Off Topic Thread 3.0

Suicide is a massive issue in this country, nearly double the amount of deaths as road deaths. Probably more if you factor in the possibility of single vehicle crashes being intentional. Yet it's only when someone high profile commits suicide, that the conversation surfaces. More often than not it's focused on the incident or on symptoms. Suicide isn't always preventable, some are just to determined and can't be reached. Though many more could and should be. We have a situation now though, that someone can present to A&E as suicidal, with a history of depression with suicidal ideation and be told to go home and sleep it off. In a time when we see over 500 deaths a year from suicide, the government cut 12 million in funding from mental health services. The amount of media conversation, negligible. Quinn's had his heart in the right place, but should have approached the subject from a different angle. There is plenty of latitude to start a conversation about this, without talking about people who complete suicide.

mfceiling wrote: »

I fell down the stairs this morning. Think I might have broken my middle toe. I'll keep you all informed of this horrendous situation.

Went down in the dark a fortnight ago to make bottles at 6am. Didn't bother turning the light on as I know every inch of the house. Wife had taken a dining chair and left in the middle of the floor when feeding kids evening before. Kicked it hard enough to send it flying back across the room. Pretty sure I broke my small toe. One of those ones that when you do it, before the pain actually registers you immediately think "Oh, this might be broken, this isn't good" and then the pain hits.

Not a lot to be done aside from painkillers and strapping. Some interesting colours and shapes on the toe.

On a slightly related note, was over with a mate at weekend and his wife was telling me her sister stepped on an upwards turned plug the other week. Did it hard enough that the plug actually broke the skin in a couple of spots and went into her foot. Would take a sore toe over that any day.

errlloyd wrote: »

This is literally the worst. I remember the absolute battle I went through with a good friend to get him into A&E after an attempt. Pleaded with him to get him in there. I'm fairly sure the physical evidence of his attempt was still prevalent. Sent home. They said they'd send a call out twice a week. She came once and then left it. The sick thing about Ireland is everyone in government seems happy for charities to pick up the slack. Pieta house are amazing, but at some point the services they provide should be paid for by taxes, not donations.

Well the HSE do fund Pieta house now. They outsource counseling services through them since the whole Console debacle. It's nowhere near enough though.

At the moment there are people waiting over 18 moths to get a psychiatric appointment. That's with a GP letter and I'm not referring to actually getting the appointment, I mean getting a date for an appointment at some point in the future. As someone who's had cancer, I've seen how fast things move when you have an acceptable life threatening illness. Yet if you're suffering from depression with suicidal ideation and a history of attempts, it's considered no more imortant, than an ingrown toenail. That sort of attitude is a top down problem.

swiwi_ wrote: »

Argh. PC bullshìt. It's all that warm fuzzy left-wing liberal stuff.

Suicide is horrible, it's very sad etc, I feel genuinely sorry for the familes.

But a spade is still a spade even if you call it a shovel.

But saying commited implies blame/fault/crime.

It's how the samaratins, pieta house, medical professionals refer to it.

Zzippy wrote: »

I lost a friend to suicide in 2015. Gutted. Shocked. Numbed I guess. The family embraced the fact... didn't try to hide it, no stigma, just a cause of death. We have no idea if DV'S family are the same, but maybe Quinny does. He has been very honest about his own struggles with depression. These things need to be talked about openly. Criticising someone for doing so is harking back to that stigma. Fvck that. Mental health needs to be out in the open, not hushed up because someone is dead. I understand the argument, I just think open discussion is so much healthier and necessary.

RIP Dan.

I am truly sorry to hear about your friend, but I still think we can talk openly about mental health and suicide without resorting to "outing" people hours after they've passed. Family and friends need time to grieve and then decide if they want people to know what happened.

Like with aids years ago, it was important to talk about it but someone having aids was something that belonged to them, not the general public. If they didn't want others to know they had every right to keep it private.

People seem to be spending a lot of time thinking of the wider public and very little time thinking about the man and his family. That wouldn't be such a big deal in a month or so, but the same day? Sorry, but the immediate aftermath of death by any cause should be about the man himself and his loved ones. And even after that if they want to keep the cause of death private then they have every right to do that, even if some of us think it's the wrong thing to do. Suicides don't belong to the public. We don't have an automatic right to know about all of them and we don't need to know about all of them to have the conversation.

b.gud wrote: »

Ended up coming back from this a few grand poorer. My OH keeps telling me to stop saying that though, apparently the more appropriate phrase is to say we got engaged

Congratulations!

Game over, man. Game over.

b.gud wrote: »

Ended up coming back from this a few grand poorer. My OH keeps telling me to stop saying that though, apparently the more appropriate phrase is to say we got engaged

Congrats!

awec wrote: »

If you think you've spent a lot of money so far you're in for a shock.

Congratulations!

No I'm fully aware that this was just the warm up for the match :eek:

pickarooney wrote: »

Every single Google result I looked at considered 'completed suicide' as negative, pejorative and to be avoided. Although the writer of one linked page described themselves as a 'suicide survivor'...

Okay. I'm just going on interactions with the different places, and a good friend of mine is a psychologist and she uses the term "completed", as does a friend of mine who is a chaplain in a school. I could be wrong. Either way, committed isn't the preferred term.