Letters 05, compliment

(For an explanation of this catagory, and the letters posted here, go to the first post in this catagory).
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Thanks for the excellent videos on suicide. I’m a psychologist, I did lose one client to suicide. It was horrifying, all those attempts she made, all those calls at all hours, all that agony. Her life was pain. Period.

I felt incompetent and inept, which I surely was. I know you cannot stop someone who is DETERMINED to kill him/herself, but if you are a therapist, you hope you can, oh, I don’t know. I guess it’s a fantasy of power, keeping someone from suicide.

Her suicide was 3 years ago, if I correctly recall, after I quit seeing her, and tried to refer her to someone more experienced. I was an intern and wasn’t even a doctor yet. As I gained my understanding of how little I could do, I felt more and more helpless. And yes, frustrated. I had SUCH a passion to help this lovely, intelligent, good-hearted young woman. I believed I could help her, when many before me had failed. Finally, my supervisor told me I had to refer her to someone else. It was painful and a relief. And THAT made me feel guilty.

In fact, I will never stop feeling guilty about it. I go through periods where I think about her and think, if only I had ______. I had told her about NDEs and how people say if you have a successful suicide, you have to go back and finish your life. She said she believed this because of her religion.

I’m rambling. I apologize. I do wish to tell you that your videos about suicide were helpful to me. I look forward to my own death, I have a selfish need to see her again and learn from her experience.

Be well.

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