The Tragedy of Suicide

I have not blogged for ages on here, but today felt compelled to. The recent news of Marie Osmond's 18 year old son Michael taking his young life touched me deeply. I too have an 18 year old son, can't envision losing him at all, never mind by his own hand. My heart just broke for Marie when I heard her son was gone and my thoughts immediately went back to my own loss of my husband by suicide too. I'm not one to contact celebrities, but did find a site for Marie and sent my heartfelt condolences.

I read some statistics a long time ago that about 50% of our population experiences some kind of mental health issue, to me that was a shocking statistic, but somehow not surprising. When you consider the stresses of everyday life, how so much of the family connections have broken down over the years, how everyone is so into what's in it for me that seems prevalent today, support networks have become less important I feel and lead to many feeling they truly are all alone in the world, with no one to turn to.

The word "suicide" still has such a negative stigma attached to it even in this day of talking so openly about so many subjects that were once considered taboo. I am very aware of people's body language, so quickly learned when discussing what my husband had done, to soften it by saying he unfortunately took his own life and that seemed to be more easily accepted.

The stigma is there because people don't openly discuss what is an all too common occurence, it's like the big white elephant in the room that no one wants to talk about. What I found was that many I spoke to had been impacted by someone they knew who had committed suicide, and with all, it brought great emotion to the forefront for them when they relayed their experiences.

For me, it's been many years, but it brings up great sadness and loss for me still to this day. For a long time I wondered if there was more I could have done to prevent this from happening. After much self work, I've come to realize that there is very little anyone can truly do if someone is determined to take their own life, unless they want the help and are prepared to do whatever it takes to treat the issues causing this.

I try very hard to put myself in other's shoes to feel what they're experiencing and have always been able to do this, however, when it came to suicide I just could not. I have had many troubling dark days, but can quite honestly say there has never been anything bad enough to make me not want to wake up and see another day. I logically can understand why they come to the conclusion that the only way out is to take their life, but emotionally I just can't get there myself and that makes it all the more difficult to fully understand.

There are many medical reasons for the various mental health illnesses, each one just as unique as the person themselves. There are so many factors and often times, more than one medical issue going on that results in suicide as well. My own experiences were that our Canadian health care system in the mental health area was greatly lacking.

At one point in the last few days of my late husband's life, I contacted the Suicide Prevention Hotline and they came out to my home where my husband waited for them. They arrived, it was two fairly young counsellors, they spoke in very soft, whispery voices and spoke to him almost as if he was a child.

This infuriated me and was in fact not helping my husband at all, so eventually I just couldn't stand it anymore and told them my husband was a highly intelligent individual who was severely depressed, that them speaking to him like a child was absolutely not helping and that I just could see this was a waste of time and asked them to leave.

I was so disappointed that this was who they'd send out to a person thinking of taking their own life and could only wonder what an individual with no advocate would do with this baby talk approach.

I did get my husband an appointment with my own doctor, she had never seen him before but let him come immediately and did prescribe anti-depressants which he did fill and take, but unfortunately, the meds take quite a while to kick in, I was told about 10 days to 2 weeks, and he was gone about 3 days later. All of this happened right around Christmas time too which was a very bad time of year staff wise, most places were operating on skeletal staff or shut down already.

When I discovered he had succeeded finally in taking his life, there was a very mixed feeling for me. My actual comment was "It's over". Some may think that's not the most compassionate thing to say, but for me it was twofold. This had been going on for quite some time, I had fought a good battle trying to convince him to stay alive and work through this, but I also saw just how much pain and turmoil he was in. So my comment was one of relief for both me and for him to not be suffering anymore.

There were several attempts with my husband over a one month timespan, he tried many ways many times and we discussed all of these in great detail afterwards. I was appalled to be having these kinds of conversations, but at the same time wanted to learn what he was thinking and more importantly, what it was that stopped him.

He told me the picture of our son's face came to him as he was doing all of this and that he just couldn't bring himself to follow through knowing how that would impact our son. I locked onto that and told him that was good, to envision our son's face every single time he was having these thoughts to keep him focused on not taking his life.

Unfortunately, in the end, I guess it just wasn't enough, and he was in such pain and turmoil that he felt everyone including him was better off with him gone. Such a sad statement, but it was one he told me of. I tried to envision laying down to wait to die and just couldn't imagine doing that, but at the same time I also imagined how sad he must have felt as all this was happening. For him it was a non-violent way he chose, but for those of us left behind, we had no answers.

I was changed forever over this tragedy, and although I'm an exceptionally strong woman, it affected me to the very core of my being. I had spent 30 years with this man, and could never ever have anticipated it ending like this. Initially I was in "go mode" getting things done that needed to be dealt with which kept me preoccupied, but eventually I had to go there and really think about what had transpired.

Having to tell my son who was just 9 1/2 at the time was one of the hardest things I have ever done in my life, but somehow I was able to to do that. I continued on for quite some time with our business that we shared, but that too eventually had to be closed down.

Was a very trying time for me, full of much emotion but it caused me to start a journey of self development that has become a lifelong love of mine. I'm one to always look for the silver lining in anything that happens in my life, it took a very long time on this one, but I did come up with a few.

Today I am looking forward to creating a new business around my experiences, what I learned from all of this so that I may share my message with others who are stuck in life from a traumatic life experience. I have wanted to write a book for so long, a memoir more or less and have begun to do that now too.

I felt so compelled when all this happened to look clearly as to why it had happened, and why I had been put on this wonderful planet we call Earth. What I've decided is that everything happens for a reason, and my reason is so that I may move forward from this life altering experience and help others do the same, to discover who they really are and what wonderful gifts they have to share with the world. I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that my life purpose is to help others get past their gap, and can't think of a more rewarding experience!

If you know someone who is experiencing depression or other mental health issues, please reach out to them. Hug them, tell them you love them and encourage them to get the help they need. A myth for many is that those who talk about or attempt suicide are not serious about it, that they're just doing it for attention. This is so NOT the truth, it is ALWAYS a cry for help, and never to be ignored. Remember that suicide is a PERMANENT solution to a TEMPORARY problem.

I thank you for taking the time to read this emotional post of mine, and I hope that it touches you so that you can be compassionate and help someone you know who is going through troubled times.

I'm blogging in much more detail on this life changing experience dealing with the loss of my husband to suicide on Wordpress. If you're inclined you can read it at: www.AllUCanBe.wordpress.com.