September is Suicide Prevention Month, spotlighting the critical need to address this often-stigmatized issue. Suicide represents a tragic contradiction to our instinct to survive, driven by temporary struggles that feel insurmountable. With depression being the leading cause, breaking the stigma around mental health is vital. Open conversations and treatment can offer hope and support. If you or someone you know is struggling, reach out to the SADAG Suicide Crisis Helpline at 0800 567 567.
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By David Gemmell
The paradox of suicide is, it is an irreversible, permanent solution to what is inevitably, a temporary problem. It is also an absolute contradiction to the inherent instinct that every living thing has to stay alive at all costs.
If someone held your head under water, eventually you would kick, scratch, bite and do everything in your power to get another breath. And it would be instinctive – your body wants to live. Yet someone committing suicide effectively holds their own head under water, until they drown.
At last count, I have lost 4 good friends and about 10 acquaintances to suicide. In the friends’ cases I had no idea any of them suffered from depression. In all of them, my first reaction, which I think is probably the universal response, was of surprise and shock.
And nothing emerged as sufficient reason for any of them to kill themselves in the aftermath of all the cases.
In 2015, I had a heart attack while training at Virgin Active in Bryanston. Fortunately for me there was a doctor training on a machine next to me. He jump-started my heart with a defibrillator machine they had in the gym and saved my life. Four years later he committed suicide. I am only able to write this article because of him, and yet he is no more. What a devastating shock that was.
It is an enormously complex issue, but as this is suicide PREVENTION MONTH – how can it be prevented, given anyone contemplating, (known as suicide ideation) taking their own life, rarely broadcasts their intention to do so? And 700,000 people took their own lives last year. That is one every forty-five seconds.
Given depression is the number one reason for suicide, perhaps it is a good place to start. One of the biggest obstacles to people getting treatment for depression is, because many of them feel there is a stigma to having depression, they are reluctant to admit they suffer from it. They don’t or won’t talk about it.
Inevitably by not talking about it, it is going to get worse. Because they won’t admit to suffering from it, no-one thinks of counselling or assisting them to deal with it. So, the first drive must be to get rid of any stigma attached to having depression. It must be seen as being another illness, and like other illnesses, it must be treated.
By de-stigmatising depression, people who suffer from it will realise it is not an identity, it is an experience. It is not someone you are, but rather something you go through. It is not permanent, no matter how much it feels like it is.
Interestingly on the SADAG (South African Depression and Anxiety Group) website, across the landing page it has the word HOPE, in capitals. When someone suffers from depression, their biggest fear is there is no way out from this terrible condition. The word Hope signifies there is one.
The success rate for different treatments to combat depression usually depends on who you are talking to – but there is more and more acceptance the treatments for depression have considerable success, regardless of the severity. At the very worst depression can be managed, just as people manage their cholesterol levels, blood pressure and diabetes, etc.
For some reason a lot of people are loath to admit to being on anti-depressants, or ‘happy pills’, as they are sometimes disparagingly known as. But people take pills for so many ailments and are not embarrassed by it. So why be uncomfortable because you are on anti-depressants, which are essentially for a body part, your brain?
If any one has ever met a suicide’s family, it is the most awful experience. They blame themselves for not picking up possible signs; they blame themselves for not being seen by the person taking their own life, as being available to talk and listen and perhaps help in some way; they blame themselves; blame themselves…and blame themselves.
The saddest description of suicide I have come across is:
It is taking whatever is tormenting you, multiplying it by 10, and leaving it for your loved ones to deal with, because you have taken yourself out of the equation. Rather than take your own life – call SADAG’s Suicide Crisis Helpline 0800 567 567 and talk to someone.
It’s easier and way, way less traumatic for everyone.
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*David Gemmell: As a Freelance writer I write for various publications. I have written a biography on Father Stan Brennan, the priest who buried Chris Hani and a bestseller on Joost van der Westhuizen. I’m also a freelance editor for an ad agency, whose clients include Nando’s, SAB, and Nedbank. Currently I am writing a book on Depression. In doing so I have put a talk together about aspects of depression I was either unaware of or feel people should know more about.
