"Looking at the facts about suicide attempts"/ "After the war"

These are articles about suicide.  You may find this to be too sad to read, so you can skip to the "my week" part.

Nov. 24, 2016 "Looking at the facts about suicide attempts": Today I found this article by Jane E. Brody in the Globe and Mail:

My family is no stranger to suicide and suicide attempts, and we are not alone. To recount just two instances:

A 20-year-old nephew, after receiving a very caring letter from his sister-in-law explaining why she could not be his lover, went to his room, shot himself in the head and died.

A beloved uncle, who had been plagued for years by bouts of severe depression that alternated with mild mania, was seen at a major hospital psychiatric clinic on a Friday and told to come back on Monday. Instead, he took every pill in the house and lay down on a rock jetty in the ocean waiting to die. Luckily, he was found alive by the police, and after hospitalization, a proper diagnosis and treatment for bipolar disorder, he lived into his 80s.

Suicide surpasses homicide in this country. Every 13 minutes someone in the United States dies by his own hand, making suicide the nation’s 10th leading cause of death over all (42,773 deaths in 2015), but second among those aged 15 to 34. Among children aged 10 to 14, the suicide rate has caught up to the death rate from traffic accidents.

Many times that number – more than a million adults and 8 percent of high school students — attempt suicide each year, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Yet a woeful minority receive the kind of treatment and attention needed to keep them from repeating a suicide attempt.

A common yet highly inaccurate belief is that people who survive a suicide attempt are unlikely to try again. In fact, just the opposite is true. Within the first three months to a year following a suicide attempt, people are at highest risk of a second attempt — and this time perhaps succeeding.

A recent analysis of studies that examined successful suicides among those who made prior attempts found that one person in 25 had a fatal repeat attempt within five years.

Now a new study reveals just how lethal suicide attempts, as a risk factor for completed suicide, are. The study, led by Dr. J. Michael Bostwick, a psychiatrist at the Mayo Clinic, tracked all first suicide attempts in one county in Minnesota that occurred between January 1986 and December 2007 and recorded all the deaths by suicide for up to 25 years thereafter.

 Eighty-one of the 1,490 people who attempted suicide, or 5.4 percent, died by suicide, 48 of them in their first attempt. The findings were reported in the American Journal of Psychiatry.

When all who succeeded in killing themselves were counted, including those who died in their first attempt, the fatality rate among suicide attempters was nearly 59 percent higher than had been previously reported.

“No one had included people who died on their first recorded attempt, so it’s not in the medical literature,” Dr. Bostwick explained in an interview. “That almost two-thirds end up at the medical coroner after a first attempt is astounding. We need to rethink how we look at the data and the phenomenon of suicide. We need to know more and do more for those who will complete suicide before they get to us for any kind of help.”

The study also showed that the odds of successfully committing suicide are 140 times greater when a gun is used than for any other method. Dr. Bostwick said that most suicide attempts are “impulsive acts, and it’s critical to prevent access to tools that make impulsive attempts more deadly.

“Suicide attempters often have second thoughts, but when a method like a gun works so effectively, there’s no opportunity to reconsider,” he said.

In an accompanying editorial entitled “You seldom get a second chance with a gunshot,” Dr. Merete Nordentoft, a mental health specialist in Copenhagen, and her co-authors wrote that “a suicidal act is the result of a temporary state of the mind.” 

Given “the high lethality of guns,” they urged that availability should be restricted through such measures as “legal restrictions regarding permission to purchase firearms, waiting periods, safe storage, background checks and registration guidelines.” Such measures have been linked to decreased rates of firearm suicides.

“Most people who attempt suicide change their mind,” they wrote, adding that “most often, firearms do not allow for a change of mind or medical attention to arrive in time. It is, thus, alarming that 21,175 (51 percent) persons who died by suicide in the U.S. in 2013 used firearms.”

In the Minnesota study, men were more than five times as likely to die by suicide as women; they were also more likely to use a gun. However, women who used guns were as likely to die as a result as were the men.

Equally if not more important to preventing successful suicide is paying attention to premonitory signs of suicidal intent and taking appropriate action to diffuse it. People who are depressed, who abuse substances like alcohol or illegal drugs or are having serious relationship difficulties should be considered high risk, Dr. Bostwick said.

In urging practicing physicians to pay more attention to the mental health of their patients, Dr. Catherine Goertemiller Carrigan and Denis J. Lynch wrote in the Primary Care Companion Journal of Clinical Psychiatry that “over 90 percent of persons who commit suicide have diagnosable psychiatric illness at the time of death.”

Psychiatrists, too, need to pay more attention to physical ills, they wrote. “Up to 50 percent of patients with psychiatric complaints have been found to harbor unrecognized medical illnesses that may have contributed to their mental deterioration,” yet fewer than one in five psychiatrists routinely perform physical examinations.

But more often than not, family members and friends are in the best position to spot a potential suicide and take steps to head it off.

 In addition to depression and substance abuse, signs include making statements (verbal or written) of being better off dead; withdrawing from family and friends; feeling helpless, hopeless, enraged, trapped, excessively guilty or ashamed; losing interest in most activities; acting impulsively or recklessly; and giving away prized possessions.

Most important is to take the person or your suspicions seriously and get immediate professional help even if the person resists. Unless you are a mental health professional, don’t assume you can talk the person out of suicidal intent.

For those who attempt suicide, the chances of a subsequent suicidal death are greatly reduced if one or more follow-up appointments are scheduled, and even further reduced if the person keeps the appointments, Dr. Bostwick said.

After a Suicide Attempt, the Risk of Another Try

After a Suicide Attempt, the Risk of Another Try By Jane E. Brody More than a million adults and 8 percent of high school students attempt to take their own lives, and many will ...

Dec. 6, 2016: Today I see there are 127 comments.

May 10, 2019 Suicide on TV:

Dark Angel: There was an ep called "Art Attack."  Max saves a guy from jumping off a building.  This job deal didn't work out and he was going to commit suicide.

Max: So you're going to leave your wife and daughter behind?
Max does find that blueprint for him so he could get the job deal.

Amber Portwood: She was on 16 and Pregnant and Teen Mom.  She was on Dr. Phil in 2013.  She talked about her suicide attempt.

Dr. Phil: What about your daughter?
Amber: I thought she was better off without me.

Cheaters:  I don't know when I saw this.  Maybe like 2003-2005?  There was an ep where this black guy who had a white girlfriend.  He finds out she's cheating on him with this other black guy.  In the confrontation, the other guy pulls out a gun.  The Cheaters crew runs back inside their car.

Boyfriend (who was cheated on): I feel like I should get shot.
Joey Greco (the host): Yeah, well then what about your daughter?  Who's going to take care of her?
Boyfriend: I don't know.  Family, foster care.
Joey: Yeah, and that's why you should stay alive for your daughter.

The guy didn't have kids with his GF.

My opinion: Even if you don't have kids, your family and friends would be hurt by your death.

Would they be more hurt if you died by accident or by suicide?

Mar. 8, 2018 "After the war": Today I found this book excerpt by Stephane Grenier in the Globe and Mail:

After continuing to think about suicide for many days and nights I decided that hanging was probably the best method. It was summertime in Cantley, and sugar bush season was over. Like many people in rural Quebec, Julie and I had a sugar shack – a little shed where we boiled maple sap – in our backyard. But aside from her throwing an annual spring party in it, I was the only one who ever used it. It was the perfect place. I could lock myself in and ensure that no one would stumble upon my body after I did the deed.

One Saturday afternoon I came up with a plan: I would write an e-mail to the police on my cell phone, giving them my address and the details of where they could find me and send it just before I hanged myself. I went to the garage, got a rope and a ladder, and brought it to the sugar shack. Julie was busy inside the house doing her usual weekend chores. She was accustomed to seeing me busy myself with home projects and wouldn't have thought anything about seeing me carry a rope and ladder.

Once I was in the shack I locked the door, positioned the ladder, and tied the rope to one of the large ceiling beams. I double checked the knots and then came back down to look up the contact information for the local police. Once I found their e-mail address I wrote a polite message saying that I had just committed suicide and I concluded by apologizing for putting them through such a traumatic event. This might sound strange to those who've never had suicidal thoughts, but as I double-checked my preparations a feeling of complete contentedness came over me. I felt relieved that soon I wouldn't have to cope with the thoughts that had plagued me for years – the little girl with her head chopped into pieces, the little boy who'd been shot, the piles of bodies and the confusion that so often accompanied these visions.

Many people misunderstand PTSD. They think that when a trigger occurs the person freaks out and that when there are no triggers the person is fine. My experience was very different. For me, triggers were easy to deal with once I knew how. It was, rather, the exhaustion of trying to pretend I was okay that got to me. I felt an intense weight pushing down on me and I could no longer remember what the point of life was. Unsurprisingly, I was also riddled with guilt over the genocide in Rwanda, and what, if anything, we could've done differently. 

Words fail me when I try to describe these feelings, but somehow I felt like my reality was not the same as everyone else's. I could try my best to be a good husband, father and friend, but I could never truly enjoy life, even though I knew I should. That feeling became my norm. Most days I held it together because I knew I needed to for Julie and the kids, but over time it became more and more difficult to maintain the façade.

After a final check of my e-mail to the police I was about to proceed when I heard a noise outside – footsteps in the gravel leading to the shack. As the steps got progressively louder I heard Julie calling my name. She sounded nervous. Maybe she was worried because the doors were closed: somehow, she always had a sixth sense for when things weren't right. 

Sure enough, she peered in through the window, saw the ladder and rope, and panicked.

She started yelling frantically as she cupped her hands over her face and looked inside. I froze as her gaze met mine, like a kid who'd been caught red-handed doing something he wasn't supposed to. Right away my thoughts of suicide were replaced with intense guilt: 

"What have I done? I just really hurt my wife." Unfortunately, sometimes when you're suicidal one of the last things on your mind is how your actions will impact others. I never even thought about what would happen if she caught me before I went through with it.

I quickly opened the door and tried to comfort Julie, who was trembling. She wasn't sure what to do and she asked if she should call the police or a suicide hotline. I told her everything was fine and then I started to cry. She cried, too, and together we walked up to the house. Once inside I sat on the front hall stairs while she paced back and forth, repeatedly asking what she should do. I tried again to console her by telling her that the thought was gone, but this was a lie: the thought was never entirely gone, it just retreated from time to time to the edge of my consciousness. 

Despite my profuse apologies, I could still see despair in her face. Although we'd drifted apart we still loved one another and I knew she felt guilty about not supporting me enough, even though she did absolutely everything she could and more. That event had a huge impact on her and I wish I could take it all back. Of course, I can't.

Although I didn't realize how much I'd changed as a result of my time in Rwanda, Julie noticed almost instantly. She saw that I was no longer the gregarious man I once was. My odd and unpredictable behaviour took a heavy toll on Julie's life.

"What happens to the spouse is that you become the protector of the one who's just trying to survive. But at the same time you know their behaviour is coming from a primal place. Their troubles are not shared with their family. So you become their connection to the outside world, their connection to their family, to their children, to their parents, and you start protecting them. You say things to the kids like, 'Now we need to let him be,' or 'We need to respect his time alone.'"

Things got inexorably worse for her.

"Eventually your world gets so small that there are no more outings. Our home life was like living in a cocoon for a long time. You become a caregiver to a young man, because he is a sick person. You care for the children and you care for your sick spouse. I took on all the roles inside the house, because he came up with a thousand projects to stay busy. I also took on more of the psychological aspects of taking care of things. There was a lot of being alone – alone not just because your spouse is often physically gone, but alone because Stéphane retreated completely into himself. You are completely and utterly alone. I still carry that deep loneliness."

Although I will always feel pained by how much my illness and my resulting actions, affected my family, I take some small comfort from hearing Julie put a positive spin on her experiences. 

"The aim," she (Julie) says, "is to turn all the resentment and anger and disappointment into something positive, to change those feelings so they don't drag you down for the rest of your life. You can grow from the experience."

My opinion: I'm going to put that in my inspirational quotes.

Well said, Julie.

From the book After The War: Surviving PTSD and Changing Mental Health Culture by Stéphane Grenier with Adam Montgomery, copyright © 2018. Reprinted by permission of University of Regina Press.

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/books-and-media/after-the-war-documents-a-retired-lieutenant-colonels-struggle-with-ptsd/article38241952/

My week:

May 3, 2019 "500k Canadians ingested pot before or at work": Today I found this article by Brennan Doherty in the Star Metro:

CALGARY—Roughly 500,000 Canadians used cannabis before — or at — work since February, according to the latest National Cannabis Survey.

Punching in after using weed — or simply lighting up on-the-clock — isn’t unusual. Around 514,000 Canadian workers, representing roughly 13 per cent of the country’s cannabis users, do so, according to the survey. Haines-Saah said this isn’t terribly shocking.

“I’m not surprised because many people don’t enjoy going to work, so they’re doing something to get them out of bed and get them out of the house, and go to work,” she said. “I’m not sanctioning that: I’m saying this is probably the reality of many people’s lives.”

Workers have long used both legal and illegal substances on-the-clock, including prescription medication. Enjoying a drink at a team meeting with colleagues isn’t unusual — including, Haines-Saah said, in academia. Where it does become problematic is when a worker is using cannabis in a “safety-sensitive” job — such as a crane operator or a truck driver — where a lapse in co-ordination or judgment could lead to a catastrophic accident.

“Obviously, in safety-sensitive positions, we still need to have those strict guidelines and no-tolerance because we don’t want people impaired putting themselves at risk and other people at risk if they’re driving or operating heavy machinery,” Haines-Saah said.

https://www.thestar.com/news/cannabis/2019/05/02/half-a-million-canadians-used-weed-before-or-at-work-national-cannabis-survey.html

My opinion: That is so bad.  It reminds me of an old script I wrote in 2003-2004 when I was 18 yrs old.  The lead character smokes pot at work, and then he does a drug test, and gets fired.

This also reminds me of my friend Angela who was talking about Justin Berry doing sexual things on webcam: "Are people really this dumb?  By the time you get to this age (13), don't you kind of know what's right and wrong by then?"

Don't people know smoking pot at work is something you're not supposed to do?

"How spending $20-billion will help fix Canada’s flood problem": Today I found this article by Barrie McKenna in the Globe and Mail:

Quebec Premier François Legault has caught flak for saying he’s tired of wasting money serially compensating people in flood-prone areas.

Heartless perhaps, but Mr. Legault is right.

Paying people to rebuild after a flood, only to give more when the same homes are under water again just two years later, makes no sense.

That is the unfortunate situation we’re in as floods afflict thousands of homeowners along the Ottawa River, low-lying areas around Montreal and in New Brunswick. Properties are flooding again after what was billed as a once-in-a-century flood in 2017.

And federal, provincial and municipal officials are starting to take notice. Quebec, for example, has warned that it will cap lifetime flood compensation at $100,000. After that, homeowners would get as much as $200,000 – but only if they move away for good.

The option of paying homeowners to abandon their properties has to be “part of the conversation as we go forward,” Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale said this week.

“The floods that were to be once every hundred years are now every two or three years,” he told reporters in Ottawa.

https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/commentary/article-how-spending-20-billion-will-help-fix-canadas-flood-problem/

My opinion: Those people need to move out.  That's a lot of time, effort, and money to evacuate your home every 2 or 3 yrs, and have your stuff damaged by water.  I remember like one time as a teen, there's a black out at my home.  A week later, another black out happens.

That's mildly annoying where I have to reset all the clocks, and not have electricity for an hr or so.  However, I don't have my stuff damaged and it's not costing me money.

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May 7, 2019 Edmonton Declutter and Organize meetup: I went to this one tonight.  The last one I went to was a month ago, and I was there for 1hr 15 min.  Tonight I was there for 2 hrs and I met 3 more people.  I met the organizer's daughter J and the organizer's friend H.

I met this new woman K who came here for the first time.  Her senior parents passed away about 5 yrs ago.  There was some planning prior to the deaths of decluttering.  It's a lot of work to declutter the old house.  She donated lots of winter coats and clothes to the Hope Mission.

Now that I talked about this topic for 2 hrs, I'm kind of bored by it.  Until next month.  Here are the tips:

1. Set a timer and clean for 15 min. a day: After that time is over, you can stop.  It's a small step and achievable.

2. Do the easy things first: When you're done reading a magazine or newspaper, you can recycle it.  If there is an article that you like, you can cut it out and file it away.

Ex. My sister gave me 200 magazines in 2012.  I read all of them once.  I then read them like once a month.  By 2015, I was ready to donate them to Value Village.  Ask:

Do you want this?
Do you need this?
Do you have to have this?

If it's a no for all 3, then you can throw it out, recycle, donate, sell, or give it to a friend or family member.

May 9, 2019 Job interviews: Yesterday I went to a job interview in the afternoon for this restaurant.  I thought it was going to be held at Mall #1 because they were hiring for that.  However, the interview was held at Mall #2.  I did spend time reading when I was waiting.

I did attend the interview today at Mall #2.

Yesterday I went to this cook job interview at this restaurant.  At the interview, the boss did say to me that I was in the lead.  He will make a decision by the evening.

I then got an email from the clothing store.  I was to attend an interview, but she said there are low sales and the hiring will be put on hold.   

May 11, 2019 "Project brief": Today I found this article by Caitlin Agnew in the Globe and Mail.  In 2013, Holt Renfew created the H Project that sells ethically and sustainably made.  If you buy Kayu's Postcard Embroidered Straw pouch, $10 will go to the charity Room to Read to help girls learn to read.

https://www.roomtoread.org/