First things first
Jun. 25th, 2008 06:10 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
gerisullivanNote to self: when reading something that sets off my hair-trigger suicide alert radar at screaming "red alert" levels, stop and check for context in minimal impact ways before escalating to more direct reality checks. Especially when nothing that friend has ever posted or said before set off the radar or otherwise suggested they might be at increased risk.
More about the minimal impacts, triggers, and my reactions behind the cut. I name no names, though some will be obvious to those who have one or more chunks of context.
For example, checking for context when reading my LiveJournal friends list means clicking through to the person's journal to see if there are other posts I might have missed, posts that would tell me that the friends-locked, comment-disabled quote that reads like a suicide note most certainly isn't one. If I'd done that immediately I would have seen yesterday's post, the one I missed, the one that said they were going to have to say a really hard goodbye today. Death, yes. Not their death, not suicide, but death, hard death.
I should have checked their journal before interrupting one friend's phone conversation with her husband to get said friend's phone number. And certainly before calling the friend whose post has that WTF adrenaline rush plunging me back into the horrors of losing not just one but two loved ones to suicide.
Because the triggers are always going to be there. Some obscure, some blatant. Some are just plain thoughtless or appallingly stupid and irresponsible, like the person on a mailing list last week who said he wasn't entirely tongue-in-cheek when he posted that shooting yourself was the appropriate response to messing up a convention so bad that it had to be canceled at-con (or after people had started traveling to it).
Some triggers are rock-solid real, others are clearly spoken and posted in response to non-suicidal life crises. Clearly spoken and posted if the listeners and readers have the context, that is.
Further note to self: while checking for context in a lower impact way would have been useful, picking up the phone and calling was certainly better than pursuing any of the higher-impact responses on the options list. Yes, slowing down a bit after getting the context clue along with the necessary phone number would have been good, too, but turning off or tamping down adrenaline-fueled reactions isn't a fast process.
For the record and my memory, this all happened after a full nine hours of sleep. I don't think sleep deprivation was a significant factor as it so often is. I think this one was straight hair-trigger suicide risk reaction syndrome.
It sure released it a lot of adrenaline.
Bath now, I think. Lush bath. Then on to the work at hand. The work, and the amusements, too. Life's full of both. That's a darned good thing, especially given the hard times and tragedies it has such a nasty habit of bringing our way.
More about the minimal impacts, triggers, and my reactions behind the cut. I name no names, though some will be obvious to those who have one or more chunks of context.
For example, checking for context when reading my LiveJournal friends list means clicking through to the person's journal to see if there are other posts I might have missed, posts that would tell me that the friends-locked, comment-disabled quote that reads like a suicide note most certainly isn't one. If I'd done that immediately I would have seen yesterday's post, the one I missed, the one that said they were going to have to say a really hard goodbye today. Death, yes. Not their death, not suicide, but death, hard death.
I should have checked their journal before interrupting one friend's phone conversation with her husband to get said friend's phone number. And certainly before calling the friend whose post has that WTF adrenaline rush plunging me back into the horrors of losing not just one but two loved ones to suicide.
Because the triggers are always going to be there. Some obscure, some blatant. Some are just plain thoughtless or appallingly stupid and irresponsible, like the person on a mailing list last week who said he wasn't entirely tongue-in-cheek when he posted that shooting yourself was the appropriate response to messing up a convention so bad that it had to be canceled at-con (or after people had started traveling to it).
Some triggers are rock-solid real, others are clearly spoken and posted in response to non-suicidal life crises. Clearly spoken and posted if the listeners and readers have the context, that is.
Further note to self: while checking for context in a lower impact way would have been useful, picking up the phone and calling was certainly better than pursuing any of the higher-impact responses on the options list. Yes, slowing down a bit after getting the context clue along with the necessary phone number would have been good, too, but turning off or tamping down adrenaline-fueled reactions isn't a fast process.
For the record and my memory, this all happened after a full nine hours of sleep. I don't think sleep deprivation was a significant factor as it so often is. I think this one was straight hair-trigger suicide risk reaction syndrome.
It sure released it a lot of adrenaline.
Bath now, I think. Lush bath. Then on to the work at hand. The work, and the amusements, too. Life's full of both. That's a darned good thing, especially given the hard times and tragedies it has such a nasty habit of bringing our way.
