The death of someone important can cause great grief and sadness whatever the cause of death. However, families bereaved through suicide also have to face additional pressures and pain.
If you have been bereaved though suicide, you will probably go through the shock, deep sadness and occasional anger felt by people bereaved in other ways. At the same time, you may also have to cope with extra emotions such as guilt, shame and self-blame. You may find yourself plagued by thoughts of ‘what if’ and ‘if only’.
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The Grieving Process
Grief is a natural process of reaction and adjustment to loss and change. When we lose someone or something that is important to us, we grieve. There are many types of losses – loss of health, loss of employment, marital breakdown, divorce and death – and the reactions we have after a loss may be very different. Every significant loss challenges us to find ways of coping with the changes that absence brings.
This does not mean that we put the loss behind us, but we now have to adjust to life without that person or thing that meant so much to us. For most of us the death of someone close will be the biggest loss we face. Your grieving process is to try to make sense of what has happened while learning to live your life without that person.
Suicide, Children & Young People
Explaining to a child or teenager that someone has died by suicide is one of the most difficult situations that a parent might ever face. It is a natural reaction with any death to want to hide away from the outside world, but with a death from suicide you are much more likely to have to deal with outsiders e.g. Gardaí, Coroner or media.
As the story of what has happened can quickly become public knowledge it is best to be open and honest from the start, difficult and all as that may seem.
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