We had a full house at last nights meeting...a different moderator who was very good at getting participation from all the attendees..everyone given a chance to talk about what they were experiencing. It's always wrenching to have someone newly grieving...she was 6 weeks "out" from her loss.

One of the survivors said he had rented the movie The Bridge and it wasn't what he expected...the mod. expressed caution about watching it..said he uses parts of it in the class on suicide that he teaches at IUSB.
Funny because I have ordered it and expect it anyday...he said there are actual suicides shown and I wondered why they weren't stopped from jumping...he said there had been a huge controversy about that very thing when the documentary first aired. He did say it had raised awareness in San Fran area about suicide so that's a good thing.

I did have an interesting private conversation about suicide notes with one woman whose husband killed himself 18 months ago..I'm going to do some research on that so we can continue next time. She said she had no idea that he was even depressed and they had been happily married for 30 years..she wished he had left a note as to why. ~sigh

FINALLY - some results.

It raised awareness... yes, that's a good thing.

I would always want to know why... and can understand why she wishes for a note...
what I can't understand is how she had no idea. I only think I could understand if I had walked in her shoes...

..........................

sounds like a good support group!!

A lot of people complete suicide without giving any advanced clues.

This is what Kay Jamison, in her book Night Falls Fast says about suicide notes.."Suicide is not entirely a private act, however; nor is it completely idiosyncratic or unpredictable. We have ways of understanding the psychological underpinnings of suicide, and while they may not provide the final clarity we would like, they give us grounds for a beginning."

She goes on, "Suicide notes - an obvious starting point - often promise more than they deliver. It would seem that nothing could be closer to the truth of suicide than notes and letters left behind by those who kill themselves, but this is not the case; our expectations of how we think people should feel and act facing their own deaths are greater than the reality of what they do and why they do it. Suicide authority Ed Shneidman, for example, in commenting on the disappointing banality of many suicide notes, lets slip his hope, a common one, that the last recorded moments of life will afford a deep or tragic view of dying: "Suicide notes," he writes, "often seem like parodies of the postcards sent home from the Grand Canyon, the catacombs or the pyramids - essentially pro forma, not at all reflecting the grandeur of the scene being described or the depth of human emotion that one might expect to be engendered by the situation."

*Night Falls Fast Understanding suicide by Kay Redfield Jamison

I saw The Bridge as well, quite some time ago. This is the 'official' movie site. http://www.thebridge-themovie.com/new/index.html

Addy, I asked why Michael would kill himself...asked it for years until I finally had to accept the fact that I would never know. I believe that it was an impulsive act...brought on by drinking brandy, missing his fiance, missing his 8 year old son who lived in Guam, and watching the Bears lose.
That gun was right there and I believe he just said s*c*r*e*w it and put it in his mouth.

I also believe that if he had thought about all the people who loved him and if he had any idea of what that choice would do to all of us...he never would have done it.

Asking WHY is part of the pkg that survivors so through.

Barbo et al ... I'm so grateful to humbly learn so much here.

Alffe from all my heart, I thank you for talking about Michael.

thanks to you all for helping me understand...