Just about every list of “suicide myths” mentions this one: “If a person is serious about killing themselves then there is nothing you can do.” But is it always a myth?
In important ways, yes, it is a myth. There are many things that loved ones of a suicidal individual can do to help – things like asking directly about suicidal thoughts, fully listening to the person, providing nonjudgmental emotional support, removing firearms and other lethal means from the home, giving a list of resources for help and support, and helping them to get professional help.
At the same time, especially when suicidal thoughts and behaviors persist for many months or years, loved ones may come to a point where they have to recognize their limitations. In some important ways, their hands are tied.
Recognizing My Own Limitations with a Suicidal Person
I came to the realization many years ago that I could not fully protect a close friend from suicide. She went through an extremely suicidal time for over a year. One night, she came to my house at midnight with her wrist bleeding. She had attempted suicide. She refused to let me call an ambulance, and it even took much persuading before she would let me take her to the ER. They gave her stitches and discharged her to my house (she refused hospitalization and did not meet criteria for involuntary commitment). The doctors advised me to remove all sharp implements and pills from her reach.
My friend stayed with me a couple days. When she went back home, I was left with this feeling of abject helplessness, this recognition that she might kill herself, and also this sudden acceptance that ultimately I could not control if she died by suicide.
Even when she was at my house, even with all my sharp implements and pills hidden in the locked trunk of my car, I could not have prevented her suicide. I had to use the bathroom sometimes. I had to sleep. She could have walked out the door at any time and found other sharp implements, pills or means to die by suicide.
Recognizing Your Limitations with a Suicidal Person
No matter how desperately you may wish otherwise, there is only so much you can do to stop another person from dying by suicide. You cannot monitor a family member or friend every second of the day. You cannot remove all means for suicide entirely from their world. Although you can talk with them about their suicidal thoughts, you cannot read their mind if they choose not to share them.
Even professionals are not fully able to prevent suicides. One study found that almost 1 in 5 people who died by suicide had seen a mental health professional within 30 days of their death. That means that in the United States, with almost 43,000 people dying by suicide in 2014, more than 8,000 of them had recently seen a mental health professional. A study in Finland found that almost 10% of suicides occurred within 24 hours, at most, of an appointment with a health professional.
Even inside locked psychiatric hospital units, even when patients are under constant supervision, some patients die by suicide. That is staggering. It is also illuminating. If mental health professionals and psychiatric hospitals cannot prevent all suicides, then how can friends and family be expected to do so?
Coping with Your Limitations when Someone You Know is Suicidal
When I realized my inherent limitations with my friend, I came up with a saying (I’m sure I’m not the first):
Do everything you can, but know you can’t do everything.
It is hard, terribly hard, to sit with the fundamental helplessness you may feel about your loved one who is in danger of suicide. At these times, it can be helpful to really recognize that many, maybe most people, who die by suicide have depression, post-traumatic stress or another mental illness, a genuine and sometimes severe illness, just like cancer or heart disease. Although the illness is treatable in most cases, and although most suicidal people go on to live many years without ever dying by suicide, the illness occasionally proves to be fatal.
Michael J. Gitlin, M.D., is a psychiatrist who lost a patient to suicide shortly after finishing his psychiatric residency. He wrote about his experience in a poignant journal article. As somebody who specialized in treating people with severe depression, he articulated the high probability of suicide among some of his patients. He came to accept that his work was like that of a doctor working with cancer patients: Not everyone could be saved.
What You Can Do to Help a Suicidal Person
I am not saying that loved ones and therapists should not do what they can to prevent a person’s suicide. Of course they should! There are many things you can do to help someone who’s in danger of ending their life:
First, listen. Really listen. Don’t immediately give advice, try to talk the person out of suicide, or try to make the person feel better. Instead, try to understand. Be curious, not judgmental. (For more info, see my post: How Would You Listen to a Person on the Roof?)
Talk directly about suicide. Ask questions about suicidal thoughts. (I talk about this more in my posts Uncovering Suicidal Thoughts and Let’s Really Talk about Suicide.)
After you’ve truly listened, heard, and tried to understand the person, help the person to problem-solve, identify other options besides suicide, etc. Also help them create a safety plan.
If you’re unsure what to say or do, call 988 to reach the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. A counselor there can give you advice. (You can also find other free places to get help by phone, text, or chat on this site’s Resources page.)
I’ve also written a book about what you can – and can’t – do to help someone with suicidal thoughts, and how to take care of yourself, too, during such an ordeal.
Limitations and Hope when Helping a Suicidal Person
Many lives have been saved by the actions of concerned others who did their best to help. In fact, my own friend, the one whose possible suicide I’d come to feel hopeless about, recovered.
Not everyone is so fortunate. And when a life is lost to suicide, that does not necessarily mean that anyone failed, that anyone made a grave mistake, or that anyone is to blame.
You do everything you can, with the understanding that “everything you can” cannot be everything.
EDITED: Feb. 5, 2015; Aug. 12, 2021, Sept. 2, 2022
*Copyright 2013 Stacey Freedenthal, PhD, LCSW, All rights Reserved. Written For: Speaking of Suicide. Photos purchased from Fotolia.
how can it be that there are all these topics on suicide and helping people with these thoughts,…and yet, my own therapist is not helping me with my thoughts.
I can’t afford therapy anymore and i’m suicidal all the time. No one around me seems to get how serious this is for me. I actually WANT help and can’t afford it.
I NEED help and can’t afford it. But no one really cares unless you can afford to PAY for their care.
Maybe suicide has a correlation with poverty too? I bet so.
Lauren,
I’m sorry you’re struggling — and alone in that struggle. If you are in the U.S., you can call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 800.273.8255 or text 741-741 at any time. I list other resources at https://speakingofsuicide.mystagingwebsite.com/resources/#immediatehelp
There may be low-cost therapy options where you live. For example, some agencies offer free or low-cost therapy in large cities. Community mental health agencies also might be an option. Many therapists adjust their fees according to ability to pay.
In any case, I hope you get the help you seek!
Believe it or not, I was in that boat too. In 2001, I lost everything. I figured it was time to lose my life to. I attempted and failed. I was saved. And in that moment I had a MAJOR conversion of heart and turned to faith in Jesus. The name of the man who got me to the hospital, I learned later, was named Jesus. After seeing how miserable I truly was, and had been for most of my life, I leaned on faith in God and He answered me. I had a lot of guilt for trying to take my own life too. It tried to weigh me down after, but I knew that if I let it, I was giving in to that old self again. I learned that we all suffer in this world. Some more than others but we can’t measure our suffering against one another because we are all going through something different, but only has some of the same feeling and attributes. What it came down to was, what was missing? I was raised Catholic, but didn’t realized I wasn’t being Catholic. I thought I was the most horrible person on the face of the earth, because I didn’t know who I was and tried to be someone I never was who wanted to fit in with things and groups I never belonged to. I didn’t think I mattered to anyone. What I learned, by praying, picking up a bible and tossing myself into it at all times rather than back into the grip death had on me, was that I did matter to God because He made me and gave me life. I returned back to going to Mass. I went to confession for the first time in 35 years. I was flat broke. Had no friends. No one to turn to but God. And He answered. I still don’t have much in regards to material things, or even good physical heath, but what I do have is the only TRUE friend I need, who has been through all of this with me and knows it all, that being Jesus Christ. I live now for Him, and because of Him. Death has no power anymore over me because He has defeated it, and commands us to live, not die. Death is no longer an option until He says it is. I pray for you and I hope the best for all here.
I agree completely, another major eventuality that happens unfortunately
I never seen it coming, every friend i know that killed themselves, It’s because, THEY REALLY WANTED OUT, AND DIDN’T WANT NOBODY TO KNOW, BECAUSE THEY’LL TRY TO STOP THEM. SO SAD.
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My friend tried to commit suicide a few years ago. She hid everything and put on a very happy face. I had no clue that she was hiding huge financial problems. She has several friends who help her out financially. I have little money so I invite her to stuff and accompany her to financial counseling and meetings. She is better now. But, who knows. Maybe she’s charging again and it will start all over. The thing is, I don’t trust her like I once did because she put on such a happy face and represented herself as an independent person. I have a hard time believing what she is telling me and perhaps that will always be the case. We talk at length about her problems, which is okay. But, she mentions her suicide attempt anywhere to anyone. It’s a little unnerving to be sitting in Starbucks and have her talk (loudly) about her suicide attempt. I feel as if this is now how she identifies herself and that seems unhealthy. We are more than our mental illness yet, some people seem to get stuck in a loop even with continued counseling. I was diagnosed with severe anxiety disorder long ago. I have found a way to help myself and it’s manageable. I don’t talk about it much unless I feel it’s becoming a problem again because I think we can become obsessed with our own illnesses. I see other friends pulling away. You can hang in there and offer support until it starts to take you down.
So my husband at the age of 63 [tried to hang himself] for some odd reason I was awake at 5 a.m. and observed this there he was dangling looking like a dead person from a nightmare I went into the kitchen and got a knife went upstairs and cut him down he looked dead but he lived he went to a psychiatric unit for 30 days and a rehab unit for 30 days he’s due to come home soon I’m not looking forward to it I do not want a suicidal person around me especially one that put a noose around their neck and jumped the thought of it makes me sick it makes me nauseous I never ever want to see that person again and I don’t want them around me but my son said I need to try to be supportive so I’ll go with the flow for 12 months but I have to keep my mental health in mind I’m suffering from anxiety depression probably post traumatic stress syndrome I never expected to see a person hanging from a noose it’s like out of the movies and then I had to do CPR and it was gross and disgusting seeds somebody hanging from a noose and like I said I never want to be around that person again but I have to be
[This comment was edited to abide by the Comments Policy. – SF]
Daisy,
I’m so sorry about the trauma you and your family have experienced. To have a loved one attempt suicide is devastating. To actually witness the attempt adds another layer of trauma to what is already traumatic.
Are you getting help to recover from the trauma you experienced? I hope so. You can text the Crisis Text Line at 741-741 if you’d like to talk with someone by text. The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline can give you advice on how to cope with what you’re experiencing on your husband’s return home; their number is 800-273-8255 (TALK).
Other resources are listed at SpeakingOfSuicide.com/resources. In particular, the booklet “Information and Support After a Suicide Attempt” contains advice for family members after someone attempts suicide. It’s geared toward veterans, but the advice is applicable to all.
May you, your husband, and your family experience soon the healing you seek.
Hi Daisy. You must be going through hell right now and I have been there too. I’m so sorry this has happened to you and your family. I hope your son is a comfort to you in these horrible times,. I think feeling angry is totally normal. I felt the same way. There is no way I could have dealt with such trauma on my own so please consider some talking therapy when you feel ready. I have come home to some horrific scenes in the course of living with a suicidal family member . I had to try to remember that nobody wakes up and just decides to attempt suicide. It is a last ditch attempt to make an unbearable pain go away. Your husband will very likely recover and if you can give your support it will no doubt mean the world to him. On the flip side, remember that your first responsibility is to yourself and your own health so do what you feel is right for you.
What if my friend cant find housing trying everything he can to look for a place but just keep getting turned down he feels like killing himself and giving up not sure what to do message me on my phone please 778 681 5554 my name is jake but for my friend robert