The sounds of suicide

Please be aware that this post speaks of suicide; if you feel you may be triggered please do not read on

It seems like there is an awareness day for everything these days, my favourite, which is coincidentally my birthday, is May the 3^rd, ‘National lumpy rug awareness day’. However, this post is about something that is close to my heart, World suicide prevention day. 

There is still stigma. Lets be honest here, the majority of those reading this blog will automatically feel a little uncomfortable already, you may be sweating a little and looking round to see if anyone is peering over your shoulder to see what you are reading. If that’s you, please keep reading.

No matter what some posts lead you to believe, suicide and being suicidal is not pretty or heroic, nor is it a trend that should be followed. It’s not a beautiful way for a life to end.

It’s brutal.

Its weeks/months/years of a war inside your mind. It’s fighting with the thought of who you would hurt if you ended your life and the feeling that you just can’t carry on.

It’s putting on a smile, but wanting to break down in tears. Or the feeling of being so numb that functioning just seems impossible.

It’s crying and screaming and whimpering in the middle of the night.

It’s being in a sea of despair, drowning in your own thoughts, whilst everyone else has a lifeboat.

And it can affect anyone. Every single person in this world is at risk of feeling suicidal. Nobody is immune.

Let’s look at the statistics. In the UK, those at the highest risk of suicide are men aged 45-49. In England, the female suicide rate is at it’s highest since 2005. And the scariest thing? An article published by the BBC last week spoke of how childline receives 53 UK calls a day from children who are suicidal, 19481 calls, a figure that has doubled in the past 5 years. Every 40 seconds someone ends their life, this has to change.

So what are we doing about this? It’s sad, but too often a blind eye is turned, responsibility is passed on to someone else and nobody is any better for it.

When thinking about writing this post, I asked some friends what made life a little more bearable when they were thinking about ending their life. For those of you who are lucky enough to have never entertained the idea of ending their life, please read this, you never know when you will meet someone who may need you. For those of you who may be suicidal, I’m not going to tell you to smile; because I know telling you to smile is not going to make things better. Its not going to fix things, it’s not going to make your mental health perfect and make you want to skip through fields of rainbows and butterflies.

Instead, I’m going to tell you that there are people that love and appreciate you. I’m going to remind you that this is such a small fraction of such a large life and you have a future in this world. I’m going to tell you that if you need to talk, I’m here, but if you need your space, you got it. I’m gonna ask you to go and talk to the ones you love, go see your kids, go see your friends smile. But most of all I’m going to tell you that it’s absolutely okay to be sad, but at the same time you totally deserve happiness.

If you are reading this and you are having thoughts to end your life, I want you do one thing, I want you carry on. It may seem impossible; it may seem like the most difficult task in the world. But I want to give you the hope that its okay not to be okay, you can get through this. Hope is what led to women being given rights. Hope is what got a man to the moon. Hope is what gets people all over the world through the day.

Hope is what is going to make things slightly more bearable.

I believe in you.

Samaritans – 116 123

Childline – 0800 1111