Acceptance. Acceptance is the key to healing for the survivor of suicide, but it is a deceptively simple concept. First of all, most of us operate under the assumption that we are already "accepting" the suicide. After all, only a deluded few would fail to believe that the event actually happened. That's "acceptance," isn't it?

It may be the beginnings of acceptance, but it's not the entire understanding. Accpting a suicide means not only acknowledging the basic reality, but accepting the contributing facors and the ramifications of it - without embellishing them with invented ideas, either positive or negative.

For example, you might have to accept that your loved one lost a very long battle with depression. If you were to embellish this reality either positively (by denying the fact that such a severe emotional illness could have existed within them) or negatively (by unfairly holding yourself responsible for not having "cured" them of it), then you are not truly accepting the suicide for what it is -a tragic event that, while wholly unwelcome, was beyond the control of you and those around you.

Author Jeffrey Jackson who lost his wife Gail to suicide.

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