I posted on twitter in response to someone else saying they don’t feel safe asking for help:
“yes…therapists often don’t get it and it can actually feel dangerous to talk to a therapist because they’re liable to lock you up when you share suicidal thoughts. That’s f***ed up. Pure and simple. Folks need to be able to talk without fear of being locked up.”
one response I got:
“Exactly. My sister told her GP she felt suicidal. The police took her away in hand cuffs.”
I said,
“thank you for sharing that …this is exactly what people need to know…who is really sick here? not your sister.”
so REALLY?? they tell us to be sure to ask for help. What do we do when there is no safe “help” available? Until we are, as a society, willing to answer that question people will continue to die without being offered a chance to share and thus process their pain.
A system that criminalizes pain rather than supporting that person with love is sick.
It’s not rational or sane to forcibly lock people up while they’re in their deepest despair. It’s not help and to call it help is double speak. It’s also a sort of gas-lighting experience to be told that you’re getting help while you are losing your freedoms.
True service: recognizing every human being as peer. I don’t like the word peer as used in the mental health field because it is, once again, divisive. Every human being has “lived experience” and we are all deeply equal. If, as professionals we are not able to bow to the wisdom of the pain in those who come to us for help, we are not helping. We need to listen and not be in fear ourselves. If we still have that much fear we shouldn’t be trying to help people in crisis. And so, the laws must change too. We are a long way off from creating safety for those in pain.
Until we embrace egalitarianism and non-hierarchical regard for every human being on the planet we will remain a troubled and sick people. When the sensitive person who is struggling risks getting locked up if they tell the truth who is insane here? Not the person in pain, I tell you. It’s the people who lock up such a person.
Liability on the part of the professional and the (mental illness system) is deemed more important than what the person actually needs. Terror, and fear drives the reactions made by the system. A loving response is what is needed…not reactivity. Who is sick here? See: Everyone is mentally ill
Those in pain must be able to talk about feeling suicidal without fear of reprisal (because yes, it’s treated like a crime – folks get locked up if they dare to discuss) people will continue to feel isolated, alone and unable to process their deepest pain. See: Forced Treatment is Coercive
Suicide need not be the final taboo…we all die…sometimes it hurts so bad people choose to check out early. It would be nice if we might learn to meet those in such pain so that it might be processed, but until we do…may those who suicide rest in the peace they were seeking.
Also published recently: When suicide ceases to be taboo there will be less suicide
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I’ve compiled a few posts that consider suicide in various ways and especially consider ways to deeply support people dealing with such inner pain.
Below are a few links to posts with excerpts from the page. I will continue to update this page as a resource and you will be able to find it in the drop-down navigation menu under the ABOUT section. The post you’re viewing now is a cut and pasted copy so as to appear on the home-page today.
Suicidal thoughts and planning: alternative ways to approach folks – Everything Matters: Beyond Meds
● DIVINE SUICIDE: Depressive Breakdown as a Call to Awakening – “I have seen far too many people in the care of social services and standard mental health care grossly retraumatized rather than helped when feeling their most vulnerable because people do not understand this loving, accepting and healing approach. It’s based in deep trust for the process of the individual who presents themselves in front of you. Listen. Love.”
● A conversation about suicide – “This conversation in the below video with Adyashanti is so refreshing. It’s absolutely true that those who are suicidal are all too often met with terror and control. Most people who feel suicidal need to talk about it. Approaching people with love and openness means NOT being terrified of that persons dark places. And not reacting in a knee-jerk and controlling manner. That has never allowed anyone to feel safe to open up about the painful vulnerability they are most assuredly experiencing when feeling suicidal.”
● Six Ways You Can Really Help Prevent Suicide – by Leah Harris “I tried to kill myself when I was 14. It wasn’t the first time. My psychiatrist had just upped my Prozac, a whole lot of unresolved early childhood trauma had flared up at puberty, and the baseline sadness and confusion I felt mushroomed into an overwhelming desire to die. The thoughts wouldn’t leave me alone: Everything I could think of circled back only to suicide. I wrote out a suicide note and made an attempt. I won’t go into the horrors of waking up alive in an emergency room where the staff was clearly annoyed they had to deal with me and my “attention seeking” behavior.”
● Living with suicidal feelings — By Will Hall “It’s time for a new understanding of suicidal feelings. Is it really best to force someone into the hospital when they are suicidal? Do suicidal feelings plus “risk factors” really mean professionals can predict whether someone might try to kill themselves? And are suicidal feelings the symptom of a treatable illness that should include medication prescription?”
● A suicide prevention poster from the Icarus Project – “Most of the suicide-prevention posters I’ve seen (admittedly not that many – the topic is still pretty taboo in our society), are aimed solely at the loved ones and close friends of the person in danger. How to recognize the signs of suicidality, who to call, etc. Somewhat helpful, I guess, but shouldn’t we be addressing, in some way, the person who is actually considering this extreme action? It’s as if the assumption is that person is beyond reason, beyond understanding (if you want to get explicit about it, not really human anymore), so there’s no point talking to him.”
● Many psychiatric symptoms remit upon drug withdrawal – including suicidal impulses – ”Something that comes up quite often in discussions with my friends and readers who have been on meds and have come off of them is how many of the “psychiatric” symptoms they were being “treated” for disappear upon discontinuation of the medications. This is widely known and experienced among those of us who have decided to stop medicating ourselves.” (**warning – rapid or cold-turkey withdrawal can often inflame psychiatric symptoms (including feelings of hurting oneself) for some time. For safer withdrawal practices see here.)
● Psychiatric Drugs as Agents of Trauma — “Drug Stress Trauma Syndrome” – ”This article is written by Charles Whitfield, MD, a psychiatrist, who has recognized the trauma these drugs can create for a very long time. It’s clearly an important read.”
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For a multitude of ideas about how to create a life filled with safe alternatives to psychiatric drugs visit the drop-down menus at the top of this page or scroll down the homepage for more recent postings.
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Great post!
I am not stupid – if I felt genuinely suicidal again the LAST thing I would do is tell anyone who might forcibly prevent me from going through with it because of ‘policy’.
yes. agreed. me too. let us find one another and get support when we need it from those we know to be safe. we do need one another and we do need to know we are safe.
Absolutely!
Simply not enough awareness of how usefully effective
an experienced therapeutic therapon can help one address
the quality, usefulness of ones I.D.B.
Reblogged this on Emerging From The Dark Night and commented:
Another imporant blog, I have experienced similar things sharing suicidal impulses with certain ‘health care’ professionals. If we feel like dying there is a valid reason and we need to be treated with empathy, openness and understanding
OOps, should be , I know what I’d” like to see happen” for my brother and though it’s not up to me, will do all I can to help him and his wife get to a better place
Thank you Monica for continuing to put such compassion and loving energy into your blog. I haven’t contacted you in years and still have your address and phone number. Always hoped someday you’d be able to feel well enough to come visit my desert home. Not to be…yet.
I continue to follow your writing regularly as I find such wisdom and comfort here. You were more helpful than you know and I cannot thank you enough for the education you’ve provided here. I am always delighted and thrilled that you continue to share your journey even when the steps seem to go backwards. So happy for you when you reach a goal you’ve set for yourself. Excited to simply know a courageous survivor/thriver as you even exists.
I find myself reviewing and going back over your archives seeking refreshers. I initially contacted you a dozen years or so ago when my young adult son demonstrated psychotic symptoms at age 21. He’s living a productive life now, though I don’t think he’s followed his dreams, he appears to be satisfied with his life and the choices have been his own. Now my eldest brother is faced with Parkinson’s disease. He’s been in hospital now for 4 months. His choices have been systematically ripped away. He walked into the hospital due to suicidal thoughts and is now in a wheel chair having ended up on a geriatric mental health unit and is imprisoned for all intents and purposes and from my perspective subjected to various forms of torture on a daily basis by staff who believes they are A) well intended and B) following dr. orders and unit policy who actually are inattentive, unobservant, discompassionate, insulting and demeaning to my brother and his wife and simply mean-spirited and dismally unaware. Working with my brother’s wife and trying to help her understand what palliative care means: comfort measures, a pleasant surrounding, kindness and available support from family and others. Food and drink if he desires it. Fluids and Oxygen if he needs it. Wound care for the bedsores he now has that are the product of neglect he’s suffered inpatient. My sister has the misconception it is simply taking everything away and leaving someone to die, to starve and slowly dehydrate and shut down. Not so. We have some work to do to get my brother out into the sunshine and fresh air again. I know what I’d like and the course ahead is one of patience and education and taking action. So again I think you for the inspiration and resources I find here due to your diligence and courage. What an excellent person you are Monica. Thank you
thank you Bonnie. It’s so good to hear your son is doing relatively well. May he also learn to follow his dreams (it’s never too late, really). And thank you for your support all these years. I’m sorry to hear about your brother. My best to you and your whole family. Much love.
Kudos “We need to listen and not be in fear ourselves. If we still have that much fear we shouldn’t be trying to help people in crisis. And so, the laws must change too. We are a long way off from creating safety for those in pain.”