The Lesson For This Week...

[scout86]

@KwanYingirl I think that's probably true. But I think the point my T was trying to make was that learning, and accepting, that we ALL deserve "kindness", even ourselves, can change outcomes. There are other ways to get rid of that monkey. I kind of suspect the addictions were an attempt to self medicate and maybe even the kindness to others was a way of trying to deal with some other, maybe unexplored, issue. What ever his inner demons, I wish he'd been able to find a different way to handle them.

 

[greenleaf]

There is also a chance that the Parkinson's had started doing nasty things to his neurotransmitters that his doctors didn't have time to react to; it's possible he was more stable until some damage was done by that. It's a nasty disease and progressive; acts on dopamine from what I understand, which is associated with feeling good things I think?

We here could all try to be kind to ourselves in honor of him. I think he would have been kind to every one of us, wanted us to be kind to ourselves, and we would have wanted to be kind to him and for him to be kind to himself, if we'd met him personally.

 

[anthony]

I don't think you can easily explore depression, especially after the fact like this. Without the person to talk with, you have no idea what went wrong. There are a myriad of reasons he killed himself, and chances are, we will never know. To be perfectly honest, I think your therapist is getting quite speculative with such assumptions and assertions, especially placing them upon you.

I can be as kind as I can be to myself, it doesn't change depression sneaking up on me and wanting me to throw myself off of a building, or other such devious method to die. Depression isn't that simple... because if it was, we wouldn't have the issues we do globally with it and suicide.

 

[greenleaf]

I can be as kind as I can be to myself, it doesn't change depression sneaking up on me and wanting me to throw myself off of a building, or other such devious method to die. Depression isn't that simple... because if it was, we wouldn't have the issues we do globally with it and suicide.

I don't think that being suicidal is always from clinical depression, or at least the way I understand it; there are some different inner dynamics that abuse survivors can have that are a bit different. I don't know what psychologists say about those dynamics though, maybe they lump them all under depression... Working on being kind to oneself can indeed help with some of those dynamics, from my non-professional perspective, and the habit can help interrupt impulses that you're describing there...

 

[anthony]

clinical depression

Depression doesn't have to be clinical... which is why it's complicated. Like you said, there are inner dynamics at play, but to be suicidal you are enduring a bout of depression. Again though... depression and clinical depression are different terms. Clinical is typically used to describe major depressive disorder, whilst it can also be used to simply say, depression. Yet depression, anyone can suffer, without diagnosis or mental health issues. People get depressed for all sorts of reasons, none of which are clinical severity, yet depression under any of these circumstances can lead a person to kill themselves.

Complicated... the experts struggle to understand it.