Coping with suicide of a family member

By the way, I don't know if you are married or not either, and don't care re relevance on this.

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Well, I am still here somewhere beneath the piles of schoolwork and stress, and I have managed to surface for a moment!

Bella Dea wrote:

As for taking the dog, maybe he felt that was the only thing in the world that still gave him unconditional love and he wanted to take that with him.

Ah, Bella, thank you for that; I hadn't been able to come up with any possible ways to look at it other than as just another way to lash out at the family. I'll never know what the truth of the matter was, but it's good to have another possibility to bear in mind that is less ugly.

Noddy24 wrote:

I was in my early twenties then and spent a great deal of time in Tumultuous Ethical Quandary. I decided that everyone is entitled to choose their own interior mental furniture--providing this doesn't present a clear and present danger to themselves or to other people.

Oh dear, even at my age Noddy was wiser than me... Smile

I've had the phrase "let them choose their own mental furniture" rattling around in my mind all day, and I'm trying to really embrace that. This certainly is not a strong suit of mine *cough cough* but I know I need to work on doing that...Especially, it seems to me, when it comes to my m-i-l; there's certainly no reason for me to talk to her about any of my real feelings about f-i-l. (BTW, we did get married a few months ago, so it's really official: I am legally a part of the madness... Shocked

)

I haven't had any problems with holding my tongue around Mr C's mom, because it's so clear that all she needs right now is someone to hold her hand and listen, and because I just don't feel like it's at all my place to say anything about her husband. But Mr C and I always talk so much about everything that it's hard not to say exactly what I think about things with him.

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OCCOM BILL wrote:

Some things are best left unsaid... and "the deceased was an A-hole" is usually one of them.

All right, all right, when you put it that way, perhaps it's not the best thing to say...

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... but you can think it!

You're absolutely allowed! :wink:

...and discuss it in these terms with close confidants. It's good for you!

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Soz, Roberta, Bella, Heeven, thank you all for the reassurance that Mr C can be okay even with the not-so-ideal bits of family life he's had. (I especially liked Heeven's vivid imagery! Very Happy

)... I just heard all these bizarro family stories and secrets while we were back home, and especially hearing them in this particular context, well, it gives one pause. But of course, it's not like my family is exactly Hallmark card material either, it's just we've been more subtle with the crazy.

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msolga wrote:

... but you can think it!

You're absolutely allowed! :wink:

...and discuss it in these terms with close confidants. It's good for you!

[breathes sigh of relief]

It's a damn good thing, because I am absolutely NOT nice enough to be able to not at least think it!

And of course, I have my mom and dad and even my grandma to talk it over with, and they see it more the way I do, so it's not like I'm alone with it or anything.

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cypher

... thinking & discussing what you really feel is absolutely legitimate! With the right audience, of course! :wink:

Hell, you can't pretend the whole time, because of decorum, can you? That is the road to ... I don't know what, exactly .... but it's definitely not healthy!

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ossobuco wrote:

I don't know what I think, Cypher, about being straightforward with your opinions, and, if so, to whom. You can assume my instinct is toward straightforwardness or varieties of silence. With your husband, certainly careful. But don't dissemble.

Thing is, we are often, perforce, counsellors of each other.
I think that is good in a marriage, but not across the board. I don't know about this one...
so no immediate advice.

That's interesting, both the idea of varieties of silence, and about being counsellors of each other; I've been thinking along those lines and not quite managed to put it into words. I'm going to be thinking these ideas over.

Quote:

Sympathy though, re the whole circumstance, and then, immediately, re your stupid teachers.

Ha, thanks for the sympathy about the teachers...I was awash in frustrating circumstances today having to do with that. It's acutally getting to the point where I think I'm going to go to the dept. head and tell him that I think this has been handled extremely poorly by my teachers.

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Olga, I agree-- and if there is anything to learn from my f-i-l's mistakes, it's that keeping your thoughts completely to yourself is not the road to well-being...

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cyphercat wrote:

Olga, I agree-- and if there is anything to learn from my f-i-l's mistakes, it's that keeping your thoughts completely to yourself is not the road to well-being...

Yes.

Yes indeed, cypher.

Now you do what feels right for you.
Don't let anyone put some sort of "disloyalty" number on you, OK?

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cyphercat wrote:

But of course, it's not like my family is exactly Hallmark card material either, it's just we've been more subtle with the crazy.

I can certainly relate.

Go ahead and follow up re: the teachers, that's shabby.

I think they maybe get so used to the "my grandmother died" sort of excuse (which I think is terrible karma, but I digress) that they get a little inured. I was told some doozies when I was an instructor. They should be able to make allowances for the real thing, though.

I had the impression you'd gotten married recently -- congratulations. Sorry circumstances are currently less than joyful.

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How are you getting along, cyphercat?

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Oh, thank you for asking, Olga-- I'm okay. It was kind of a hard weekend in some ways; we went out on Friday, which was good mostly, but a lot of the places we went were places Mr C had last been with his dad a month ago when he came for a visit. So it sort of brought it to the forefront again, because everywhere we went it hit him over again that he wouldn't be going to the mall with his dad anymore, or going to that coffeeshop with him again, that kind of thing. It was hard on both of us.

It has only been two and a half weeks or so, so I guess it shouldn't be surprising that it's still so unreal and hard to accept. It's just that the time has been going so slowly that it feels like a lot longer than it's actually been-- it's kind of surprising to think that it really just happened so recently.

But we're watching the Oscars tonight and getting our minds on something else, so we're okay. Just thinking about who's wearing a crazy dress and whose speech goes too long and all of that Smile

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It took me quite a time to fully "get" that my father was no longer in existence, cypher. That sounds strange, I guess, but it's a very difficult thing to fully comprehend at first. That a person can just vanish altogether like that. I sympathize with you & your husband & what you're both going through now.

And enjoy the Oscars! Very Happy

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Sorry to hear this, Cyphercat...

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Sometimes you don't react to it as you are shocked but they appear in your dreams sporadically for even a year or two after the event. At least, it did to me when family members passed away.

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How did he commit suicide- and why do you think he did it? Did you know the reason why?

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lovelymitchangel wrote:

How did he commit suicide- and why do you think he did it? Did you know the reason why?

I think, lovelymitchangel, that if cyphercat had wanted to talk about these things here, she already would have done.
A little respect & consideration, please!

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I'm still thinking, "I must remember to tell mother" and my mother died eleven years ago, more than a year after being diagnosed with terminal cancer.

Cybercat--

Actually, the "never again" realization in familiar places is a good sign. Your husband is accepting unpleasant reality.

How are you ? Being a loving listener can be exhausting.

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I just wanted to give my sympathies to you and your family. i know a bit about what your going through, my fiance's brother took his life dec.12 . even though its almost been 3 months it still feels like it hasn't been that long, he was only 21. but i just had a question to ask, how do i get him to open up to me or anyone. its hard to find the right words. he thinks he can't/doesn't need/want to talk to anybody else about it, that he has to work it all out alone in his own head and doesn't want to cause grief for anybody else. he opened up some a few nights ago, only because i was fussing on him about smoking. he uses smoking as his stress reliever right now, not all the time, but still. i'm only 22 and hes 24 and neither of us has ever dealt with anything like this. i've read all the posts and they have been extremely helpful about how im feeling. thank you.

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Coping with suicide of a family member

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