Suicide.

Why are so many people in this world committing suicide lately? Is life that hard? Is it that unmanageable? There is no rationalization, no answers, no life left. All of a sudden the person is gone and all that are left are anger, grief, and questions. Many questions, never to be answered.

Four people I know of have taken their own lives in the past couple of weeks. I wonder what is going on. Sometimes I feel there is a curse upon The Children's Hospital. It has happened on this campus, it has happened to people on this campus, it has gotten to our patients.

Nearly 11 years ago my father took his own life. It is difficult for me to understand what happened and why it happened. I know he was bipolar, but I didn't know it had gotten this bad. Four days after I said good-bye and told him I loved him, he was gone. Why? I will never know. I cannot know. Like it is a beautiful book written in a language I will never be able to read. The answers are there, I just can't make sense of them.

I think about the kind of pain one must be in to put a gun in his or her mouth, or to jump off a crane. What kind of pain and anguish must someone be in to think that is the best option. Many people call suicide selfish, but I don't think there is enough rational thinking to consider the act selfish. It is desperate and lonely, isolating.

I will never understand what drove my father or the other people around me to take their own lives. It is not an answer I will be given in this lifetime, hence I need to be okay with that. I need to be at peace with it.