A friend's untimely passing

[mythteller]

I just got the call from a friend back home. An old school chum of mine from Quebec city committed suicide last night.

I'm reeling from waves of reactionary emotion about this. Of course, I'm devastated to hear that my friend is dead (he was in his late 30s), but I'm also furious about how selfish and self-centered this course of action is. He's suffered from a few setbacks in the past year, but he had strong family support, long-term friends to lean on, and he had first-hand knowledge of the many services available to the public.

Instead, he chose to end his life in his parent's house with a pistol.

I can't imagine what must have driven him to this, but I just want to shake him and cuff him about the head. He had so much to live for, so many friends and family that loved him, and hundreds of kids who looked up to him (he was a vice-principal of a high school).

I feel bad and guilty for feeling this way, but I'm just so angry at him right now. I'm way more angry than sad, although I'm sure that will change with time. This suicide is such a betrayal of every thing he was, everything he stood for (in my mind). He could've reached out to any of us, and we would've been there to help. Instead of facing his demons, he ran away from them. He took the coward's route.

Yes, I know. It is bad form to speak ill of the dead, but these are the emotions I'm struggling with right this minute. Maybe we'll find out more of what his demons were exactly and somethings will make more sense. Maybe nothing will make sense.

Good night Guy. I'll light a candle for you tonight to guide your troubled soul. It's the least I can do for you in death since I didn't know how to help you in life.

Comments

[jdhobbes.livejournal.com]

I was being honest with the emotions I'm struggling with right now, right now in the moment. Don't tell me that I have no right to feel what I feel; they are my feelings and rather than deny them, I'm working through them. Where the fuck is YOUR compassion?

I'm sorry that my lack of character is such a disappointment to you, but keep in mind that all you know of my friend is what I put in this post, so you don't have the whole story. Deal.

I have never had a friend commit suicide before, so this is new for me. So sorry that I'm not as enlightened as you are. Bravo C. We are all so impressed with your moral outrage and your finger pointing. Give that girl a cookie.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to work out my grief by mowing children down with my snowblower.

[jdhobbes.livejournal.com]

I know it was unfair and I know that I won't feel like that later. But you can't work these things out by denying they ever come up.

This friend and I had a falling out about 12 years ago, and although I've been keeping tabs in his progress, we really haven't spoken much at all. But I never wished this on him.

I'm angry that he didn't let his support network help him. I'm angry that I couldn't have worked out our problems and have been a better friend. If that's selfish, then I'm selfish. With time, I'll probably move past it and learn. But right now, this is where I am.

[hoppibadge.livejournal.com]

I get that. But grief is about *your* loss. Yes, it *is* absolutely normal for grief to be about the person grieving, and it *is* normal for anger to be part of that process.

But dying of suicide triggers a character assassination that dying of cancer doesn't. There's this big myth about people's support networks being all ready and willing to help if only the person who died had let them. They're not. If you're lucky, there might be a few people around you who have it in their own character to actually see, understand, and help. And even they might not be enough.

If it will help you, perhaps leave the cause of his death aside for now. You dealt with feelings of loss, including lost opportunity, when your cousin died - though the nature of his illness gave a chance for closure in his lifetime that this doesn't. Maybe it will help you to just process the loss itself first, before taking on the circumstances.