Dallas family hopes personal documentary can shine light on mental health

Sue Loncar looked through the pages of a photo album for her daughter, Grace.

"She was so beautiful," Loncar said of her youngest child. "She was so precious. So wanted."

Loncar lost Grace to suicide in 2016.

"I still picture her at 16," Loncar said. "She'd be 23."

Loncar is sharing her story as Executive Producer of the feature-length documentary, 'Losing Grace Finding Hope.'

"I think to show that's the thing, is depression doesn't discriminate at all," Loncar said.

"She really did have it all by the 'outside world' definition. She was loved."

"I remember that day like it was yesterday," Loncar narrates in the film. "The day we lost Grace."

"Suicide is an epidemic," family friend and 'Losing Grace Finding Hope' Writer/Producer/Director Marcia Carroll said.

"I think if we don't show it, then we can't help others to get through it."

The filmmakers hope the documentary helps chip away the stigmas about talking about mental health.

"Why my precious daughter?" Loncar asks in the film. "The other side to that point is why not her?"

"So for anyone else out there who's struggling with the death of a loved one to suicide, we have to show them the hope and proof that it can be done," Carroll said.

"That we're not alone and that things are much better tackled together," Loncar said. "There is a rainbow at the end."

'Losing Grace Finding Hope' was produced on behalf of the Grace Loncar Foundation. It premiered at the Greenwich International Film Festival, where it is up for a $10,000 Social Impact Grant.

The film will screen at the Dallas International Film Festival at 6:00 p.m. on April 30 and 4:00 p.m. on May 2.

If you or someone you know is in crisis, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8355), or you can text the number 988.