Suicide: Getting to Resilient

                        

            Five percent.  One out of twenty.  That’s the reality of our community, our country.  Within the last year, one out of twenty adults seriously considered ending their life.

            Suicide.  It is an epidemic, and we don’t talk about it much.  Suicide talk is taboo.  Don’t go there.  But, we must.   

            Every person needs to be connected to at least one other person, and to be able to reach out, talk about depression, sadness, and hopelessness.  We all need hope, an expectation that there is a tomorrow, there is opportunity for change, that our lives make a difference, and that life is worth living. Life’s problems can’t be only on our own shoulders. 

            Last week, I was part of a workshop, getting trained with skills to take on this intensely personal problem, to be a first responder in addressing suicide in our culture.  Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training (ASIST) is a national movement to develop a first response model in our communities.  Evidence based models and techniques gave us the tools and the confidence to reach out and connect with someone who is possibly contemplating ending their life. 

            Invite a conversation, and plunge into the “perfect storm” that is roaring through their lives, and make connection.  When the signs are there, find the courage to “ask the question” and begin talking about suicide, and options for change, connecting them with you and connecting them with resources to be able to move ahead with their lives, and regain hope. 

            Suicidal thoughts have stormed through my own life, sometimes ending lives far too early, or paralyzing people with deep depression and isolation.  Surviving family and friends are wracked with uncertainly and chaos, leaving profound questions unanswered and lives thrown off track. 

            Making connections is what changes lives and saves lives.  What I’ve learned in life, and relearned at the ASIST training, is that you do connect.  You do reach out, engage people, and show your genuine concern for them and their well-being.  You connect with your own humanity and your fellows, and make that vital one to one connection. 

            Showing concern and empathy, and making that connection often saves lives and gives people a new sense of hope and possibility in their lives. 

            Help make them safe now, and help them develop their plan to be safe now.

            When you have that conversation, make those connections, one to one.  And, help them connect with others; not only with friends and family, but professional care givers and health care providers.  Be the gatekeeper for them and help them find their way. 

            The National Suicide Prevention Hot Line, 1-800-243-8255(TALK) is a  valuable resource. I’ve added it to my phone contacts.  Other resources: http://suicidepreventionlifeline.org, Youthline (1-877-YOUTH-911) and their text: TEEN2TEEN@839863.

            Connect with your local mental health services provider.  In my hometown, Tillamook, their crisis line is 800-962-2851.

            All of these services operate 24 hours a day, because suicide is a 24 hour a day issue of community wide concern. 

            Help build a resilient, safe community.

            ----Neal Lemery 9/1/2016 

Dealing With Suicide and the Loss of A Friend

I don’t know what to say, or even think.  A friend of mine has gone, at a time and place and manner of his own choosing.  He left, not saying good bye, not asking for help with his pain, his choices.  But, then again, maybe he did, and we did not listen, or did not respond to what he asked.  At least, I did not hear him asking for a hand, or my ear, or even considering other choices.  Or, maybe I did.  And now, I do not know.  I am, at the least, confused and lost, and stumbling around in my grief, my impotence.  

Now, there is an emptiness, and a great unknowing.  The “what ifs” keep multiplying, and I am left with wonder, with sadness, and guilt.  “What if?”  “What if?”  

And, in the silence that follows my asking, there are no answers, only more questions.  

Friends of mine, closer to him that I was, are left empty, unknowing, wandering in the wilderness of uncertainty, of deeper questions which have no answers today.  My pain today is enough; I cannot imagine theirs.  

I search for answers that are not there.  I search for so much, for reasons, for explanations, for understandings, knowing that there is now only a cold wind blowing around my heart.  

Raw craziness, that is what is running amuck in my life now.  No answers, just more questions.  Not much solace, yet knowing that my friend was, at least for a second, at peace with himself and what he was doing.  

I was not on his road of life, and I did not know his journey.  In his departing, there is even more uncertainty in my mind as to what I might have known, might have done, might have loved him deeper, had he shared his pain, his questions, his journey.  But, he did not, and somehow I must accept that.  Yet, in that, I find myself angry, and unknowing, and uncertain.  I am confused, and enraged, yet what has been done was beyond what I could have done, and beyond what I am, and what I could have been to him.  

Old pains, and other suicides, and those still unanswered questions come back now, again reminding me of old wounds, unresolved enigmas, old doubts and tears.  I do not know.  I didn’t know then, and I still don’t know.  Old stuff, reopened, bleeding again, making new tears.  

Part of me wants answers, but I know that answers won’t ever come.  I move on, in life, yet I am left with wonderment, and enigma, and cold winds, ice in my heart that comes at unforeseen, strange times, dragging me back to old ghosts and old, unresolved times.  

The poet writes of what I feel, and points me towards forgiveness.  Yet, that word seems foreign to where I sit now, empty and alone, not knowing, not finding sanity in all of this.  The poet’s wisdom circles about me, aflame, trying to warm my cold, lonely heart.  

Perhaps, I should reach out, and accept that warmth, on this cold winter’s night.  

Forgiveness

By Marion Waterston, January 31, 2005

I guess I'll never know

All I want to know

Or understand

What can't be understood

But I believe it's time to forgive

Time to forgive you for leaving me

So abruptly and so painfully

And time to forgive myself

For talks we didn't have

Laughs we didn't share

Songs we didn't sing

Foolishly I thought that time was on our side

Can it be that time now wishes to atone for this betrayal

For tears no longer flow like endless rivers

Anger seems a wasted emotion

And dreams those dreaded night-time visitors

Can come as friends

Once again I smile at the innocence of children

The unabashed warmth of lovers

The enthusiastic affection of dogs

And although I do not see you my precious love

You are with me

So I guess I'll never know

All I want to know

Or understand

What can't be understood

But here in this quiet moment

It's time and I'm ready

To forgive.