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By: Raylene Nickel
In 2006 Randy Roecker expanded his dairy near Loganville, Wisconsin, to 300 cows. But a few years later the price of milk plunged, throwing the family operation – Roecker’s Rolling Acres, LLC – into a financial tailspin. Roecker’s emotions took a deep dive, too.
“I got depression really bad,” he says, “and I couldn’t find anybody who was able to help me. I was seeing a therapist; I was taking medication, but I still felt like I was fighting depression all alone. I kept taking overdoses; every day, I wanted to die.”
But time passed, as Roecker cobbled together his life, his emotions, and kept going, still fighting depression while working alongside his parents, son, daughter, and son-in-law to keep the dairy on its feet.
Little changed – until December 2018. Then came a turning point. “My neighbor Leon Statz, also a dairy farmer, committed suicide,” says Roecker. “That took me back to where I was 10 years before.”
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