Yesterday someone in my life took his own life. I was devastated
by the news…but only worried about what brought him there…not anger because he
did it. No one can know the last thought of anyone who dies…by disease or by
their own doing. To think otherwise is selfish and self-serving.
I have had thoughts of suicide in my life…many of us have. I
don’t condone it and I hope that anyone who does have these thoughts finds a
way by whatever means to get to the next moment and see hope as an option.
I have recently been the subject an indictment of my character in a way that essentially renders my
life invalid and a lie. What inspired this is beyond my ability to explain or
even care. It did however raise questions with me.
If you are or ever have been in a relationship, does [did]
your significant other know every detail of your life? The answer is NO. I remember stories my
father who lived 91 years told me. I heard many of them many times and
something new was added to each version. I relished the stories and admired my
father for having lived them and never once thought he was lying because the story
was not the same verbatim every time. Any story that is told is told in the moment and
if it is exactly the same every time it is rehearsed or memorized…an alibi.
I can honestly say that I have never done anything in my
life that required an alibi. I have lived my life and always felt fortunate for
the experiences I have enjoyed and openly share them because I have always
hoped that my fortune might inspire and encourage others.
If anyone asks you to repeat a story in your life ten times…they
will hear ten versions and that is fine. It has to do with the time,
circumstance and question.
Have you omitted pieces of your life from friends? The
answer is YES. NO ONE ever gets to know everything. That doesn’t make you bad…it
makes you human. If you question everything someone tells you it is because you
don’t trust them, not because you love them. Your distrust is your issue…not
theirs. Not believing someone does not make them a liar.
If you don’t like someone because you don’t believe them it
is because they were never a friend and nothing can change that. Your beliefs
will never invalidate another human being.
Until you have lived another person's life, you can never know the whole story. I only wish I knew my friend's life better...and last thought...so I could understand better. He will be missed.
I’m just saying.
25 comments:
All I've got to say is, it riles me up when people criticize suicides. I like what you said, that you don't condone it and you hope people who have those thoughts can get help. You didn't slam your friend for doing it and realized you didn't have his inner thoughts to know how he felt.
It bothers me that we live in a culture where, if someone takes his or her own life, after they are gone in our own guilt, anger, and bitterness at having them die that way, we trash them, blame them, and much more.
Shouldn't we at least seek to understand them?
This is a wonderful post, you are so right in your assessment that no one knows the last thoughts of another. I was young when daddy died and I was angry for a long time. Not until I got older did I realize that I never knew him at all and I don't believe my mother did either. He didn't commit suicide, but refused to get the health care he needed as a result of that he died.
I am so sorry for your loss and my prayers are with you. <3
Jan - Thank you so much...it is hard for everyone, and I will never forget my friend. Thank you.
JR - BLESS YOU!
This is so hard to comment on...because I live with it everyday...A symptom of my PTSD/DID is Suicide Ideation...where the thoughts are constantly there..I write about it on my own blog...I can't tell you the emails I get and reactions from friends and family....most are angry that I even talk about it....No one wants to know the real me...they want to know the bubbly cute..laughing me....I have been shunned from friends and family because I even consider the act of suicide....just "get over it"they say....they don't listen ..they don't want to know...if I should ever succeed at taking my life...they will all question..WHY? but I have tried to tell them.......no one though could ever know a persons last thoughts....if someone takes their life...there shouldn't be anger.....I want to understand......i imagine the pain that person must've been feeling...and pray that they are finally free from it.....I don't know I have jumped around a bit here...hope it makes sense....As always...XOXOXOXO
Bonnie - I only wish good, kindness and a chance to heal for you. I cannot imagine you pain, I only wish you well.
Ron, sorry to hear about your friend. Suicide is never easy to understand. Because we've thought it but, never followed through with it does it make it harder to understand? At the same time it makes it easier to understand the thoughts of suicide, but not the follow through?
This touched a soft spot for me, in 97 my father committed suicide. You're completely right you don't know what they are thinking, how they felt, what was their last thoughts etc. I remember asking so many questions (never got answered)
Questions like, what made him so sad to do this? What would make him believe that our lives would be better without him? I was angry and wanted to judge him, in a way it might be human? I remember calling him a coward once. (personal reasons my story is on Bongo's site)I was also the last person he wrote (2 days before he did it) Which led to guilt, I hadn't spoken to him in a very long time (because of the story).
The day of his funeral, I forgot all about everything that made me mad, sad and I think the part that made it easier was, I knew he worked hard all his life, and it wasn't an easy life, I remember seeing his hands and thinking finally he could rest, sit back and let someone do something for him. I will never really know why he did it, nor will I completely understand. I do know that to make it easier for myself, I've stop thinking about all the questions (i won't ever get the answers too) and I've learned to remember the fun and the good times, and know that whatever made him do it, can't hurt him now.
Suicide isn't easy to digest,in any shape or form. Do you think because we don't have the answers to those questions, as human we judge?
yep... soft spot definitely touched, this is the first time since 97 that, I've written or openly spoke of how it made me feel. Other than an occasional, my father committed suicide.
Sorry I rambled ... sorry again about your friend, just remember even thou you don't know why whatever the reason, it can't hurt him now. I don't think, they think of the pain they leave us with thou......
Debbie - We are only ever left with questions, and there are no right answers. I believe it is our purpose to care understand and help to the best of our ability and to pick up in the aftermath and make the most positive difference we can. That is the least we can do.
Condolences on your friend’s death Ron.
Sorry to hear of your friend more sorry to hear of the way your friend felt to do what he did. You are so true in your words about people really never know the other through mainly lack of trust.
Peace be with you mate.
Hi Ron. Wow we need to talk. I have much to share, and I sense you do as well. Much love, Jen.
Jen - Thank you...please call.
Someone dying is such a sad loss whether the person took their own life or not. It is generally shocking since few suicides speak openly of the desire, and if they do, even fewer people will take them seriously - no one wants to believe.
That one person would attack another especially over something as personal as a point of view is a show of such self-centeredness as to be just as stunning. How can any person expect another to have exactly the same opinion on anything? A similar end conclusion might arrived at but one's journey to that end is as varied as paths through the woods. I'm so sorry you were hit with both blows so close together.
My brother lost 7 friends to suicide in the space of 2 years, 2 more he lost to drug overdoses. We lived in fear for a long time that he would be the next one.
I'll never understand why my grandmother didn't get the help for her cancer that she could. It took me years to forgive her.
No judgement, just questions and pain.
My husband and my best friend know a lot about me but neither of them know all of it. That's for the best, really. Anybody who claims to know everything about a person is either lying or deluded. Part of being in a relationship is to keep learning about that person.
My thoughts and prayers are with you and your friend's loved ones. I think any loss is terrible, how ever we lose a loved one. We'll never understand it, but "somewhere down the road, you will find mighty arms reaching for you, and they will hold the answers...." That's from a song that always comforts me.
I'm sorry to hear about your friend, Ron. There really isn't any way to determine what plays in a person's mind that makes them feel like there is no other way out.
I was at a point as a teenager where suicide seemed the only way out. I was home alone one afternoon and knew where my dad kept his gun and ammo. I had the gun loaded and all but put to my head when the phone rang. It was a guy I really liked at the time, and we talked without the restriction of my parents time limit for phone calls. By the time we were done talking I put everything back, and kept moving through life. To this day I don't remember what I was thinking that caused me to come to that moment. So maybe even those who had been suicidal don't really know or understand the thoughts that brought them to that sort of moment in their life.
In the end, though, life is worth living. Even at it's worst. Things do get better, and maybe as a society we need to tell the world that it does get better.
Dear Ron,
I'm so sorry! XOXOXXO
Dear Ron,
I am so sorry you lost your friend and hope healing and comfort for you and peace for him. I am sorry for everyone else's loss and admire the honesty and trust it takes to reveal such personal pain; I can relate to a part of each person's story as I just lost my sister last June know the absolute loss of hope intimately;
I don't know how to undo what I did only to know I could never judge anyone that "the deeper sorrow carves its furrows into our souls the more joy we can contain. (Kahlil Gibran)I pray that for everyone and know you are all Iblessed with one another's support and love. Blessings, Ron and love and light to you and everyone who commented on this page. willow
It's hard to say these two things at once: 1. Sending good vibes to you and your friend's family. 2. Do you need me to come up there and lay the smack down on someone? You are one of the most authentic and truthFULL people I have ever met.
Ron; I shared your post and apparently this caused some self-centered person to go off on you. I apologize that this caused you more pain. When I shared your post I felt it was poignant and important to help people in the same or similar situations. Voicing an opinion has always been a risky business, I so deeply agreed with yours, that I wanted others to see and comprehend. Continued Prayers, Jan
Ron, suicide and suicide ideation is something that many would just prefer to turn their head away from than to truly listen and try to comprehend what is being said prior to the act. I have had many friends over the years, that have spoken of suicide. Some have acted on their deep, depths of depression and others have talked about it. Either way, being there to listen, and I mean truly listen, is one of the best things a friend/family member can do. I, as a teenager, contemplated suicide and was almost successful. It was those teenage hormones and a boy that led me to believe that there was nothing in life living for anymore. A wonderful woman found me and spent hours listening to my story. She very seldom had a comment to make, but touched my arm ever so lightly to let me know she was there and cared. That was my turning point in life. Sometimes, people don't have that available to them, or if they do, they don't accept it because they believe that no one can help.
I am so sorry for the loss of your friend. There are no words to explain that loss, nor to take your heart ache away. I can feel your emotions through your words. I hope that you and your friend's family and friends can accept what he has done, remember him in a better light, and continue on. You are in my prayers _/\_
So, so sorry for the loss of your friend, Ron. Please know that my prayers are with you and his family.
Thank you for sharing this most touching, heart-felt post.
Ron-having lost a friend and a nephew to suicide in the past few years, I feel your pain. I'm sorry anyone ever has to go through this. Don't apologize. Never apologize for having real feelings.
Take care,
Jen the wanderer
I am so sorry for the loss of your friend. You're right...nobody really truly knows us...I know I keep parts of my past and self from my friends, even family. I think that's natural.
Ron, I'm incredibly sorry for the loss of your friend. My paternal grandfather took his own life. It was right after my parents got married. I did not know about this until my late 20s though. I never knew him, and my father didn't tell me about this because he did not want me to think anything negatively about his dad. I, of course, do not think that. I feel horribly that he felt like that was his only option left.
I'm just so sorry for what you are dealing with and completely agree with you that no one truly knows us. They can know a lot about us, but still it's just a fair bit that has made it through one kind of filter or another. Hang in there.
Natalie
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