.....the reasons most people kill themselves are within the range of ordinary human experience - depression, financial setback, humiliation, unrequited love, the collapse of a marriage, unreasonable pressures at school or work, and all sorts of other hurts, and injuries to our self-esteem.

But these stresses and losses and experiences of loneliness and depressions and anger have, at bottom, a familiar ring to them - they are all within the realm of common human experience. You, like me, are not that different. We all live next door to each other.

So, you might ask, how do we get through these times of crisis in our lives? For whatever comfort you may find in some statistics, it might help to know that studies have shown that as many as fifty percent to the general public (and that's all of us) have seriously considered the suicide decision as a solution to a life problem. Other studies have shown that as many as sixty to eighty percent of the entire population have given thought to solving a problem by suicide.

What does this tell us? First, I think these numbers tell us that thinking about suicide is more normal than abnormal. If more than half of the people you pass on the street have at least considered what you are considering, then how different can you be from the rest of us?

But there is something more in these numbers. Question: Why haven't all these people killed themselves?

The answer, I think, lies in the balm of time. The reason most people who think about suicide don't kill themselves is that, even without professional help, they experience some kind of spontaneous recovery. Things change.
Their situation changes. The pain they are experiencing diminishes. The hurt and anger ebb away. They get a little help from their friends They find themselves closer to their God. Someone finally listens to them.

Somehow, soon or later, the crisis passes, the suicidal thoughts fade and, like a sudden squall on the surface of a lake, the winds stop, the waves quiet down, and a passage opens up where none existed only moments before.


Taken from Suicide, The Forever Decision by Paul Quinnett

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This is long and if your eyes have glazed over, I'm sorry.
I've been recommending this excellent book to people for years and have sent it to numerous friends who struggle with their lives.

I guess if you won't go buy it, you can read it here.....

Lara speaking about Peter this morning reminded me of his fights with the "beast" and the lure of suicide, the lie of it.

This poem says it so well:

Lovers

... and then you courted death,

and he became the friend

that promised when you needed one

he'd be there in the end.

When every painful pulsebeat

put living into doubt,

the last friend that you made,

you made to let you out.

****** Fierce Goodbye by Gwendolyn Carr