Someone else wants to speak today. A reader who heard what the experts had to say about death and depression last week and wants to talk about how the State manages the business of suicide.
"I found my husband dead. He killed himself. Two months later, I had to go to court for the inquest. It was the second worst day of my life. I was never in a court before, I'd never even got a parking ticket and nor had he. The only court I'd ever seen was on television.
"I was terrified. No one told me what to expect. I thought they'd have some sensitivity for us after everything that had happened. The gardai had been understanding from start to finish - they were human, and they didn't crowd us. But this was different.
"It was a trial in the true sense of the word. There was a big courtroom with about 50 people in it because the public gallery was open to anyone who was curious.
"Now suicide is not a criminal offence. He did nothing wrong, I did nothing wrong, my family did nothing wrong. He was sick, just like he had cancer. But if it was cancer, I wouldn't have had to go to court and have my life put out in front of everyone for them to judge.
"My name was called and I had to walk all the way up with everyone looking at me. I was put in a box like the dock you see on television and made swear an oath, facing out to the crowd. I turned my chair away.
"I wasn't ashamed: I was upset. It was so degrading. A garda read out my statement, the one I had to give to them when I found him. They had written it down in private but it wasn't part of the record until it was read out loud in court. I thought these were modern times.
"EVERYONE listened to the story of my life - private matters such as my age, the time I was married, everything about his last days when he was so sick and how we worried about him. I was glad it was me and not the children who had found him, for all I know they would have had to be there too. Then I had to sign the statement, and for that I had to turn and face the crowd. I was heart-broken putting my name to it, I never knew the truth of that word before.
"I never knew it was like this, I never saw it in a newspaper, and that is why I'm telling you. I want it highlighted and changed, because there is no need for it to be this way. If someone else had found him, I wouldn't have had to attend the court. But it would still be bad. I'd have had to give a statement at a time when I was desperately upset. Then I'd be at home knowing that his death and our life were being read out loud for the titillation of anyone who wanted to hear. There was a reporter there that day - it could have been in the papers except my brother went to speak to her. How would my children have felt to read about their daddy in that way?
"He was a good man, a fine husband, and I miss him so bad. I miss little things like having him to snuggle into in the middle of the night. But if men like him speak their mind, they're thought less of a man for it.
My name was called and I had to walk all the way up with everyone looking at me. I was put in a box like the dock you see on television and made swear an oath, facing out to the crowd. I turned my chair away. I wasn't ashamed: I was upset. It was so degrading
"He was badly depressed, but he didn't know what the feelings were. It came on so fast: he was working like hell and he felt he wasn't achieving anything. The despair he suffered, the way he thought no matter what he did it wasn't going to work, all that came out in court. He'd hate to think everyone knew that about him.
"If people were educated about depression, it would be no big deal. We'd get them in time. It puts me in mind of the way my grandparents talked about TB and how in the early days when no one understood it brought shame to a family because people thought it came about from dirty personal habits. We solved that one. We can solve this too. It won't ever go away, but I cannot understand the way we try to pretend it doesn't happen, or blame it on a bad childhood . . .
"SINCE my husband died a number of people who are badly depressed have come to talk to me. They know I'll understand, and that I won't be a threat. Some of them won't go to a psychiatrist unless they can afford to go privately. Otherwise they'll be queueing up in a clinic or a hospital and word will get round. The stigma of depression is nearly worse than suicide. People aren't allowed to deal with it in peace.
"People try to be kind to me. I hate it. `God help you,' they say, `you're brave.' It makes them feel better, but it marks me as different. I'm not someone to be stared at, I'm not different. What do they expect me to say? I'm broken inside. But I have to keep things going.
"If the Government wants to do anything for people like me they could spare us the humiliation of having it all done in public. Not because I want it hidden: I don't. I'm not ashamed and I won't be made to feel ashamed. But I deserve my privacy: I don't want the world looking at me as if I'm a person in a television show. I'm not. I'm real.
"Why did I have to go to court as if I had done something wrong? Was it for the convenience of the coroners? I can't think of another reason. All deaths are the same to them when it comes to the business of it. But not to me, and not to the other bereaved relatives who've spoken to me since. Are they pure stupid, or do they just not care? A court was no place for me to sign away his life. If they wanted to punish me, they couldn't have done it better."