Trigger warning: suicide

[Spinningandwhirling]

One of my best friends committed suicide recently.
I have been knocked sideways...I’m still “doing” life competently, but am struggling with intrusive thoughts which leave me in a state of panic and horror.

AIBU to just not know how to get through this? I’m interested in other’s experiences, I guess.

Movement is good.... shifting the mind, as are walks and talks...... Mood lifting music... Conversations.... Treasure yourself, really take care of yourself through this tough time. Clean sheets, nice wild flowers, a good book, be kind to yourself, nice thoughts, not harsh ones. you are battling and doing what you can to be the best you can. just be with that. This will pass, better things are coming.

Matilda15,
So sorry to hear your story, you are doing the right thing with your son, be honest. Also as the bereaved child (older admittedly) please try and remind your son of the good times he may have had with his dad, and any positives he may have given him, there maybe none (sorry if I am being rude or sound uncaring) but I think as a child you need to remember positives about your parents, if not you just grow up knowing your dad committed suicide, and you end up believing you can't have been good enough for them to stay around (I often felt like that). It is rubbish, they just weren't thinking straight at the time.

Spinning I would add to do the same to your friends daughter too.
If this post is anyway inappropriate or too sensitive please ask for it to be deleted, I don't want to offend anyone on such an awful subject

I would highly recommend accessing a bereavement service local to you. You may be able to get free or low cost counselling. Having an empathetic person, who is neutral (in the sense of not being related to you in anyway), can help enormously. You can explore these intrusive thoughts in a safe space

Not casual, factual!

Hi there,

This is a super sensitive subject, and we really want to be kind and mindful of how we talk about it.

For example, we don't allow mentions of suicide methods, and will remove any that we see.

We thought we would also add a link to our Mental Health resources - here.

You can also go to the Samaritans' website here, or email them on [email protected] if anything here is triggering difficult emotions for you.

And, as ever, don't hesitate to report any posts you feel we should take a look at.

All the very best from MNHQ

It’s not insensitive user it’s enormously helpful.

My total fear for my friend’s dc is growing up thinking they weren’t enough. I look at my dc and just...I just can’t. Explaining this death to my dc has been very hard. To hers? I have no words.

mountains thank you. Running is helpful, and I’m in agreement re the restorative power of clean linen.

Thanks HQ

Hi user,

We are definitely remembering the good times, his room is full of holiday pictures and days out that he had with his Daddy. We also share memories and talk daily about fun things we/they did.

He doesn’t know the word suicide yet, I have explained that Daddy had a poorly brain and none of us knew, when you have a poorly brain it can stop the chemicals working properly and when that happened to Daddy it made him do something very dangerous which meant he wouldn’t be alive anymore and that it’s important to know that if he hadn’t had a poorly brain he never would have done the dangerous thing. Essentially we are treating mental health like any other illness like cancer for example.

DS hasn’t asked what the dangerous thing was, I’m dreading when he does but will be honest. I also won’t push it and am letting him ask questions in his own time.

Mathilda that’s almost word for word what I have said to my dc about my friend (godmother, so an important person for dc).

I hope that’s how it has been explained to her dc.

You are winning at mummying, you really are.

Suicide is a very emotive and difficult subject.

A friend of mine took her own life when I was 15, she was 14. She had depression and saw no way out. She was the happiest she had ever been the weekend she died. We believe she felt peaceful once she’d made her decision to go.

I made a few suicide attempts, but mine were all desperate pleas for help. In that moment though, you really only think about ending the pain.

DH’s father took his own life when he was little, and it’s still a very very painful subject.

I don’t think you can view it as ‘how could she leave her children’ but rather ‘how much terrible pain must she have been in, to leave her children’.

Poor lady. It must have been unbearable. To the point that it was.

It’s not an easy way out, at all. We may never understand why.

Good luck as you get through this time x

It’s been more than 15 years since my brother took his own life. For a very long time I couldn’t sleep as I was hurting so much. I felt such guilt for not helping him. The pain is less now but it still hurts. Just try to be kind to yourself and take one day at a time. Xx

Thank you both Matilda and spinning, you both sound amazing ladies and mothers, I rewrote that post numerous times, sounded insensitive to me. Spinning just talk to your friends daughter, like you do normally, please don't stop talking to her or about her mum. Answer any questions she and your child have honestly in an age appropriate way, if possible. I found it really hard in losing both my brother, car crash and dad, suicide in 16 months of each other, that many people, including relatives and close friends, avoid talking to you or avoid you totally, because they don't know what to say to you.
So please treat your friend's daughter normally, she will be bewildered and lost, just talking to her, showing her people still care and they are there for her will matter more than any words you say to her.
PS I not trained or anything, that just the way I felt in my situation. Please fell free to ignore or get deleted, I won't care. to you all

Someone I knew killed themselves, after talking about it a lot in their case - we had tried to get help, but, well, that didn't work out so well.

I was surprised at how angry I was with them. Then I started thinking a lot about the last conversation I had with them and wondering if I could have said something that would have helped, that might have made a difference, just relived it over and over, picking it apart.

Of course I know that there really was nothing I could have said that would have made a difference. Nothing that would have magicked away the pain that living caused him.

OP, as well as the 4 relatives who succeeded in killing themselves, I have two more who made three unsuccessful attempts between them.
They both said that they believed they would be doing the family a favour by dying - their depression made them feel so worthless and full of self loathing that they felt nobody would miss them, and everyone would be happy that they were gone.
It’s very likely that your friend “believed” she was an awful mother, and that her children would be delighted she was dead. Depression distorts people’s thinking to a degree that is unimaginable to a healthy person.
My own closest relative who has done this finds she can hardly believe or even recall that she thought like this during her attempts.
What I’m trying to say is, don’t blame your friend for abandoning her children - she will have been firmly convinced she was acting in their best interests.

Op i have also lost someone to suicide. It is very hard. Please go to see your GP and let them help you. If you Google the Help is at Hand NHS booklet, I found it useful and it looks at all the wider network of people who suffer in these situations. Exercise has been the single most helpful thing for me. I hope you start to feel a little calmer soon.

Babdoc

I know logically it’s not her fault. I do. I’m not there yet with feeling at peace with it. Ironically, I work with teenage mental health, so I know a fair bit about it - that means nothing, it seems when dealing with this.

Anna - I’m sorry you have had this in your life. I agree that exercise is helpful. I find the “intrusive thoughts” (maybe not quite the right term, but sums it up) make motivating myself really hard though. What did your GP suggest?

My gp helped me with medication for sleep (quite subtle stuff not knockout drops), referred me for counselling which was incredibly helpful and monitored my health. Intrusive thoughts are hellish and support with them is essential IMO.

Thanks anna
Help with sleep would be good - might help me get running a bit more regularly also, if I wasn’t exhausted! There’s only so much camomile tea I can drink...

Zero in my case - can't bear camomile tea...

I am doing a lot of long walks with friends (long to me is anything over 8 miles) which is physically helpful and also lots of laughs and chatting. Swimming is great because I can cry underwater... I do yoga sometimes, never used to, but it's tricky as nothing makes me want to sob more and it mucks up the breathing.

Suicide seems like an action that the person doing it thinks will be a tiny stone slipping under the water without trace but is actually a boulder hitting a puddle. Everyone for hundreds of yards is affected.

anna that’s funny - yoga is also off limits to me because it makes me cry.

Yes - the boulder analogy is a good one. I’ve heard it described as “grief with the volume turned up”.

It’s just shit, isn’t it? There’s no way of it not being.

There is no way of it not being shit overall but there ARE things that produce better pieces of time, and good experiences that can be in your mind alongside the awful ones. It seems to be time above all though - not exactly time is a healer, though I suppose that's what it is really.