How To Change How We Deal With Suicide And Suicidal Ideation As A Community?

[ms spock]

I am watching people coming from all over Australia to go to a funeral of a suicide.

Wouldn't it be wonderful if we could pull together and come together before the event of a suicide. It would be a good tradition to start.

It would be good to come together before a suicide attempt.

 

[Lucycat]

@Ms Spock you are so right! Additionally coming together to support a suicide attempt survivor would be good.

 

[Britt.f7]

This would be a great idea. Take the shame away and view it with compassion. Instead of people looking on it with blame.

 

[Upside Down Eagle]

It is a good idea. Do you mean like a sort of demonstration? I know sometimes even coming together won't help a person who has had it entirely with life. I'm speaking from experience, I was in a a theraphy group where we used to always discuss things togheter, until one of our members took her own life. She had been talking about it, but just couldn't take it anymore. But it would be good to spread awareness, and indeed teach people some compassion.

I've been doing my own bit of compassion work in trying to make people understand about it. We get people launching themselves in front of trains in this country regularly, and all that the bystanders talk about is "geez, how arrogant is it that this person killed themselves? Do they not have any respect for anyone else?" This just goes to show how small their worldview is. It's difficult to engage them in conversation about it though.

 

[DMerish]

Wouldn't it be wonderful if we could pull together and come together before the event of a suicide. It would be a good tradition to start.

Ms. Spock -
RE: The title of your thread . . .
I'm in the U.S. rather than Austrailia. On the surface, I think what you're proposing is a good idea. But I'm not clear with what you mean by "pull together and come together before the event of a suicide." Can you be more specific?

Between Sept 2012 and Dec 2013 three suicides occured that effected the lives of people I'm close to, one of them deeply affecting my own life also and prompting all of my PTSD symptoms to resurface.

 

[ms spock]

It is a good idea. Do you mean like a sort of demonstration?

Well people do have demonstrations and days like that here in Australia. We have Are you Okay Day as well. I meant more like in a social support way. That we keep in contact and make sure we really have a chat with the people in our lives every few weeks or divide people up into buddy systems for one month we talk to a person each day and then we change over and talk to another person for a month. Like creating a community village.

I know sometimes even coming together won't help a person who has had it entirely with life. I'm speaking from experience, I was in a a therapy group where we used to always discuss things together, until one of our members took her own life. She had been talking about it, but just couldn't take it anymore. But it would be good to spread awareness, and indeed teach people some compassion.

For those bridges that people jump off - when they did a study of the people who survived 80% regretted it.

If we can come together and talk about yes suicidal ideation is hard and about it but also work on solution based problems. Or engaging people in a positive manner so they feel like that they belong and have a purpose. The Men's Sheds work well in that way. There needs to be a lot more done for men's mental health in Australia.

We need ways of connecting up people who are isolated, having a hard time or suffering from some form of mental illness. Even if it is a solution like having someone work two hours a day so they have the social contact and connection of having a job.

I've been doing my own bit of compassion work in trying to make people understand about it. We get people launching themselves in front of trains in this country regularly, and all that the bystanders talk about is "geez, how arrogant is it that this person killed themselves? Do they not have any respect for anyone else?" This just goes to show how small their worldview is. It's difficult to engage them in conversation about it though.

Sometimes that is people covering up guilt for their own feelings of suicidal ideation. Sometimes it is people feeling hopeless and helpless to stop or understand such big emotions. Sometimes judging someone is easier than feeling the sadness and pain over the suicide of a person.

So perhaps you can have compassion for people who don't have compassion. Maybe ask how do you think a person like that can ask for help and what could a person do to manage such feelings of despair?

 

[ms spock]

Ms. Spock -
On the surface, I think what you're proposing is a good idea. But I'm not clear with what you mean by "pull together and come together before the event of a suicide." Can you be more specific?

Between Sept 2012 and Dec 2013 three suicides occurred that effected the lives of people I'm close to, one of them deeply affecting my own life also and prompting all of my PTSD symptoms to resurface.

What I am not saying is that people feel guilty for someone else's suicide.

It is very upsetting and you need to feel compassion for yourself for having not one but three suicides in your life in four months. That is pretty rough going. I can see that your PTSD symptoms would be hard to manage after that.

If we can come together and talk about yes suicidal ideation is hard and about it but also work on solution based problems. Or engaging people in a positive manner so they feel like that they belong and have a purpose. The Men's Sheds work well in that way. There needs to be a lot more done for men's mental health in Australia.

We need ways of connecting up people who are isolated, having a hard time or suffering from some form of mental illness. Even if it is a solution like having someone work two hours a day so they have the social contact and connection of having a job. So the whole community links in.

I meant more like in a social support way. That we keep in contact and make sure we really have a chat with the people in our lives every few weeks or divide people up into buddy systems for one month we talk to a person each day and then we change over and talk to another person for a month. Like creating a community village.

It would be good if someone had three or four people to ring them each day and have a chat about how they are going.

It doesn't need to be based on mental health or helping. It can be hobby based or interest based.

A friend once sent me a newspaper clipping about an elderly couple that adopted a woman in her 40s. We need to connect up people more.

We could have a register to connect people up.

 

[ms spock]

@Ms Spock coming together to support a suicide attempt survivor

That would be a good time to put stuff in place.

Hopefully we could get to that before it gets to a suicide attempt early intervention.

 

[ms spock]

There will be more than 400 people at the funeral – if they all rang once a day that would have covered the year and then some. It is such a waste – the money being spent on airfares local and international, the hotel bills, the eating out – it could have paid for a half decent psychiatrist or psychologist or something along those lines. It is such a terrible, terrible waste.

 

[ms spock]

This guy jumped under a train where some of another online community that I belong to travel along.

So people were coming up with all the usual judgmental jokes and platitudes. So I started off with my friend's brothers suicide and said how said it was that so many people were coming to the funeral but if we had got that together beforehand then it might have been a better outcome.

One thing that didn't occur to me is that people make platitudes and jokes to cover up their feelings of inadequacy. I was challenged about how would you know what to say and what to do. That was a really big concern on the forum for some people. One woman felt hopeless and helpless to understand such big emotions. I was able to talk about the [Australian Resources] SuicideCall Back Line, the Mental Health Team, Life Line that would get people connected up to local services. One guy really supported my position and said if people did R U Okay? it could help reduce suicides. I talked about how men's mental health being pretty bad in Australia. And the guys weighed in on that agreeing and disagreeing and coming up with some good ideas.

Remembering that jokes and judgements are people sometimes covering up guilt for their own feelings of suicidal ideation. Sometimes judging someone is easier than feeling the sadness and pain over the suicide of a person.

So I tried out having compassion for people who don't have compassion for those who have suicided or feel that way and it worked out rather well in this instance.

 

[DMerish]

[Just to clarify: The suicides in my circle happened between Sept 2012 and Dec 2013: over a fifteen month period, not a four month period. If they had happened over four months, I don't think I could be writing here/now :-o]

I think I understand better what you mean. I believe, there needs to be more openness about the "problem" - by that I mean easier/better accessibility to mental health resources, at less cost, more media coverage, better hand gun control, subway car accessiblity via directed walkways with walls (rather than open platforms), eight foot fencing along "dangerous" bridges, etc. The saddest thing IMO

Even if these things were in place, people that have poor inpulse control may still choose to follow through . . . The "problem" isn't the only thing that needs to be addressed. Suicide ends a certain situation for the person that commits it, but it opens up a whole a pandora's box for those left behind, which often isn't dealt with effectively. Anyways, I "hear ya" Ms. Spock.

 

[ms spock]

Thanks for clarifying that DMerish.

I think early intervention is the key DMerish.

Getting it tackled before the attempts start.