Yesterday we got the news that the husband of an acquaintance killed himself. He was 38 years old, an Army war veteran, receiving treatment for PTSD and depression, successfully running a contracting business, seemingly happily married...and yet...
The first thing I wondered was whether or not his wife found him. The trauma of finding someone who's committed suicide never leaves you. Though I am not speaking with first hand knowledge, I well remember my father relating the story over and over how he, as a child of about 8 or 9, was sent out with his grandfather to a neighboring farm to check on someone who hadn't been seen in a day or two. They found the farmer hanging in the barn, his tongue black and protruding from his mouth, his body bloated and grotesque. Imagine if you'd loved and cared for this man and found him like this. That twisted horror your last memory of him. I wonder why planned suicides don't just go directly to the morgue and kill themselves right there, to save the people they leave behind further grief, and expense.
It's all awful, and I don't mean to be glib. The simple fact is that when you kill yourself, you condemn that person that comes upon your corpse. You leave them with something they never asked for or wanted. I wonder if that's why Virginia Woolf filled her coat pockets with so many rocks before she walked in to the river, to remain swallowed up by the cold, dark waters, to save someone the terrible burden of finding her.
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