SUICIDE!!! Let’s Talk … Chapter 1

SUICIDE!!!  Let’s Talk … Chapter 1

Calm down … stay calm … don’t panic… !!!  ???

It’s time, dear readers, it’s time to talk (talk) about suicide.  I mean really.  After the recent case of the young woman who talked her boyfriend into killing himself – and was convicted!  She could get 20 years in prison – for what was actually emailing and texting with an already very troubled young man.

Let me repeat that.  She texted him to, basically, go through with a plan and method he already had in process.  She was 17 when she hooked up with this guy and 19 when she talked (encouraged) him to finish what he had started.  Just over 20 when she was convicted of “aiding and abetting a homicide”.  The precise details are not as important as our cultural attitude towards the whole topic; as in the concept of killing yourself (suicide).

How does a 19 year old girl have any concept of what it means to end your own life?  How do any of us, no matter the age, really understand the depth of despair that any human brain can inflict on itself when its chemistry is fucked up?  As a species, even with all of the extreme science we have at our fingertips, we still cannot truly fathom what is truly amiss – to such a drastic degree – in a given unique brain.  AND, we still refuse to use the word, suicide, in context in polite (?) conversation.  Just using the word suicide in conversation can (can) have legal consequences.

#killed himself – took her own life – ended it – etc.  We have a word for the start of life – birth (accepting this as independence, or separation, from the mother’s body).  We have a word for creating your death – suicide.  The first, a joyous occasion, we really have no control over, and the second we have determined is a terrible act.  ???

Always study history.  The long range history, anthropologically speaking, suicide is not, by a set standard, considered to be bad, or evil, or even wrong.  In many societies, to support the continuation of that group, taking your self out, when you became too old or infirm to aid in the maintenance of the group, was what you were expected to do.  Take the long walk out onto the ice or in the desert – whatever.  In some societies if you were guilty of committing an act that put some type of horrible shame on your family – ceremoniously gutting yourself was the honorable expectation.

Where things get weird is when religion gets into the mix.  Suicide in support of the groups survival is proper.  Suicide to demonstrate respect and honor for the groups determined moral code is proper.  Bring in some supernatural spirit that is supposedly responsible for creating life, puts a terrible negative spin on everything.  Even in the face of physiological defect within the brain itself, or when a particular brain is so damaged that rational thought and behavior is extremely skewed, suicide is held to be the ultimate wrong-doing.  Or, even when you don’t really know what you are doing, you are NOT supposed to do that.

So, what is my personal stand on suicide?  Frustratingly I find this issue is far more complex than most people want to listen to, read about or even consider.  My first wife committed suicide.  In a deep depression she found a rifle and put a bullet through her own brain.  This was many years before Mental Illness was even on the map.  In essence, at that time, there weren’t many treatment options available.  Almost none.  Medical Science only had a few drugs to help and most of those came with very severe side effects.  Very severe side effects – like hair loss and general stupefaction (just made the afflicted into drooling morons).  She had witnessed this and the side effects when her own mother had had the same problem.  She chose not to take that path.

A friend of mine wrote on his Facebook page, the other day, “the miracle might happen tomorrow”.  Things might just get worse tomorrow for a person – sure, that could happen.  OR, “the miracle might happen”, things could take an unexpected positive direction.  I believe, whenever possible, remembering this very simple theory can push away, at least some of, the clouds. 

One of my mother’s sisters, a college friend, my current wife’s sister – all took their own lives.  All of the elements that came together such that they made the decisions they made resulted in an action that cannot be judged by anyone else – morally.  And, the resulting consequences on family members and friends, it would seem, have very little baring on that decision at the moment of action – pulling the trigger, stepping off the stool or ledge of a high bridge. 

In truth, the miracle could happen tomorrow, it could also happen within the next five minutes of this writing or reading.  In my life 90, or even 180 degree turns have happened with a single phone call, letter, email – even a text these days.  At the darkest moment you cannot see even a glimmer of light, if your eyes are closed.  And, that is my answer.