Thoughts from a Therapist About Suicide

Thoughts from a Therapist

By Shannon Petrovich, LCSW, LISAC, BCD

Two shocking headline suicides in one week, and many heads are spinning trying to understand what happened and how friends and family might have prevented these tragedies. The answers are many and complex and there are plenty of researched papers with APA footnotes and all of that; this is not one of those. Instead, these are some thoughts based on my 30 years of practice as a therapist.

“Pain in this world is inevitable; misery, however, is optional.” I had a professor in Grad school who said this more times than I could count, and he spent many lectures fleshing out what he meant by it. In essence, he was saying that we are going to face a lot of hard times in our lives, but we don’t have to fall into a dark pit of misery. We can learn to be resilient, to plow through, to not think in catastrophic terms, to not become overwhelmed. We can persist, surf the waves, rather than getting rolled under by the curler and ground into the sand.

The hardest part is that when you’re in that churning wave, you can’t see the sky and often don’t even know which way is up; you often feel like you can’t breathe and are so overwhelmed you don’t see a way out. As a therapist, a large part of my job is to help people re-orient, find their way to the surface, take a breath, and then to reframe their misery into just plain pain. Then to help them cope with that pain until it subsides, and eventually to feel joy and fulfillment in their lives.

Often the most important thing a person needs to know and to feel is that they matter. Perhaps this is the one most important and ultimate question in life; Do I matter, to anyone or anything, and is there a purpose for my life? Furthermore, do I matter enough to make it worthwhile to work through this immediate pain or difficulty? We can think back to the studies of baby monkeys who were taken from their mothers and died, even if they had all their other essential basic needs met. We are the same; we need to be connected to others and to know we matter to those around us. We need it as much as we need food and water. And, Sadly, this isn’t accomplished through our technological connections; we need real human connectedness.

In our very material and secular culture, our sense of meaning and purpose has largely been lost. We don’t focus on it, and we don’t understand that having a sense of meaning and purpose is another critically important basic human need. One of the major problems is that in our current culture we believe we will be happier if make this amount of money (always more than we are currently making), or we accomplish this, or purchase that, or get accepted by or belong to such and such college, group or clique. These are largely empty adornments that give us a momentary buzz and then fade. If we are empty inside, what does it matter if we put on a fine suit or drive a sweet car? It doesn’t. And therein lies one of the main lies that we fight. When rich and famous people suicide and everyone says, “they had it all”, we are all re-validating that lie; that they had everything they needed; when obviously what they really needed was missing.

The other problem within this mindset and with many of our cultural messages, is the largely self-centered and self-focused thinking. We are taught and encouraged to focus on these self-absorbed goals and achievements, and yet, we are just not built to be fulfilled and happy with this self-centered living. Strange but true. When we are self-centered and continually looking for that thing, or high, or whatever, to make us happy, we are a hamster in a wheel; running and running and getting nothing but exhausted. And when the reality of that emptiness comes crashing in, despair takes its place.

But the solution is not to run faster; it’s to get off the wheel and re-assess everything we are doing and everything we are thinking; and to redefine what will make us happy. This should bring us back to some basic truths.

The truth is that what makes us feel like we matter is when we matter to others. But wait, didn’t we spend the entire 80’s learning to love ourselves and stop being codependent? Yeah, but we lost sight of the truth of our interdependence. A 16-year-old client once told me, “I felt happy today for the first time in forever. And the weirdest thing was that it was because I was there for someone else. I sat and talked to Joe for an hour and he felt better, and I suddenly realized that I actually felt happy! I had no idea I could feel happy by being there for someone else; and it was a better feeling than any drug I ever took, or any party I ever went to.” (and he had done every drug and been to many parties!).

As the Beatles said, “We need somebody to love.”

A study on intractable depression was done with a bunch of psychologists and therapists who were challenged to help a bunch of super-depressed people who no one had been able to help. The one psychologist who succeeded simply gave his client a violet plant and asked her to water it every day. The following week he showed her how to grow more plants from that one. And in subsequent weeks, he asked her to give one away every week. This woman who had been severely depressed for years, got better. The therapist had created a situation where she had to care for the violet; then she had to find someone to connect with enough to give them a violet; and then each recipient became a grateful neighbor, who began to know her and care about her and to see her differently than they had seen her when she was a recluse in her apartment.

There is also the issue of how we treat ourselves. If we verbally berate ourselves internally when we are stressed, or sad, or angry, or hurt, then the natural course and end result of that is to spiral down into a dark pit of self-destruction whenever we are challenged. We all need to speak more gently to ourselves, encourage ourselves, talk to ourselves the way we talk to our best friend when he or she is down. We need to learn to nurture ourselves and enrich our lives; we need to take breaks by going for a walk in a natural setting, appreciating beauty and simplicity, breathing in of the great outdoors, relaxing. If we have no ability to wind ourselves down, then we will be increasingly wound up. If we use substances; (prescribed or illegal) to calm ourselves, we will always need more and more, and they will become less and less effective. Gradually, we will be using just to get up in the morning, and using other things to get to sleep. This all leads to a numb existence that challenges us to then do other self-destructive things in order to feel something which ultimately ends in despair.

It breaks my heart that Kate Spade and Anthony Bourdain’s children will grow up without them. The legacy and the sadness in that is so profound it’s difficult to find words. I have had clients whose parents have suicided and they suffer with that loss more than anyone can fathom. The depressed person’s immediate act of getting out of their pain creates a suffering for their children that will last a lifetime. I have often in very blunt terms, driven that point home with a client who is suicidal; letting them know that this pain will not last forever but if you check out, your children’s pain will be ongoing. A child cannot help but feel they were not important enough to keep their parent here; they will question their mattering for a long time to come.

I have also had clients who have had a child who suicided; The complex grief of people who have been so close to someone who suicides is a grief like no other.

A suicidal person is often very self-focused. Their pain is overwhelming at the time and we need to empathize and support them in feeling and processing it. At the same time, it is critical to help that person see that this pain is temporary; and the decision to suicide is permanent. I will sometimes say they have to love their children/parents/friends, enough to tough out this period of sadness and pain.

A year ago, a woman came into my office in so much emotional and physical pain she wanted very much to end her life. She was, in fact, determined to do it. Over the following weeks, I listened to her work through the worst of her fears and frustrations. She began to see and feel hope that she would someday feel better. She began to know that, “this too shall pass” and to realize that ending her life would never pass for her husband and son. She regained enough of a sense of connectedness and purpose that she settled into the fight for her life instead of against it. The fight has been tough but she’s been tougher. Today she is intensely grateful that she is still around to raise her son. She can hardly believe or imagine that she was in such despair that she would even consider suicide. She is blown away that she almost did that to her loved ones; and the thought that she would not be here for them is simply unthinkable. I share this to help others realize that what seems impossible to face and overcome today, will someday be a distant memory in your rear-view mirror.

It’s very important to let a person know; ‘You feel so much pain and so much despair right now, but feelings change while the act of suicide is permanent.’ ‘It will forever scar those who love you and those who care about you. It will also give them the message that when the going gets tough, give up, bail out, escape in whatever way you can.’ This message to children of people who suicide often leads to generational legacies of suicidality.

People often are afraid that if they are direct with someone about suicide, that will “make them do it.” Nothing could be further from the truth. I am very blunt with clients and they always tell me later that is just what they needed to hear. I tell them the often basic and important truths; that they matter; that this momentary decision will last a lifetime for those who love them; that they can and will get through whatever this is, and they will learn to feel joy through meaning and purpose; that when this fog of pain lifts, they will be amazed they even considered suicide, and they will be glad and grateful to still be here; that they need to borrow other’s view of them as valuable and lovable until they feel it themselves.

If you are struggling I hope these words have been helpful; reach out, connect, don’t give up, you are worth it. If your work is people-connected, notice each day and in every way that you connect with and help others. If you are isolated, volunteer; find places that need you, and then notice being there for others in small and grand ways.

If someone you know is struggling;

Reach out, reach in, connect, listen, be present, and let those you love know that they matter!

For everyone; Please sit back and take stock; challenge the pursuit of emptiness; the things, the substances, the accomplishments which truly don’t feed our inner beings; and encourage yourself and others to find more genuine connectedness and fulfillment.