“THERE IS always another option. There is courage in everyone, no matter who you are. Don’t ever feel alone.”
This was the message of one speaker at a conference on suicide yesterday attended by 600 second-level students from eight schools across Cork.
Organised by transition-year students at Mount Mercy College, the conference was aimed at tackling the issues around suicide. “We do not see the wreckage of a family affected by suicide the way we see the wreckage of a car after a fatal crash. There are no photos about suicide on the front pages of newspapers or on TV. We chose this topic because we feel it’s something there is not enough awareness around,” Niamh McCarthy (15) said.
University College Cork lecturer and mental health professional Marie Cregan spoke of the heartbreak one mother felt following the suicide of her 17-year-old son.
“She said to me: ‘I don’t know why they call it heartbreak – it feels as if my whole body and soul is broken too.’” These kinds of deaths were one of the “greatest causes of misery in Ireland. The devastation caused to families is unbelievable,” Ms Cregan said. Effective methods of preventing suicide include listening, understanding and sourcing support.
Patricia McCarthy, a Ballincollig-based psychotherapist and counsellor, said bereavement grief is more intense following suicide. “Suicidal youth are in pain, they don’t necessarily want to die – they want their pain to end,” Ms McCarthy said.
One young man from Dublin told students the story of his attempted suicide. “I know now you need to face issues head-on. You need to face what’s happened and deal with it. The world keeps going and life goes on, the only thing you can control is your own behaviour.”