Suicide, Guinea Pigs, and Kindness

September is Suicide Awareness Month, so admittedly it was a bit of a hard month here. Last year on September 10th, which is World Suicide Prevention Day, my son got released from the ER and went straight into a week of inpatient treatment in the youth psych unit of a hospital. During that week I walked the halls of the facility in shock and disbelief that I was there, that he was there, that this was our reality. I saw on the walls signs everywhere saying it was suicide prevention week/month. The irony was noted in my mind. Guess these suicide prevention campaigns work really well, huh? This was the week last year that began the trauma and shock that hasn’t ended to this day. This week began my inability to say a coherent prayer or think straight or feel the same way about almost anything. It also opened my eyes and increased my level of compassion for those struggling as those families became our family.

I, like many other suicide survivors (that’s what we’re called if we’ve lost a loved one to suicide), have mixed feelings about the term prevention. We tend to prefer awareness. Suicide obviously can’t always be prevented. 

My daughter has guinea pigs. Did you know guinea pigs do strange things out of their instinct for survival? They will hide an illness so you often don’t know they’re sick until it’s too late. Why would they do this? Because they are a prey animal. They are hiding their illness which could kill them ironically because they don’t want to seem weak to an enemy who might also kill them. This is twisted, but don’t humans sometimes do this? We can be afraid, maybe because of life experiences, to let people know what’s going on with us. Maybe the treatment will be worse than the disease. But this is the power of the disease. It messes with your mind. You don’t know your thoughts are deceiving you. You are not thinking rationally. 

Suicide survivors often harbor a lot of guilt for missing signs or not doing enough to save their loved one. This is part of the torture of this unique grief journey. In an effort to comfort, someone will say, “You cannot blame yourself for someone else’s choice.” Or, “They have their agency.” Those seem like obvious statements but when your child’s mind is their own enemy, they don’t really have their agency, not in the same way a healthy person does. This is why we have never blamed Luke for his death. We feel compassion and sadness for what his mind was going through and his inability in those last moments to change his course.

In terms of suicide awareness, I do have some thoughts and some things I’ve learned that may help others. This is strictly from my own experiences. I want to be clear I am not a trained professional. 

First, we are lucky that our son did show signs of illness. He was sleeping all the time. That was my first clue to his depression. I asked him directly about it and he denied feeling depressed. It’s possible he didn’t feel depressed. Or he could have been hiding it from me, like a guinea pig. So I watched for more signs. It wasn’t long before he made comments to a friend at school about wanting to die. The friend told the school counselor. There’s quite a bit more that happened in between, but basically the necessary information got to us and we got him evaluated and into treatment.

During treatment, after many weeks and much improvement, our son opened up to his counselor one day and said he was having sudden thoughts of suicide again. We sat down with the counselor and talked about a plan and he had to be closely monitored again. It is common in treatment to have setbacks. Healing is messy. It was a good sign that he opened up. Unfortunately, he didn’t do the same when that happened again several weeks later. You can’t always know. You can’t always count on signs.

What can you do? When someone makes threats or talks of suicide, the most important thing is to TAKE IT SERIOUSLY AND TELL A TRUSTED ADULT, someone who will help ensure the individual gets evaluated by a mental health professional. You may have to do this more than once. If you are a parent having your child evaluated, I recommend following your gut. If you think it’s more serious than the counselor is taking it, get another opinion. 

If you are a friend, CONTINUE TO BE A FRIEND. Be kind. Be compassionate. But also don’t think that this is your problem to solve. This is more than a friend should handle. The right thing for a friend to do is tell a trusted adult as soon as possible. When my son was in treatment, we were told as caregivers what to do and how to handle certain situations, like sleeping outside their room if necessary. But that’s not something others should be burdened with. If it is an adult, do everything you can to convince them to get into treatment. Friends should offer love and support, but this is not for them to manage. Once Luke was in treatment, he was told to share any suicidal thoughts with trusted adults and not his peers. 

KNOW WHO IS AT RISK. The individuals at highest risk for suicide are those who are clinically depressed, those who have made past attempts and those with a family history of suicide (that now includes my other 3 children, by the way). Also LGBTQ individuals have higher rates of suicide. These individuals need our love and support. 

Once, probably sometime in late October or early November, after things were more stable, I asked Luke what was most helpful in his recovery. I expected him to say his counselor at St. Vincent or the friends he met there or even the meds when they finally started working. He said he really appreciated a certain family who brought him a basket of goodies and a thoughtful card acknowledging what he had been through and that they’re there for him. He said, “I thought they hated me.” I knew some of Luke’s friendships had become strained, and that weighed on his mind, but that small act of kindness put that history to rest and apparently meant a lot to him. It surprised me how much it meant to him. 

Never underestimate what a simple act of kindness can do for someone struggling. This is from my son’s own lips. So from the bottom of this grieving mother’s heart, if you don’t remember anything else from this post, remember to be kind. It may not be able to fix a broken mind, but it can heal a heart.