I wonder if one of the reasons for the reluctance to talk to our young people about suicide is the mistaken belief that we might give them ideas. As if by starting a conversation about suicide we might inadvertently plant the seed of death in their heads.
On Monday evening I went to bed early as it had been a long week and I was knackered but there is never any true rest in my house whilst my teenager is awake as he bangs doors, clatters dishes and clomps about the house late at night in an eternal quest for food and facebook.
There wasn’t to be any rest for me that evening either as one of David’s friends had put a suicidal status update on his facebook page. I lay awake in bed listening to my son trying to contact his friend, X on the telephone, hearing my sons voice rising in fear as he demanded that X pick up the god damn phone.
After about 15 minutes of distraught phone calls and frantic inboxing with no response from X, I ended up in the car in my nightie driving David down the road to X’s house.
I was so tired I was a bit trippy and the memory of my son frantically ringing and ringing X’s mobile has become less real now. Eventually when we were about half way there X’s brother answered the phone telling Dave he had come home from work and found the boy passed out in his bed covered in blood from multiple slashes to his arm and wrist.
Shit.
Luckily the cuts were only superficial and didn’t require stitches.
David stayed with X that night and the next and on Australia day I picked them up and drove them down to the Mona museum.
I don’t know what I was hoping to achieve by taking the boys to Mona. I know that I was hoping that the museum would work her magic on X. That he would see that there is a whole other world of beauty and art and expression out there.
That there is never only one path.
That it is okay to be different.
That we are all different.
Maybe I was also a little bit starstruck by the sheer amazingness of the Mona museum and I know I wanted the boys to share my joy because in hindsight Mona really isn’t the place to take a confused and sensitive 16 year old. X was totally freaked out by the place. The darkness of the rooms made him jumpy and video art works that my eyes had only skipped over because they weren’t my cup of tea drew the boys in and they were repulsed by them. X was horrified by the wall of porcelain vaginas and declared Mona to be totally creepy.The boys didn’t even glance at Snake as I took them to see the fat car hoping that the sensual curves of the car and the brightness of the red bodywork would at least be a positive experience for them and it was.
As we drove away from the museum towards the city park where they like to hang out with their friends, we had a brief discussion about what is art and what isn’t. I had forgotten the black and white certainty of being sixteen, of a sixteen year old perspective that art has to be beautiful in order to be called art and I worried if I had done more harm than good.
On the Thursday morning I took X into a youth counselling place, I had previously spoken to them about X and they had prepared a packet of pamphletts and such for him. I waited in the car whilst Dave and X walked into the building and I knew that I had done all I could for this boy.
It is never easy when it is someone elses child.
Years ago an old woman held my toddlers hands in hers and told me, this boy is going to be a healer. Over a decade and a half later I watch as my child gathers the broken to him, as the broken are drawn to him and I worry.
It is never easy when it is your own child either.
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This post has moved me to tears. You’re right, we don’t allow our children and teens to talk about their worries enough BG Xx
Wow, just wow. So sorry you all had to go through that. I have memories of my own of suicidal friends… we are just not well equipped to handle those realities at such a young age. You and your son did amazing things.. I hope that X recovers and doesn’t keep lashing out against himself/herself.
Amazing post Kim, and what you and your David did for X is a great good.
I well remember the panic and confusion of being a teenager with a suicidal friend and I can tell you that David handled things so much better than I did, and you were much more supportive than my mother was.
Somehow, despite my inadequacies and those of the adults around her, my friend, my best friend, survived three attempts (one very serious, the other two nmore cries for help) and is now a 37-year-old professional woman who is the doting godmother to my three children. If you had asked me when we were 15 if she’d ever see her thirties, though, I’d have said no.
I don’t know what to say. I hate the thought of a child hurting that much but I hope David will be ok as well, and X’s brother.
X is very lucky to have you and David in his life.
Mental illness is such a taboo subject. It is partly so, I believe, because if you tell someone else about what is most deep in your head, you give someone else control over yourself. If we let someone know us that well, they may be able to predict and stop us from doing something drastic. It’s particularly screwed up, because what we actually want is to be loved and helped and understood, but the fear of letting the understanding happen and still feeling like crap makes a person hold their pains and plans to themselves. I”m not sure if that makes sense. thoughts that have been running through my mind since I read Lori’s blog.
Hm – your CommentLuv is picking up my old post.
David is a good kid and a great friend. You’ve done well, Kim.
I hope and pray that boy is getting the helps that he needs.
There is too much silence, I agree. Thank you to you – and to your son – for taking care of X.
There is too much silence about a lot of things teens need to talk openly about, not only suicide and other mental health problems. Such a shame that there are parents who have absolutely no idea what is happening with their children or even worse in some cases don’t really care.
Bravo David, and you too Kim, for going the extra miles for his friend. Fingers crossed X will find both the support he needs and the ability to work out a solution for life.
Wow. Thanks for sharing this. You’ve clearly raised an amazing man.
There is far too much silence about it.
Australia used to lead the world in youth suicides…until the stats were ‘rejigged’, and some ‘suicides’ were changed to ‘misadventure’, ‘accidental’, ‘road trauma’, etc, depending on the situation.
Read these stats here.
Almost bad enough to make some pollies start a foundation…like beyondblue.
and Jayne if you missed the film “Drive” on ABC last night you can catch it here on iView http://bit.ly/hEY9Hm all parents should watch this film with their teenage children before teaching them how to drive.
I have had this open for ages. But I don’t know what to say… but I feel like I should.
Make sure your boy looks after himself. Having friends in such a dark place is very draining.
Not talking about suicide makes as much sense as not talking about sex, in case your child wants to go out and try it.
People need to see that education in ALL areas is better than having someone worry in silence.
David sounds like a wonderful young man. I hope he does well in whatever career path he chooses.
@Watershedd: “if you tell someone else about what is most deep in your head, you give someone else control over yourself.”
This is one of my husbands problems. He’s convinced that if he talks openly to a psychologist or psychiatrist, they’ll see how “bad” he really is and lock him away. No amount of trying on my behalf has changed his mind. So he continues to live in fear.
Your post made me cry too. I do find it a little strange that reports of self destructive behaviour are widespread (hooning, alchool & drug abuse etc) but suicide is not. I am so sad for X that he had got to that point in his life and your son sounds like such a wonderful friend to help X through this, as are you. Im sure many people would be so overwhelmed and confused by the situation that they would stay away because they didn’t know what to do and felt powerless to help.
I hope that I’m doing enough for my son that he will always be able to talk to me about whatever is bothering him – or if not me, someone he trusts.
It isn’t ever easy.
Your son’s friend X is very lucky to have a friend such as David.
Make sure David is ok too… it’s a HARD position to be in, wanting desperately to help your friend, but nothing you say really getting through.
You’ve done all you can, and by the sounds of it, so is David. *hugs*
Well done you. Hugs.
Wow. David is doing a wonderful job as are you. I hope X pulls through this hard time in their life.
Never give up.
A friend of mine recently succeeded and I was surprised at how many people were so apathetic: “he’d been miserable for ages”, “it was going to happen anyway” etc etc. It made me so angry, because people can always be helped. I don’t advocate pharmaceutical help, but more support and innovative ways of tackling their issues, and most importantly TIME.
Sometimes suicidal feelings can hang around for years, beyond first attempts, second attempts, third attempts; yet 5 years later the same person can be sitting on a rock at the top of Mt Wellington, wondering at the view and reflecting on their life trying to comprehend of a time when they didn’t want to live anymore, failing to imagine that dark place and thanking the universe that somehow they didn’t succeed. Thank fuck for time.