SUICIDE...A BLOG NOT SUITABLE FOR ALL READERS

I discuss the topic of suicide combining serious thoughts and glib thoughts which attempt to lighten this topic.  If a reader has lost someone to suicide, s/he probably will not want to read this blog.

I admit to a macabre fascination with suicide.  I am not suicidal; I hope to live to 90 and piss off as many truly evil people as I can and enjoy my life with that as a side activity. I worked long and hard at many jobs I never did really like, to enjoy a rewarding  financial and healthy retirement and I am doing just that. Recently I have become addicted (I am drinking less so had to find another addiction) to videos on Youtube dealing with suicide. The videos are not well produced; many lack basic information; some are just plain incorrect in their facts and some apparently take information from obituaries rather than do any further research.

But, the videos fascinate me.  The faces are generally beautiful, smiling, some are professional pictures, perhaps from a modeling audition.  Some are from a yearbook. ALL of them leave me wondering, “why did you do that”? “Why did you not reach out for help”?  Was there absolutely no alternative...running away, getting divorced, leaving your job, closing down social media accounts”?  (A disproportionately large number of suicides of people younger than 20 seem to be from social media or in-school bullying). In my opinion, suicide is not rational.  If I come home and catch my wife in bed with another guy (both of us are way too old to see that event as a real threat) why would I shoot myself? As a Libertarian, I see marriage as a “contract” and third parties are not responsible for one of the “signatures” breaking the contract. It does not make any sense to take your own life. And shooting your spouse wins you a free trip to prison.  Best just to move on...counseling and drugs if necessary. Self-preservation is rational; self-destruction is not.

The following article offers six reasons why people commit suicide.

https://www.kevinmd.com/blog/2010/06/6-reasons-people-commit-suicide.html

I assume not one of the people who reads my blog (I have an avid readership of two) will be the least bit interested in the linked article so I will bullet the six reasons:

1) Depression in the extreme leading the victim to believe there is no way to escape it and living with the pain is worse than the alternative.  Depressed people may give some indication they need help.

2) Psychosis (schizophrenia) may actually command people to kill themselves (in the case of politicians that is a wonderful remedy to poisonous government).  These people (often dangerous at large) usually show no signs they may commit suicide. No remedy or prevention.

3) Impulsive, typically related to drugs or alcohol where the victim may feel so remorseful during a binge s/he cannot forgive himself.

4) Some people are shouting for help and often don’t intend to be successful but often are or do serious damage to their body, making their life more challenging that it was pre-attempt.  I think I would rather be successful.

5) Philosophical desire to die:  This one means alot to me though I have no experience with it either myself or with others close to me.  This is the person who has been reliably diagnosed as terminal, perhaps with cancer and chooses to end his life rather than go through the pain and sadness of what is happening to him, as well as financial destruction. The author of the linked article is quite clear that these people ought to be allowed to die at their own hand.

6) Accidental: the article offers the example of deliberate oxygen deprivation (which some people find creates a “high”) and they goof.  Darwin had an explanation for this one.

These reasons make sense to me but I find myself staring intently at the faces on these videos searching for a reason or something that might indicate the person is troubled and of course nothing is there.

As fascinated as I am with these videos they are also very haunting.  Frankly, someone who is troubled might be pushed closer to the edge watching these videos.  Yet there is something very magnetic about them. Three brothers committed suicide within years of each other because of having lost the other(s).  How horrible that must be for the parents. That would devastate me. I ask myself if I knew one of the victims and had reason to be concerned about the possibility s/he might commit suicide, how far would I go to try to prevent it.  Some solutions are obvious: counseling and drugs.

I take a Paxil generic, have for 20 years.  While often prescribed for depression, for me it was to moderate mood swings and it is a miracle.  I remember when my GP recommended the prescription (after an evaluation by a psychologist, who reported to me after the extensive Minnesota Multi-Phasic Pesonality Inventory test or MMPI that I was not neither artistic nor an alcoholic). I expressed some humiliation to my GP about using drugs.  Was I mentally defective? (Some people think I am but I deny it) He explained that the drug replaces a chemical in some people whose brain does not produce it sufficiently (“re-uptake inhibitor”...like I know what THAT means) and that the use could be compared to insulin..a chemical necessary to the body but whose body does not produce it sufficiently.  There is no shame in taking insulin. Nor should there be taking a PRESCRIBED mood-altering drug. Given only the benefit of 72 years of life experience, I believe counseling has value and I am absolutely convinced chemistry does. At least for me. My wife, for whom counseling was a career told me that counseling the potentially suicidal patient is the process of showing (especially the depressed) that there are alternatives and nudging the patient to try alternatives.  Suicide is awfully final she tells the patient and it is worth trying alternatives.

I have no other answers; any answer I would offer would be cliche and discussed endlessly previously by professionals.  While I would be thrilled to create a continuing list of people I would love to see commit suicide. There were other solutions for many of the people I see on the Youtube videos who deserved more to live than do some who refuse to commit suicide and it is sad to see they were not aware of alternatives or where to get help or just chose to not avail themselves of the alternatives. Hence, counseling is the logical place to start.

Actually, suicide is a risk for those of us who are left behind. The deceased simply won’t care (unless s/he survives with life-altering injuries).  If we who are left behind work to maintain a positive, mentally challenging lifestyle, we are the lucky ones. Lament the loss of a loved one but rejoice in your will to live.

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