent an emergency tracheotomy. The procedure went well: “He’s resting now. We got to see him right after the surgery,” Suttle says.
It’s good news he and his family could use.
Last week, Michael tried to kill himself by hanging, allegedly after enduring months of bullying at school, in part because of his passion for the show My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. He’s alive but suffering from severe brain damage, unconscious and unable to breathe without assistance. Doctors predict he’ll be blind if he ever wakes up.
Michael is 11 years old.
The online “brony” community — a name typically given to male fans of the My Little Pony franchise — has responded en masse. Complete stranger Eileen Montgomery established a GoFundMe recovery initiative from her home in England Jan. 28 to help settle Michael’s medical bills. It has since raised more than $48,000 at the time of writing.
Suttle’s family also reached out to brony site Equestria Daily for help in raising funds.
He’s humbled by the amount of support, both financially and emotionally, the family has received so far. As Michael continues to battle for his life, it’s one less thing that weights on them.
Suttle married his wife Tiffany last year. The family has a total of four kids: Michael, 11, Angel, 13, Xavier, 5, from Tiffany’s previous marriage, and Ethan, 9, Suttle’s biological son.
That night, around 8:16 p.m., Suttle was still out when his wife texted: “Hope your night’s better than mine.”
Concerned, he texted back and asked what was wrong. The boys were arguing, she said. It was nothing unusual — in a house with one TV, one tablet, one Xbox and four kids, minor fights were common. Just boys being boys, brothers being brothers.
Michael had seemed especially irritable that night, though. He’d gone to bed around 8 p.m., then come out of his room and, oddly, asked for a pencil sharpener.
“She said we didn’t have one. Then he asked for a pair of scissors. She asked him to wait until the morning, but he kept getting upset,” Suttle recalls Tiffany saying.
“He kept saying, ‘I need this tonight. I need to do this tonight.'” “He kept saying, ‘I need this tonight. I need to do this tonight.'”
He eventually went back to his room and slammed his door. Twenty minutes after texting Suttle, his wife checked in on Michael to see if he had calmed down. She found him attempting to hang himself.
“She picked him up and called me right away, but she was so hysteric I couldn’t understand what she was saying,” Suttle says.
“Then my stepson Angel picked up the phone and said, ‘Michael tried to kill himself — come home now.’ ‘Michael tried to kill himself — come home now.’ I’ve never driven so fast in my life.”
Michael fell in love with My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic after his uncle introduced him to the show a few years back. His favorite character is hyperactive horse, Pinkie Pie.
“He has ADHD. He’s always dancing around, smiling,” Suttle says. “He really related to Pinkie Pie because of her energy.”
IMAGE: Shannon Suttle
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