Wanted to add that I’m using the literal definition of “suicide”…not one which involves making any judgment calls re’ REASON or circumstances. Just “the intentional ending of one’s own life”.
I voted less than one per 10 years, but as I’ve read through the thread, thought of a couple of others. I’m 34 and can think of 4 right now.
When I was in 6th grade my music teacher hung herself over one of the breaks (Christmas, spring break, I’m not sure which).
Last year one of my students shot himself. I had actually had him in class when he was a junior, and we got along really well, although he was a poor student. He dropped out when he was a senior. Then the next year he came back to repeat his senior year. He always spoke to me in the hall and smiled, but I remember thinking he seemed different. I heard he was in trouble a lot that year, and only came back to school because of his girlfriend. Then one morning his body was found in a little wooded area behind his house, shot himself. Really sad.
One of my brother’s childhood friends shot his wife and then himself a few years ago. We had gone to church together from late elementary all the way up through high school at least. I had lost track of him after growing up and getting married myself, although I still saw his mom from time to time. He had a little boy the same age as my daughter (so now 5), and the grandparents share custody, so on paternal grandma’s turn he is in my daughter’s sunday school class.
One of my husband’s cousins hung himself last year. I didn’t know him well at all, only having met him once or twice, but he’s the same age as my husband and they played together a lot as kids. The two families only live about 3 hours apart, but by the time the boys were in high school they didn’t visit as often anymore.
Um, I meant to type “attic”.
Known fairly well, only one I guess. My first cousin did, but I barely knew him. And a girl from high school did.
I know of two, my very good friend from high school, he got turned down for a date by a cheerleader, blew his brains out that night.
My MLI, I married her beautiful daughter, and her protest was to shoot herself.
Using just my personal life, zero. There was one incident with someone that I knew slightly (in my military unit) that was ruled a suicide attempt but many felt it was someone else. He survived but was too damaged to remember anything.
Of course as a police officer I have dealt with many but not anyone I did not know outside of work.
I’m 51 and I’ve known only one so far, and that was coming up on 30 years ago, so I wasn’t exactly sure if that fell under the 1 for 10 years or not.
Oops should have said that I’m 43.
my ex girlfriends mom tried a few times, and my uncle succeeded, but i didn’t know my uncle, i was 2 years old. so zero.
A few years ago one close friend killed himself a couple years after he was severely disabled in a crash and then his work & family life fell apart. It was pretty predictable & I have to say I’d probably have come to a similar decision had I been in his place.
One very aged relative became permanently bedridden after a fall & decided she didn’t want to put up with that & just stopped eating. She lasted almost a week. That’s about 99% a suicide in my book. And like the above, I’d probably do the same thing if facing the same circumstances.
So that’s somewhere between 1 and 2 total in my life. I’m 52.
I’m 50, and can recall four.
“Steve” was a salesman at the stereo store I worked at back in the 80s. I didn’t know he was gay (it never came up). He found out he was HIV positive and drove to an area around the Liberty Memorial (the main Kansas City cruising spot in those days) and shot himself in his car.
“Brian” was a salesman at the same store, only 19 years old, was dumped by his first girlfriend and killed himself with carbon monoxide in the garage.
I can’t blame Steve, and if I was in his situation, I’d definitely think about it - I’ve had other friends die of AIDS and it is an awful way to die. But Brian? That was downright spiteful and left a scar on the life of another person.
Two other friends suffered from mental illness, and couldn’t have been more different.
“Joe” was a loner who suffered from depression his entire life, but he threw himself into his work, and was excellent at his job as a psychiatric nurse. There is a cliche that the mentally ill are attracted to working in the field, and in his case it was true. Some of his co-workers were of the opinion that his own suffering made him especially empathetic to the patients.
I’ve gotten to know him a lot better after his death because he left everything to his best friend, and he and I have been dealing with Joe’s estate. We’ve had to clear out his entire apartment, and he was a “tidy hoarder” - no piles of rotting food, but one bedroom was entirely filled with boxes - literally to the ceiling. We had to move all of this out of the apartment and filled one of those PODS units. After that was moved to the friend’s house, we spent another few days sorting the boxes - donate, sell, keep, gift. A huge amount of work.
But it was the most well-planned suicide I have ever witnessed. He left a long will, canceled his utilities, e-mailed everyone he knew (very late at night) and left meticulous instructions to our friend down to what storage facility and funeral home to use. He even withdrew cash to cover expenses before the insurance paid off (and he had made sure it had vested). There was even a checklist on his desk where he had crossed off every one but the very last item.
“Martha” was his opposite. She was bi-polar and had a huge number of friends. She had a record store and supported the local music scene - there was not a musician in town that hadn’t had some contact with her. She was very socially conscious, and did various benefits - once she cleared her entire record store out to hold a benefit concert. Thousands upon thousands of LPs. People volunteered to move all of the stock into the basement, and even more amazingly, stayed around after the concert to bring it all back up so the store could be open the next day.
Her funeral was amazing. The place was packed to overflowing - you literally could not get one more person in the door. If being loved was a cure for mental illness, she would still be alive. She killed herself while her husband and two small children were downstairs preparing dinner.
I’m and have only met one person that I found out later had committed suicide. I can’t say anything about it as it would be easy to track in the news since he was associated with a VERY famous criminal case.
I left out the number “40” after “I’m.”
My maternal grandfather, to whom I have never met or even know his name committed suicide by hanging. By sheer coincidence, both grandfathers died around the same time, and my father was estranged with his father.
My cousin’s son (is that my 2nd cousin?) killed himself with a gun around the age of 18 or so. He was into drugs and trouble and was arrested for strong armed robbery with another individual and was looking at time in the penitentary.
I’m 60 and I’ve known three.
#1 was a bloke I hung around with during a period as a teen. He shot himself in connection with a police search for him after some break-ins he was supposed to have done (he was a drug addict). The police also had a suspicion that it was he who had killed the local grocer in an attempted robbery the day before Christmas.
#2 was the son of the above mentioned grocer. He had taken over the shop but was no business type, so in the end when things had gone out of hand completely he locked himself in the garage and started the engine of his car.
#3 was someone I had learned to know at our mutual favorite bar. He was a quiet person who mastered the art of not getting involved in conversations with others more than uttering something to one another every now and then (but so are many people at that place, including me). Apparently he was in the closet and couldn’t get out of it.
I’ve known three or maybe four, over many decades.
Maybe my uncle, although he was an alcoholic and it was ruled something like accidental OD on sleeping pills while in an alcoholic stupor.
The other three were all in the same family. The children were my mother’s first cousins, but closer in age to me and lived nearby so we were fairly close. The first suicide was the wife of the eldest boy. She had, by all accounts an absolutely horrid mother. She was also just about the most painfully shy person I have ever met. She poisoned herself one mother’s day around 1960, leaving two young children.
The second was six weeks older than me. He had a PhD (in physics) and after his second divorce, he shot himself around the mid 70s.
The third was the youngest, a girl about 5 years younger than me. She attempted suicide in the weeks after Marilyn Monroe. She recovered and then sometime in the 90s suicided, I’m not sure how.
The fourth child in the family, about two years older than me, died in her 50s of a brain tumor. Talk about a star-crossed family! The oldest son remarried and is still alive, in his 80s.
As I rack my brains I can’t think of a single other suicide among acquaintances.
I also had an inlaw who killed herself around Easter of 83. She suspected her husband was cheating on her; she tried five different methods and was rescued each time. One day she called her husband at work to announce that she knew he was cheating and she was going to shoot herself. He heard the sound of the gun. When he rushed home, she was dead.
A single acquaintance apparently blew his brains out on his sailboat where he lived. There was some question at first whether he was shot or whether he shot himself, but it was soon pretty clear that he did it.
Just one. My uncle, three years ago, at the age of 30, ODed on heroine. We grew up together. He was like an annoying jackass of an older brother and it was pretty shocking when he died.
My Mom has a friend with three suicides in his family: His mother, his sister, and his nephew. Tragic stuff.
a high school friend = carbon monoxide
a family friend = gun
my husband = hanging
a distant neighbour = unknown
a close friend = intentional drug overdose
I am 47.