Post by Admin on Jul 3, 2023 12:47:34 GMT
The violence of suicide reverberates in, and through, us all
psyche.co/ideas/the-violence-of-suicide-reverberates-in-and-through-us-all
A psychodynamic perspective on suicide can help us all reckon more honestly with the interconnectedness of psychic pain
In many societies today, thinking around suicide is mostly compassionate, and rightly so. There’s widespread acceptance that a person who seeks to end their own life must be suffering desperately. However, what this well-intentioned focus on the individual misses is that suicide does not only reflect a crisis point of one person’s suffering. Rarely acknowledged is that suicide is also an act of terrific violence – against the victim’s body and against those around them.
To find the body of a loved one who has taken their own life is deeply and irreversibly disturbing. The suicidal person knows this, and so if we – the relatives, friends and mental health professionals – are to develop a fuller understanding of how to support a suicidal person, we must attempt to reckon honestly with the powerful relationship dynamics that are operating within, and around, the suicidal person, leading them to act with such violence towards themselves and those who will be affected by their death.
Engaging in this reckoning is incredibly challenging. The closer you get to the frightening emotional reality of suicide, the more your mind tries to defend itself. To encounter a suicidal person is to come into contact not only with death, but also with deep suffering and emotional pain – pain that you can’t help but identify with in some way. I’m not suggesting that everyone will experience suicidality, but that we all experience psychic pain and, when we’re unable to resolve this pain within ourselves, we are all vulnerable to acting out that pain in and through others. This is why responses to suicide can be as much about the onlooker – whose mind is desperately trying to distance itself from any recognisable element of a suicidal state – as it is about the suicidal individual.
As a clinical psychologist working with suicidal patients, I’ve experienced first-hand how difficult it can be to hear about the trauma, the loss and the intense self-loathing that often accompanies a person who is feeling suicidal. In the therapy room, my mind may try to wander away from their distress, turning the discussion towards the parts of their life they enjoy – their so called ‘protective factors’ – as mental health professionals are often taught to do. Or I might otherwise feel tempted to try to reduce my patient’s experience, to convince myself that the situation is not so serious because they seem to demonstrate ‘futuristic thinking’ (that is, they’re able to talk about the future, which is usually taken as an indication that there is less of an immediate risk) or because of I’ve noticed some other possibly tenuous hopeful sign.
While these conversations focused on the positives have merit and may help the suicidal patient to remain connected to those parts of themselves that want to continue living, I am sure that another function is to help the therapist reduce his or her own anxiety. But at what cost? Will I leave enough space for my patient’s distress, their anger or their disappointments?
psyche.co/ideas/the-violence-of-suicide-reverberates-in-and-through-us-all
A psychodynamic perspective on suicide can help us all reckon more honestly with the interconnectedness of psychic pain
In many societies today, thinking around suicide is mostly compassionate, and rightly so. There’s widespread acceptance that a person who seeks to end their own life must be suffering desperately. However, what this well-intentioned focus on the individual misses is that suicide does not only reflect a crisis point of one person’s suffering. Rarely acknowledged is that suicide is also an act of terrific violence – against the victim’s body and against those around them.
To find the body of a loved one who has taken their own life is deeply and irreversibly disturbing. The suicidal person knows this, and so if we – the relatives, friends and mental health professionals – are to develop a fuller understanding of how to support a suicidal person, we must attempt to reckon honestly with the powerful relationship dynamics that are operating within, and around, the suicidal person, leading them to act with such violence towards themselves and those who will be affected by their death.
Engaging in this reckoning is incredibly challenging. The closer you get to the frightening emotional reality of suicide, the more your mind tries to defend itself. To encounter a suicidal person is to come into contact not only with death, but also with deep suffering and emotional pain – pain that you can’t help but identify with in some way. I’m not suggesting that everyone will experience suicidality, but that we all experience psychic pain and, when we’re unable to resolve this pain within ourselves, we are all vulnerable to acting out that pain in and through others. This is why responses to suicide can be as much about the onlooker – whose mind is desperately trying to distance itself from any recognisable element of a suicidal state – as it is about the suicidal individual.
As a clinical psychologist working with suicidal patients, I’ve experienced first-hand how difficult it can be to hear about the trauma, the loss and the intense self-loathing that often accompanies a person who is feeling suicidal. In the therapy room, my mind may try to wander away from their distress, turning the discussion towards the parts of their life they enjoy – their so called ‘protective factors’ – as mental health professionals are often taught to do. Or I might otherwise feel tempted to try to reduce my patient’s experience, to convince myself that the situation is not so serious because they seem to demonstrate ‘futuristic thinking’ (that is, they’re able to talk about the future, which is usually taken as an indication that there is less of an immediate risk) or because of I’ve noticed some other possibly tenuous hopeful sign.
While these conversations focused on the positives have merit and may help the suicidal patient to remain connected to those parts of themselves that want to continue living, I am sure that another function is to help the therapist reduce his or her own anxiety. But at what cost? Will I leave enough space for my patient’s distress, their anger or their disappointments?