Need for reason. "What if" questions may arise after any death. So the feelings of anger, rejection, and abandonment that occur after many deaths are especially intense and difficult to sort out after a suicide. On the other hand, the act may seem like an assault on or rejection of those left behind. On one hand, a person who dies by suicide may appear to be a victim of mental illness or intolerable circumstances. In a suicide, the victim is the perpetrator, so there is a bewildering clash of emotions. Mixed emotions. After a homicide, survivors can direct their anger at the perpetrator. In addition, if relatives blame one another - thinking perhaps that particular actions or a failure to act may have contributed to events - that can greatly undermine a family's ability to provide mutual support. The decision to keep the suicide a secret from outsiders, children, or selected relatives can lead to isolation, confusion, and shame that may last for years or even generations. Family differences over how to publicly discuss the death can make it difficult even for survivors who want to speak openly to feel comfortable doing so. There's still a powerful stigma attached to mental illness (a factor in most suicides), and many religions specifically condemn the act as a sin, so survivors may understandably be reluctant to acknowledge or disclose the circumstances of such a death. Stigma, shame, and isolation. Suicide can isolate survivors from their community and even from other family members. In PTSD, the trauma is involuntarily re-lived in intrusive images that can create anxiety and a tendency to avoid anything that might trigger the memory. Some suicide survivors develop post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), an anxiety disorder that can become chronic if not treated. You may have recurring thoughts of the death and its circumstances, replaying the final moments over and over in an effort to understand - or simply because you can't get the thoughts out of your head. But it can add to the trauma if people feel that they don't have a choice," says Jack Jordan, Ph.D., clinical psychologist and co-author of After Suicide Loss: Coping with Your Grief. "Either may be the right decision for an individual. Sometimes officials will discourage the visit as too upsetting at other times, you may be told you'll be grateful that you didn't leave it to your imagination. While you are still in shock, you may be asked whether you want to visit the death scene. Depending on the situation, survivors may need to deal with the police or handle press inquiries. For example:Ī traumatic aftermath. Death by suicide is sudden, sometimes violent, and usually unexpected. But several circumstances set death by suicide apart and make the grief process more challenging. The death of a loved one is never easy to experience, whether it comes without warning or after a long struggle with illness. Grief after suicide is different, but there are many resources for survivors, and many ways you can help the bereaved. And when others know the circumstances of the death, they may feel uncertain about how to offer help. Survivors may be reluctant to confide that the death was self-inflicted. Suicide is a difficult subject to contemplate. People coping with this kind of loss often need more support than others, but may get less. The grief process is always difficult, but a loss through suicide is like no other, and the grieving can be especially complex and traumatic. Every one of these deaths leaves an estimated six or more "suicide survivors" - people who've lost someone they care about deeply and are left with their grief and struggle to understand why it happened. People bereaved by a suicide often get less support because it's hard for them to reach out - and because others are unsure how to help.Įvery year in the United States, more than 45,000 people take their own lives.
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