Yesterday was Easter. The Christian world was largely focused on the thought of rising from the dead. My thoughts, though, were on it's polar opposite: the decision to deliberately end one's life. No, not mine. The 18-year-old son of a dear friend of ours made the decision last week to end his young life. A great many of us are wondering why. And trying to provide love and support to his mother.
I have not had much experience with suicide in my life, fortunately for me. When I was about 20 years old, I carried the torch for a lovely and lively young lady. She, however, carried a torch for some other guy who treated her like dirt. Sometime before I met her, she had tried to commit suicide. By the time we connected, she seemed to have recovered and was living a normal life. "Seemed" is the important word here. There were large areas in her life that were walled off from me and, I suspect, most other people. So although we dated for quite some time, had a lot of fun, and were close, she kept a major part of herself locked away and hidden. Eventually, she left town to be with the other guy, he treated her like dirt again, and she again tried to commit suicide. I saw her a few times after that. As before, she seemed to be normal, but the wall was still there. I've often wondered how her life turned out, whether she made it past whatever demons drove her to attempt suicide twice, or whether the demons won.
Many years later, while I was the Executive Officer at a Navy command in Misawa, Japan, we had two suicide cases. One was a young enlisted woman. Her incident was clearly a cry for help rather than a serious attempt to end her life. We arranged for psychological help for her, and engaged her supervisors, division officer, and friends in providing her with support, and generally tried to help her deal with her issues. I'm afraid that we weren't very successful. She had a couple of other, very different incidents later on that (fortunately) didn't involve suicide attempts, and we eventually had to give her a medical discharge.
The other individual who attempted suicide was very different. The young man was hospitalized after his attempt. The CO and I went to see him in the hospital and talked with the doctor, who told us that this was a very serious try and that, if not for somebody finding him in time, he would have died. We then went in to talk with him and it was, in a word, chilling. The young man was emotionally dead. There was no interest, no spark, nothing. I babbled some things about his shipmates pulling for him, and that we wanted him back at work, and it was like talking to a wall. He wasn't unresponsive - he talked with us, answered our questions, but was pretty clear that there was no reason for him to live. There was nothing about life that had any hold on him any more. It really shook me up. I had never had a conversation with a dead man before. I'm not saying that to be funny: it really was like talking with somebody who was already dead.
And now my friend's son has ended his life. It was, apparently, a complete shock, not only to his immediate family, but also to his friends. He had a lot of friends. It seems that none of them had any idea that he was considering ending it all. But he did. It's not a question of it being an accident, it was quite clearly a deliberate, well-thought-out act.
Suicides sometimes run in families, and that's the case here. This young man's father committed suicide about 11 years ago. Two uncles did as well. Is it genetic? Maybe one suicide leads others to consider it as a viable way to end their troubles? I don't know. Pain sometimes begets pain, in any number of ways.
Meanwhile, his family and friends are left with picking up the pieces of their lives and, eventually, continuing on. Only there will be this huge hole where he used to be. His mother has a large circle of very supportive friends who are doing everything they can to help her through this time. I don't quite know what to say to her, but we're going to see her Thursday, so we'll try to do whatever is appropriate. We don't have answers, just support.
I have not had much experience with suicide in my life, fortunately for me. When I was about 20 years old, I carried the torch for a lovely and lively young lady. She, however, carried a torch for some other guy who treated her like dirt. Sometime before I met her, she had tried to commit suicide. By the time we connected, she seemed to have recovered and was living a normal life. "Seemed" is the important word here. There were large areas in her life that were walled off from me and, I suspect, most other people. So although we dated for quite some time, had a lot of fun, and were close, she kept a major part of herself locked away and hidden. Eventually, she left town to be with the other guy, he treated her like dirt again, and she again tried to commit suicide. I saw her a few times after that. As before, she seemed to be normal, but the wall was still there. I've often wondered how her life turned out, whether she made it past whatever demons drove her to attempt suicide twice, or whether the demons won.
Many years later, while I was the Executive Officer at a Navy command in Misawa, Japan, we had two suicide cases. One was a young enlisted woman. Her incident was clearly a cry for help rather than a serious attempt to end her life. We arranged for psychological help for her, and engaged her supervisors, division officer, and friends in providing her with support, and generally tried to help her deal with her issues. I'm afraid that we weren't very successful. She had a couple of other, very different incidents later on that (fortunately) didn't involve suicide attempts, and we eventually had to give her a medical discharge.
The other individual who attempted suicide was very different. The young man was hospitalized after his attempt. The CO and I went to see him in the hospital and talked with the doctor, who told us that this was a very serious try and that, if not for somebody finding him in time, he would have died. We then went in to talk with him and it was, in a word, chilling. The young man was emotionally dead. There was no interest, no spark, nothing. I babbled some things about his shipmates pulling for him, and that we wanted him back at work, and it was like talking to a wall. He wasn't unresponsive - he talked with us, answered our questions, but was pretty clear that there was no reason for him to live. There was nothing about life that had any hold on him any more. It really shook me up. I had never had a conversation with a dead man before. I'm not saying that to be funny: it really was like talking with somebody who was already dead.
And now my friend's son has ended his life. It was, apparently, a complete shock, not only to his immediate family, but also to his friends. He had a lot of friends. It seems that none of them had any idea that he was considering ending it all. But he did. It's not a question of it being an accident, it was quite clearly a deliberate, well-thought-out act.
Suicides sometimes run in families, and that's the case here. This young man's father committed suicide about 11 years ago. Two uncles did as well. Is it genetic? Maybe one suicide leads others to consider it as a viable way to end their troubles? I don't know. Pain sometimes begets pain, in any number of ways.
Meanwhile, his family and friends are left with picking up the pieces of their lives and, eventually, continuing on. Only there will be this huge hole where he used to be. His mother has a large circle of very supportive friends who are doing everything they can to help her through this time. I don't quite know what to say to her, but we're going to see her Thursday, so we'll try to do whatever is appropriate. We don't have answers, just support.
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