I think many people were already at the tip of their iceberg and this is just the tipping point. Depression has afflicted so many in our society, and I know from personal experience how difficult it can be to deal with. It is so surprising to me that with psycho therapy being around for so long, the situation has just gotten worse. I think people feel disconnected from themselves and can’t see that there is a light at the end of the tunnel, not it is not a train. I am tired so I should try to post on this again at another time.

I have a friend whose son and his wife are both psychiatrists. He told me that since this economic downturn has happened both their patient loads have increased. I asked him how they could afford it under the circumstances. Perhaps with the advent of so many drugs for depression any thoughts of suicide might be replaced with temporary thoughts of hope via drugs. Who knows what might occur in the near future when the realization that there will not be any quick fix for this sets in? I think we will see more repercussions from this happening this year.

What even the most charitable, caring people fail to realize in serious financial times for one or all, is that no matter how many assets one has, when they must cut back they still must either pay for their possessions (real property, boats, cars, bills, etc), or try to sell them. That doesn’t work when others cannot afford to buy such assets, either. I watched this tragedy play out during both of the Braniff Airlines’ shut downs. Yes, there were 2 and I was flying on them both times (I know know the sign very well - the flight attendants merely sit down and do not speak ever again!). My neighbors were primarily Braniff senior pilots and executives, with children! It was a very sad time. Worse, our community was built by a mediocre national home builder (who was thrown out of Delaware - get that!), and our foundations were literally crumbing, and after the S&L crisis, the economy was terrible, and most of us ended up like today, with 17%-19% mortgages that shot up before our eyes - nice bankers! All of us could afford our homes, at the 6+% we were paying, or thought we were, and the savings rate was about the same as our mortgages, so up to that time, it was wiser to borrow, and save and pay out of the largess of savings interest. Needless to say, no government helped anyone. I, a single mother of 6 then moving from high school into college, could only help my neighbors with anything I could do, heaps of food, encouragement, love, reprieves, etc. I still ‘see’ their boats lined up with FOR SALE signs on them at the piers on our lake, and vehicles in driveways, and parked near stores, and shops, and this went on throughout the early 1980s. It broke my heart and scared the liver out of me - I still attribute those years of terrible stress to thyroid cancers, then invasive breast cancer in the 90s. I also think that it hardened our kids who were teens then, in an unfavorable way. That brings to mind something that never escaped my memory - with teens one day, I heard someone remark about the large number of not very pretty people ‘around’ and another commented, “It has to do with money, they don’t have it …” I was shocked.

PS: friends who are psychoanalysts have told me that not only is mental illness rising rapidly, but those affected by same are seriously depressed trying to cope with those who are mentally ill; something they realize is “from the top down.” It is very sad, and thank goodness, all I know are highly empathetic about those suffering under the sociopaths that prevail in our society now.

Attempting to attribute something so complex and individual to “It happens because…[fill in the blank] ” is disrespectful, wrong-headed and dismissive. In the case of men who’ve always been successful and who self-define by being providers, sometimes they do it for the pragmatic reason that the suicide clause on their multi-million dollar insurance policies has expired and they see it as a way to take care of others. Not because they didn’t love life, but as a selfless act born out of an overwhelming sense of responsibility. After French investment manager, Rene-Thierry Magon de la Villehuchet, lost $1.4 billion of his family’s and friend’s money in the Madoff fraud he killed himself in his Manhattan office. By all accounts he was down-to-Earth, a great sailor, friendly to all, and in love with life. His brother said he it was a ‘noble’ suicide. Even when a note is left behind no one knows the full reasons of another person’s heart or mind, no matter how close. We never know what long-held dreams or beliefs were shattered, or the meaning or weight of events to another. De la Villehuchet was the furthest thing from ‘crazy’ and what an indignity to characterize what he or anyone else does in that horrible moment, other than what it is…an irretrivable tragedy for everyone involved, and one that will never go away. For example, Socrates had his full wits about him when he drank the Hemlock in 399 B.C., he was a martyr of conscience. Even centuries later one can feel that sad ending to a contributing and majestic life. Didn’t men landing at Normandy know they were committing suicide? etc etc etc. A list of high-profile suicides…..these did not have any commonality except possibly momentary despair that they couldn’t see past. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_suicides

A very good friend of mine has always been able to stay at home while her husband provided the income. In the last year, they have lost thier home, he took a job with less pay, obligations continued to mount and in March he ended up in emergency surgery for a heart aneurysm, that was like a piece of cauiflower on his artery. It is a miracle he made it, but yet, he has been angry since then because he did, knowing what is still facing him in life. With the monetary/material losses seeming to make life his obstacle in being alive, rather than appreciating that he beat the odds and is still breathing. The doctor asked his what he thought caused the heart problem and all he said was “a broken heart”. I don’t believe he is any different than many on all levels of income at this time, broken spirits trying to cope, or refusing to cope. I was watching Oprah last week, and she asked a woman what she had to be grateful for, and the woman could really not think of anything, and Oprah told her she was still breathing. For many the warnings were not seen coming, and our economy felt like a train wreck. If our world learns to breath through this, rather than deciding to cease to breath in this world, lives will reinvent again, maybe different but still living. Blessings, Linda