THAT'S MEN:Making the connection could prevent suicides, writes PADRAIG O'MORAIN
TO ME, one of the saddest aspects of suicide is that the person who takes his or her own life often reaches out to other people, or is thinking of other people, at the time. We know this from suicide notes.
I sometimes wonder, though, if the suicide would have happened at all had the reaching out been done at an earlier stage.
Perhaps in some cases the answer is yes, but I wonder in how many cases would the answer be no – in other words, would reaching out have saved a life and prevented great misery?
Human beings desperately need connection with other human beings. It’s one of the most enduring and pervasive traits we’ve got.
So it is hardly surprising that people who are about to take their own lives often write notes as a last act of connection – and it is hard to see a suicide note as anything else.
And if connection is the need, persisting even to the moments before a self-chosen death, couldn’t connection in many cases be the life-affirming solution?
These thoughts were stimulated by an article on psychcentral.com by Dr Sandra Sanger called Relationship Themes in Suicide Notes. Some years ago, Sanger was working in a psychiatric emergency room when a nurse asked her if she would like her to give her a collection of patients’ suicide notes which she had kept over the years and which were now in a box in her attic. Before long, she was carrying home the nurse’s collection of more than 350 notes.
What struck her most on reading them was that they so often demonstrated a need to acknowledge connection with other people and even to maintain the connection by advising them on how to live their lives following the death of the writer.
Here are some quotes from the notes:
“You’ve been a sweet, dear, faithful wife. Thank you for that.”
“I’m sorry to have to do this to you and the children, but I’ve come to the end.”
“I hate myself for giving you this shame, but people will understand that none of it is your fault.”
“It is best I go now before things get worse for you and yours. Please forgive me for unknowingly hurting you. I should know by now that people do not want anyone with problems around them.”
These notes were written between the mid-1940s and the mid-1960s. Most acknowledge love for those soon to be left behind.
Sanger found it troubling that the writers often saw themselves as a burden in the relationship. This seems to me to reveal a fundamental mistake in the thinking of the person who is about to take their own lives.
Hardly anybody is a burden in life. The person who sees himself or herself as a burden is rarely seen in that way by family or friends. It is more likely that the person is judging themselves against some standard so exacting they cannot possibly meet it.
Contrary to what may be thought sometimes, people who take their own lives very often express compassion for others. It could be that the roots of the suicide lie, in some cases, in a lack of compassion for themselves.
Cultivating that compassion requires, among other things, a willingness to allow other people to know and accept you with all your weaknesses.
I won’t pretend that’s easy – far from it – but if you take the risk of letting yourself be seen for who you are, you will almost certainly find that other people view you as infinitely more important than your weaknesses and may, indeed, regard your weaknesses as a matter of no significance.
The key point I want to make, though, is to urge people who may be harbouring thoughts of suicide to trust in the life-affirming value of reaching out to other people before, and not after, it is too late.
You can read Sanger’s article at bit.ly/sandrasanger
Padraig O’Morain (pomorain@ireland.com) is accredited as a counsellor by the Irish Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy. His book, Light Mind – Mindfulness for Daily Living, is published by Veritas. His mindfulness newsletter is free by e-mail.