Being silent isn't being strong
Suicide is the biggest killer of young men in the UK.
More than violent crime. More than road traffic accidents. In fact every day 12 men take their own lives. That’s one every two hours. What battles do these men go through? How do they justify it? And what of those left behind? This supplement, the second of a two part special on male suicide, aims to answer some of these questions. www.thecalmzone.net
More people die by suicide each year than by murder and war combined Joseph: my fight There is a war going on right now within me. Hardly anyone knows though. It rages on while I’m on the train. It’s happening on the bus. It unfolds as I’m stuck in traffic. The war rolls on when I get to work. It’s going on during my lunch hour. It’s happening as I make my way home. Another skirmish kicks off during dinner and as I close my eyes and nod off, the war continues as I begin to dream. This war is a fight to the death between myself and myself, and believe me I’ve come close to losing on at least two occasions. There have been tears shed; blood spilt; substances abused; dull and rusted razor blades aiding selfmutilation. I've tried to end it all; there was the subsequent extended stay in a psychiatric unit, and then there was the antidepressants. This war is brutal and takes only one prisoner: yours truly. This is what depression is like for me. I usually take it upon myself to suffer in silence. I focus on everything negative running through my weathered mind. I believe that no one cares and no one can help. I’ll tell everyone that everything is fine when asked, “What’s the matter?” It's some vain attempt to keep the ones closest to me from getting caught in the line of fire. I withdraw, actively shut people out, all while remaining desperate for someone to come along and save me from this myself… from this illness.
I hate calling it that. But I realise this truly is an illness. It’s as terminal as cancer, and arguably just as aggressive. It destroys like a virus and everything feels as if someone or something has sucked out your soul. This is the invisible civil war that I fight every single day and it’s exhausting. Desperation and loneliness are my constant companions. Self-mutilation and self-deprecation are
This war is a fight to the death between myself and myself, and believe me I’ve come close to losing on at least two occasions my vices. Misunderstanding, harsh judgments, and wilful ignorance from others are definitely unwelcome but here’s the twisted bit about depression: I easily believe what others say about me, even though they haven’t a clue. They don't know what I’m really feeling; what I'm fighting with every fibre of my being. I can’t tell you the amount of times I’ve thought that only suicide could bring me peace. I can’t tell you
why, despite the attempts, I’ve been unable to take my own life. I can’t even tell you what possessed me to write this piece. I can tell you that I’m not the only one fighting for his life in an invisible civil war. I can tell you that many people are suffering in silence like me. I can tell you that there is likely to be someone that you know personally desperate for a ceasefire. I can say that depression isn’t something I would wish upon anyone and that there is no strength to be found in remaining silent about what ails you. I don’t know what 'real strength' is. But despite this invisible civil war being waged, I am still here. There are others out there dealing with something similar; whether it’s milder or more severe is immaterial. And for those fighting there is this: while there may not be an obvious cure for what we have, you are still here. You have a testimony. You’ve been to the very depths of hell and back, tormented by every demon imaginable along the way… and you’re still here. Fight on, we must. So fight on, I will.
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Dean: my choice It annoys me when people call suicide a selfish act. “Think of the effect it will have on your family” they say or “how can people do that when they have lovely kids?” etc. When you get so desperately low that you are considering suicide, you have thought long and hard about it. It’s not a flippant decision with the ultimate aim of hurting others. You justify your suicidal thoughts by virtue of the fact that at that particular point in time, you feel that your actions will actually be a benefit to your family. They’d be better off without you. You’re a burden to them. You’ve weighed up all your options. It’s not as if you are going to suddenly say “oh yeah, I forgot about my family” and put the idea behind you. While the ‘selfish’ argument is a throw away comment by many, it lingers with me since I am a father and have battled suicidal thoughts on a regular basis. At those times, in my eyes, my children deserve better; I decided I would make it look like an accident and have them think I was unfortunate or a bit careless, rather than them knowing I couldn’t cope with disappointing them on a daily basis. This is how I would justify it in my mind. Suicide is, in the majority of cases, a long thought out process where all options have been considered. In circumstances like my own, everything had been thought about
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I decided I would make it look like an accident and have them think I was unfortunate or a bit careless.
deeply, down to the last minute detail, and only when all avenues appeared to have been exhausted does suicide become a viable reality. At these times, when I am at my lowest, I feel that I have put my family first, as I would rather cause them a one off pain like that, than break their hearts on a daily basis through my depression. You feel as if you are doing it to help them, not hurt them. This may sound irrational to those who have never experienced suicidal thoughts, but when someone is considering taking their own lives, rationality doesn’t come into it. I’m happy to say that, despite all this, I am still here. Why? I don’t know exactly, but I can guarantee it's not because someone advised me to ‘think of my family’. I was thinking of my family. Understanding the circumstances surrounding suicide is half the battle of preventing it. The thought processes and state of mind of those who are feeling suicidal are extraordinarily hard for ‘non-suicidal’ people to understand, but what is assured is that selfishness and the desire to hurt others doesn’t come into play. I cannot say that it is one single thing that has stopped me from taking my own life – it’s not a
three times more men than women commit suicide in the uk each year
religious belief or an epiphany, or even a motivational quote. All I can say is that something stopped me. I sat down and discussed my thoughts and behaviour patterns with my family, and was met with understandably emotional responses such as “if you kill yourself, I will never speak to you again” and the equally baffling “if you killed yourself, I will kill you more”.
Suicide is a hard thing to understand and even harder to talk about, but neither of these things are going to improve unless both those considering suicide and the family and friends around them start talking. I have learnt to take one day at a time, take the highs while I can and learn to cope with the lows when they happen. Life is one giant roller-coaster. Never give up on yourself, as you may miss a high down the line that stays with you for a lifetime.
In January 2012 the body of Kevin Boyle was found not far from his south London family home. Kevin was a young man realising his potential as a top London chef. He suffered with depression, and after he ended his life, he left behind his family, broken hearted. Enter Kevin’s mum Patti.
Patti: my son Horrified. I can’t tell you the horror of losing a child, and the double horror of losing a child who chose to end their own life. You’re paralysed by grief. There is nothing in life, no matter how many times around the block you’ve been, or how well travelled you are, or how well educated, that can prepare you for it. Kevin suffered from depression. This illness is as nondiscriminatory as cancer; in fact depression is a cancer of the mind, body and spirit. It takes hostages, it tortures and it kills. Kevin was a complex human being. People don’t talk about depression if they suffer from it. They talk about feeling low. They talk about being surrounded by darkness. But that was only for the home, for the family, privately. I know this because the amount of friends that came up to me at the funereal and said “I never knew”, and that blew me away on it’s own level. It’s not uncommon for depressed people to hide how low they actually are. Kevin would walk penniless to give you his last pound. Everything about him emanated from food. He was always cooking for people, for his friends. He was a great joker; they called him ‘King of the Lads’. No matter what he was doing he always had time for others. He would sit up all night on the Internet, counselling others, because he knew what they were going through.
...the amount of friends that came up to me at the funereal and said ‘I never knew’...
But none of that would ever be seen in public. Outwardly, he would have a jovial Jamie Oliver type, let's-love-the-world type attitude, because that was the school he was brought up in. He was very opinionated, he was intelligent, he was very emotionally articulate, but Kevin just simply chose not to say certain things. Someone who commits suicide is in so much personal pain, and they see taking their life as the only way to end that pain. My initial response to Kevin’s suicide was “didn’t he know how much we all loved him?” His funeral was a classic example of just how much people thought of him. And that was overwhelming in itself, as you’re dealing with the grief as a family, and then you’re seeing all these other people grieving as deeply as you. My message to anyone thinking of taking their life is that you leave brokenhearted people behind. You don’t end your pain; you pass it on. Any parent would give their life up for their child who died in this manner. It doesn’t resolve anything. At least give yourself a chance at looking back with experience. And in the meantime can you try new things that could help you. Give yourself a chance to see yourself change. There are three things that are certain in life: death, tax... and change.
Model used
Patti: why men? I think it’s about how society expects men to be. It starts from a very early age: your boy screaming in the playground because he’s tripped over. He sounds just like his sister. And we say to them “don’t scream like a girl”. It’s meant to be an innocent message, designed by parents and families to prepare their boys for the hard knocks of life, that “big boys don’t cry”. I said it to my kids. I so regret that. I wish I had let my boys scream and shout and ball as much as my girls did. They did privately, in their bedrooms, but it just wasn’t acceptable to be seen. At 11 we put them in men’s suits, we call them ‘school uniforms’. He goes out at 7am and comes back after 4pm, and from that age they are doing a man’s day. And, unlike women, who have time off for child care and the like, the men’s role is hunter, gatherer, and provider. They have expectations that that’s what they should be doing, because that’s what they’ve been doing since they were small. But not all men are built that way.
Top image: illustrations by Ruth Ogundamisi, 13 photographic assistance by Obi Okoro, 15
CALM believe...‌ ‌that if men felt able to ask for - and find - timely and appropriate help when they need it then hundreds of male suicides could be prevented in the UK. We believe that there is a cultural barrier preventing men from seeking help as they are expected to be in control at all times, and failure to be seen as such equates to weakness and a loss of masculinity. We believe that suicide is neither inevitable nor an indication that the individual was a failure in any respect.
Call CALM on 0808 802 58 58
This supplement was funded by the Big Lottery Fund and produced by with help from CALM (Campaign Against Living Miserably) Editing, research and artwork Sean Williams 17, Ruth Ogundamisi 13, Aidan McVary 15, Natasha Minto, 22
www.thecalmzone.net