What Suicide Tells Us About Us

I have noticed that the only time suicide gets any air time in the media is when someone dies by suicide. That someone is often a celebrity. The recent focus on the passing of Anthony Bourdain and Kate Spade are two recent examples.

I know I am not alone in this feeling as I have read several articles and blogs expressing the same sentiment.

Let me clear about something. Any death by suicide is one too many. A death by suicide is tragic no matter who dies. The status or fame of the person doesn’t matter. I don’t want to make this post a conversation about celebrity death. I would rather shift the focus from celebrity to one of suicide itself.

Between 3500 and 4000 die by suicide each year in Canada. That breaks down to about 10 people a day die by suicide in Canada. Think about that for a second. Look around your place of work. Is there more than 10 people in your place of work? Think about ten of those people not being at work tomorrow. Kind of chilling isn’t it?

Why is it we pay so much attention when someone famous dies by suicide. There are so many people that die worldwide by suicide that a celebrity death isn’t that unique. The comments that are raised when a celebrity dies are not any different from those raised by any death by suicide.

“They seemed to have everything so why did they die?

“It makes no sense.”

“I didn’t know that they were suffering.”

“I don’t understand why this happened. “

Perhaps the death of a celebrity is a reminder to all of us that no one is immune to suicide.

If suicide can happen to someone that outwardly appeared to have it all, what does that mean for us? That is a scary thing to come to grips with.

We want simple answers to complicated questions. When those answers don’t come easily, we don’t know what to do. We will do what we can to create answers through research, speculation and if nothing works we make things up.

We are afraid of what we don’t understand.

Trying to understand why someone died by suicide challenges us to consider that for someone life had lost its hope and meaning. The fact that life meant nothing to someone is a daunting and scary thing for many of us to confront. Believing that things are hopeless and that life has no meaning is a very dark place that none of us want to venture into. Confronting suicide reminds us of that.

Trying to understand the why of suicide tells us something about ourselves that we are not necessarily ready to face.

I have not had anyone ask me why did I attempt, yet. I am not sure if I have an answer to that question. I may never have “the” answer to that question however I feel that it is a question we can no longer hide from.

Celebrity deaths by suicide are a tragic reminder of the issues we all face.
By focusing on the celebrity we don’t have to look at ourselves. It is safer to speculate about someone else.

Let’s stop focusing on someone else and let’s start talking to each other. Please.