A moment of sadness
here in my corner of the world.
A friend from work died - suicide.
It brings up so many thoughts:
"Did I miss something?"
"Could I have helped if I'd known?"
Now there are no answers.
Sometimes things lurk inside
when no one else has a clue.
Unanswered questions
are often the hardest
to live with.
Whatever your troubles, Alex,
I wish you had reached out.
"In the U.S., suicide rates are highest during the spring. Suicide is the 3rd leading cause of death for 15 to 24-year-olds and 2nd for 24 to 35-year-olds. On average, 1 person commits suicide every 16.2 minutes. Each suicide intimately affects at least 6 other people."
National Suicide Prevention Lifeline
Call 1-800-273-8255
Available 24 hours everyday
Heartfelt sympathies at the loss of your friend.
ReplyDeleteThanks, John. It's never an easy subject, and the most unknowable answer is to the question "Could I have made a difference if only .... ?" *hugs*
ReplyDeleteThe author David Foster Wallace committed suicide. He also wrote about it and this is what I wonder about. What is that other terror? Could I have helped? Here's what he said.
ReplyDeleteThe so-called ‘psychotically depressed’ person who tries to kill herself doesn’t do so out of quote ‘hopelessness’ or any abstract conviction that life’s assets and debits do not square. And surely not because death seems suddenly appealing. The person in whom Its invisible agony reaches a certain unendurable level will kill herself the same way a trapped person will eventually jump from the window of a burning high-rise. Make no mistake about people who leap from burning windows. Their terror of falling from a great height is still just as great as it would be for you or me standing speculatively at the same window just checking out the view; i.e. the fear of falling remains a constant. The variable here is the other terror, the fire’s flames: when the flames get close enough, falling to death becomes the slightly less terrible of two terrors. It’s not desiring the fall; it’s terror of the flames. And yet nobody down on the sidewalk, looking up and yelling ‘Don’t!’ and ‘Hang on!’, can understand the jump. Not really. You’d have to have personally been trapped and felt flames to really understand a terror way beyond falling.”
― David Foster Wallace
"A certain unendurable level" ... I will always wonder what that point was for Alex. But it also serves as a reminder that we should all treat each other better, build each other up, reach out when someone's hurting. Sad that it takes a tragedy to help us each remember that we're not perfect, and we should strive to do better.
DeleteThanks for sharing! ~Gal