High Profile Suicides

[Lucycat]

I have really noticed recently how much I react to news of a suicide. I guess it has become so much more personal to me over the past wee while.

This morning it is PC Rathband, the UK Police Officer blinded after being shot in the face in the line of duty about 2 years ago.

It makes me feel terribly sad, that his life was so affected, but it is hardly a surprise that he could no longer cope.

But the other feeling that it stirs up in me is the sense of my own failure.

I just wondered how other people feel when they hear of a suicide, of someone they don't personally know.

 

[Anna]

It makes me feel sad that the system failed them. That they didn't get the help they needed. They were ill and in pain. It is terrible how you always have to ask for help and nag all the time before something is done.

 

[cherryblossom]

His death is so sad.

From what I understand, he loved being a police officer, and it seems he could not cope with life with his disability, and also without his profession. So very sad. My heart goes out to his family.

 

[freakofnurture]

I just wondered how other people feel when they hear of a suicide, of someone they don't personally know.

I don't care, emotionally. I usually wonder what they thought right before they did it and how it felt for them to die; I also have thoughts about the fact that my brain will stop producing 'me' one day, and that gives me strange feelings somewhere between despair, dissatisfaction and who-gives-a-f*ck.

 

[NIKI]

I feel bad that they feel NO HOPE for anything better than that.

 

[Lady of Longbourn]

I feel sad and wish they had gotten the help they needed in time.

But then feel...It was their choice if they wanted to end there life. That's a personal choice and I could understand it. Maybe it was to much...I can understand that and sympathize with it.

 

[Meadowsweet]

It might seem strange, but I can kind of understad the suicidal person. But I feel like I wish I could try to explain to the family, because I feel they will go through hell trying to get their heads around it.

I almost want to speak for the suicidal person and say the things that were left unsaid.

 

[mamachick]

I feel some of that. Similiarly, I had a very hard time over Whitney Houstons death, even though it was not suicide-I had to quit watching the media.

I think it is because she was a talented and beautiful woman. In her later years, she was obviously suffering and turned to drugs. In her interviews, she did not deny. Because of being in the public eye, and having those around her that probably enabled her, she continued to fail in her recovery. She adored her daughter, and her daughter adored her. She kept trying to come back it seems, or is my interpretation.

There was a lot of pain there. Why exactly, we will never know. Somehow I identified with her when I saw her in an interview and often heard people criticize, while she tried to pull it together or hold it together. Personally, I think much of this came from Bobby Brown, his abuse, and her falling into the drug scene to cope. While I have never turned to drugs, I understand well the need to escape at almost any cost.

Maybe it is just the mystery of her death as well. My sister died at 28 in almost the same way. The cause was undetermined, and being an unimportant person, nobody cared to push for a more thorough reason. The coronor reported "undetermined". I have had many others close to me that have had similiar unnecessary premature deaths. That saddens me very much. I have left with the belief that there is such thing as a passive suicide, not planned and intentional but not caring to live anymore. Meaning that some of us that are not real happy with life may be careless. A high school bf who is a good friends brother, who was depressed, died of gunshot to head several years ago. The said he was cleaning the gun. I dont think it was an accident. A good friends brother died in a car accident at high speed, and they summized that he swerved to mis hitting a deer, (his divorce was to be final in 2 days).

All were suffering, depressed, fighting demons, etc. I also wonder how they felt in those last minutes. My heart goes out to the families. Yet I understand loosing the will to go on.

 

[heidi]

I guess I find it hard to relate to famous people. I'd say surprised. When you try to reconcile this information with the way that person presented themselves, it's hard to imagine the pain they felt. It is sad.. of course. I guess I just don't relate to famous people. I mean obviously none of us really know these people at all. Their appearances are all carefully crafted and maintained.

With Houston though.. I did feel a little sad. I don't know her whole story but she was abused and certainly some of the fall out in her life was probably due to that.

I was going to say it's too bad people can't be more open about what they're going through, but then I remembered when they do they are relentlessly mocked. Then we feel "bad" for them when they die.

 

[mamachick]

Houstons will has been uncovered and of course the media is all over it.
I heard one therapist saying that because of her addictions, she could not have had any real good relationship with her daughter. They said that her daughter is now very vulnerable to be an drug abuser.

While some of this may be true, I think this kind of reporting is unnecessary and potentially damaaging to her daughter. My mother suffered severe depression and was an alcoholic. All my life I have heard about the potential. It is a feeling of doom. Even during years of a good life, I always had this cloud over me that one day I might be just like her. Even sisters use it against each other. When they cant find any other insult, they say you are just like mom. It is a self fulfilling prophecy.I wish they would leave that poor girl alone.

 

[cherryblossom]

I guess I find it hard to relate to famous people.

PC Rathband, wasn't 'famous', more 'high profile' (in the UK). He was a police officer that was blinded in the line of duty, when he was shot in the face by Roul Moat, who was on the run after shooting his ex girl-friend, and her partner. His suicide to me, is tragic; Moat has claimed another victim.

Houstons death is not comparable, IMO.

 

[mamachick]

In 2008, CDC reported nearly 37,000 suicides in the US, most of which we never hear about. The high profile or famous end up in the media. Everybody has a story. Regardless of the persons personal attributes, very few make it to media.

I was not familiar with the suicide of Rathband. That is very tragic and I also understand it. Another poster said the he could not cope with his disability and accept not being a police officer. We are often so defined by some aspect of ourselves that it is a huge struggle when that is lost. We can loose our sense of self.