The Final Frontier

 According to Star Trek, space is the final frontier. But there is another journey, on which I am in no hurry to embark, that presents the true and final frontier: Death.

While death will come to all, we have insufficient information about our existence after death and we lack universal agreement about our post-death condition.  There is, however, one aspect of death where I have found near universal agreement: Suicide.  When one person decides to end his life those who survive feel that loss and see it as wrong and an unnecessary act.  Those who remain are left feeling empty and questioning: Why?, What should I have known, done, or said?  What if? If only.

For all of us who have dealt with loss from suicide there are things that we can do to help prevent those we know and love from taking that action.  A clinician from Spain has suggested that suicide results when the pain we feel is greater than the resources we have to deal with that pain.  I find that description both simple and profound.  This same clinician would be the first to express that there is no one sentence explanation to suicide and likewise there is no single solution to the phenomenon.

But as I consider those two-step conditions before suicide occurs it gives me ideas how I can help others choose life rather than their own death.  The first step is to recognize those who are in pain and then identify the source of that pain.   As one who represents children who have been abused and neglected in their family homes I come across young men and women, and sometimes much younger children, who express suicidal ideation.   I have a renewed awareness to make certain that we have identified the causes of their pain.

It is easy for us to assume the causes of that pain.  The removal from their home life and their family and friends.   Some have experienced physical and sexual abuse.  Others have simply been unattended and neglected and the change in circumstances and expectations are so much that they begin to consider death as a legitimate option.  But when we discover the true source of that pain we are then able to to treat it.

But while we are searching to identify the source of their pain so we need to provide the tools and resources so that they can deal with that pain.  Some of those resources include therapeutically prescribed skills of relaxation, biofeedback and other self soothing techniques. Sometimes it is obvious family support  and not leaving them alone.  We also need to make sure that the individual feels needed and useful.  While counterintuitive, often the best key to suicide prevention is to give someone a responsibility so that they feel important, acknowledged, needed, wanted and loved.

Through the pain resolution and resource development processes we stand ready and prepared to act in support as we avoid unnecessary loss through death and find joy in life.