Death of a loved one is difficult to deal with, but suicide can be even more devastating for family, friends and acquaintances.
The 12th annual National Survivors of Suicide Day is celebrated Nov. 20 to support survivors of suicide loss in a “day of healing,” according to the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention’s website.
“It was created by resolution of the United States Senate,” said Joanne Harpel, the director of survivor initiatives for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. “Senator Harry Reid of Nevada lost his father to suicide and so the Senate passed a resolution declaring the Saturday before Thanksgiving to be National Survivors of Suicide Day.”
The day was created in 1999.
“Because there is still unfortunately stigma attached to suicide in many places, oftentimes families that lose a loved one to suicide don’t talk about it very openly and don’t know anyone else who’s been through this experience,” Harpel said. “It provides an opportunity for survivors of suicide loss to feel less alone, to have a sense of community, to meet other survivors, to get information and guidance about how to manage this loss and cope with it based on what’s worked for other people.”
Suicide loss is such a sensitive topic, but she said she has gotten positive feedback for the day.
“It’s certainly very emotional, but overwhelmingly they feel incredible gratitude,” Harpel said. “For many people this is the first time they’ve ever met anyone else who’s been through this experience, and so they find it incredibly comforting and they also find it very informative.”
There are 250 conferences available around the world in order to support survivors of suicide, and those can be found on the website.
According to the American Association of Suicidology, 2007 statistics that were released this year found that “suicide is the eleventh leading cause of death” in the U.S. and that although males complete suicide more often than females, “females attempt suicide three times more often than males.”
According to the association, suicides are more likely associated with those who have mental disorders.
“Psychological autopsy studies reflect that more than 90 percent of completed suicides had one or more mental disorders,” according to an association fact sheet, and those with mental disorders like depression, schizophrenia and drug or chemical dependency are more at risk.
Harpel said that using the words “committed suicide” can be offensive.
“A lot of survivors of suicide loss find that term very upsetting because the word committed is associated with things like sins and crimes and they feel it has a negative connotation,” Harpel said, and language like “took his or her life” and “died by suicide” is preferred.
Although the focus of the day is not for suicide prevention, it still can be useful for awareness.
“It does certainly raise awareness about the toll that suicide takes and about how important it is to talk openly about it and not continue to stigmatize suicide,” Harpel said.
She said the day is more for bereavement support.
“Our goal every year is to give every person who watches the program or attends the conference something that resonates for them,” Harpel said.
This year, she said there is a discussion about military suicide, and the program hopes to “raise some awareness about the tragedy of suicide loss in the military and the effect on the families,” she said.
The programs can be helpful for women, she said.
“The focus is on sharing your emotions and talking openly and coming together as a community,” Harpel said. “That kind of approach tends to be extremely comfortable for most women.”
However, she said women should realize that not everyone deals with suicide loss in the same way.
“If they find that their husbands, for example, are not talking about it as frequently or as openly as they are ... that’s fine,” Harpel said.
Henry M. Seiden, a clinical psychologist in New York and co-author of “Silent Grief: Living in the Wake of Suicide,” said that not everyone could be benefited in the same way by this day.
“I think people should have the opportunity to decide for themselves how and in what way they’d want to participate in such a thing,” Seiden said. “The general principle on shame, which is what is a core dynamic in suicide, is that when shame is out in the open, it becomes detoxified.”
He said it is important to find someone who can listen.
“What we generally recommend is that you talk about it and that you find somebody who knows how to listen to you and talk to somebody who knows how to listen,” Seiden said. “When you do keep it inside, by and large it kind of festers.”
However, as he said, “Different strokes for different folks.”
“You do need some kind of processing of traumatic experiences, and having a loved one commit suicide is a traumatic experience,” Seiden said.
“The problem of trauma is that if it’s left unprocessed, it doesn’t go away,” Seiden said. “Time does not heal all wounds.”
For example, he said he talked to a man whose son committed suicide around 40 years ago.
“It was as if it was yesterday,” Seiden said, including the same guilt, pain and shame.
One issue survivors of suicide can deal with is self-blame.
“People feel that their love was not good enough to keep the dead person alive,” Seiden said, and that they did or said something wrong.
This can lead to depression, anger, guilt and blaming others for the suicide.
“They may well have been quite angry with the person who committed suicide,” Seiden said. “Typically people who commit suicide have been difficult to live with when they were alive ... people were angry at them and people were rejecting them.”
This can cause survivors to “feel terrible.”
“People who commit suicide are typically desperate to solve problems that they can’t imagine any other way of solving and so they come to this because they can’t think of any other way to fix what’s going on,” Seiden said. “If you have the opportunity to intervene before the suicide happens, you try and help people see that there are some other alternative ways of solving the problem.”
Sources: http://www.afsp.org/index.cfm?page_id=fee7d778-cf08-cb44-da1285b6bbcf366e
http://www.suicidology.org/web/guest/stats-and-tools/fact-sheets
http://www.nimh.nih.gov/health/publications/suicide-in-the-us-statistics-and-prevention/index.shtml#risk