How to help a friend cope with a parent's attempted suicide.

March 4, 2009 4:49 PM

Help me support a friend whose father attempted suicide. Added complication: my friend is half a world away from both his family and me.

My friend "M" called me a few hours ago with the horrible news that his father had attempted suicide. Its caught him and his family completely off-guard as M's dad has always projected the image being the total strong and capable father/husband/provider - also the type that probably bottled issues and emotions up, fwiw. Thankfully, it does appear that he's now getting the care that he needs. My question is how to support my best friend through this.

The complication is that M is currently stationed overseas, with his family and myself back in the states. Talking to M, he seems to be a little dazed by these events right now. I've strongly urged him to go talk to someone over there - he mentioned that there are facilities with counselors/therapists where he's at, or he may go talk to his unit's chaplain. This is his second deployment, and he's always had such an incredibly good state of mind given the stressful conditions he's faced, and I worry that this could really throw him. M pushes himself hard being a good officer and commander, I'm concerned he won't make the effort/take the time to help himself deal with it.

I'm the person that he's emotionally closest to (much more so than his family), and we're able to talk fairly often. I've already started to gently urge him to talk to a professional about this, and I'll continue to do so. But I want ideas/suggestions/comments on anything else I can say or do to help him through this tremendously difficult time. If you wish to respond off-metafilter, please email me at: [e-mail]

posted by anonymous to human relations (5 comments total)

I posted a thread recently on helping a friend who lost his grandmother. I live in Madison, WI, United States; he lives in Bucharest, Romania.

I think the best you can do is talk to him, send a care package or 3452344, and gently urge him to do some things. You're not a therapist.
posted by kldickson at 4:58 PM on March 4

Be there to listen, just listen, whenever he needs it. Make sure he knows you're available any time.
posted by tristeza at 5:11 PM on March 4

Not only did my father attempt suicide (a few years ago, a two weeks before my first law school finals), but he was successful.

There is no formula. I have three siblings and all four of us needed and wanted a different kind of support. Some of us needed professional help, some of us didn't. Some of us actually got professional help. Some of us didn't. Some of us needed to be reassured, continually and for months, that it wasn't our fault. Some of us soldiered through it, but needed to have the occasional break-down, cry-it-out session with a trusted friend.

Dozens of my classmates, many of whom I hardly knew at the time, pitched in for a card and made a contribution to the funeral expenses, which meant a lot (both sentimentally and financially), but don't discount little things.

The only thing you can do is listen, be there, and be perceptive. Don't try to follow a recipe. For goodness sake, don't push about therapy -- you've probably already said enough on that for quite some time. One of my siblings still, years later, refuses to see anyone because of all of the pushing he got right away.

I don't think I can stress enough, though, that everyone is going to need support in different ways, and you have the difficult task ahead of you of finding out just what way that is. That said, don't let fear of doing it wrong keep you from trying. Almost anything is better than nothing.

When my father died, it was probably the first time in my life I felt really, totally alone, and lived with my younger sister, was surrounded by hundreds of sympathetic classmates and had tons of close friends who were at least as shocked as I was. Every gesture, offer, condolence, and comment, no matter how big or small, was a piece of reality that pierced the weird emotional seclusion of trying to figure it all out and reminded me that, hey, there's still a lot going on out there in the world and it's not all going to stop while I gnash my teeth for all of the selfish reasons that people tend to.

In my opinion, your goal should not be to impact the process, really, but to serve as a lifeline and resource available if your friend wants or needs it. People are resilient as hell. Be there, let him talk about it if he wants to. If he doesn't want to, find ANYTHING ELSE to talk about. There were hours and days that the last thing I wanted to talk about was my father because I had been obsessing over it for the past god-knows how long . . . but there were also times that there were just things I needed someone -- anyone -- else to hear me say.

Also be aware that there are going to be a lot of emotional responses that might surprise you. I started making jokes. Not as a defense mechanism so much as because, as I came to accept it, I started treating it like EVERYTHING ELSE in my life, so it became fair game for jokes. A few of my siblings would randomly lash out for no particular reason whatsoever. Both of those things earned us some bewildered looks.

So, uh, yeah. Long, rambling anecdote just to say that you're probably going to get a lot of advice and it's worth considering all of it, but at the end of the day remember that your friend is not a formula, he's a person that none of us know, so you should let your own heart/conscience/head guide you here.

Good luck.

If you have specific questions about anything at all, feel free to email/mefimail me.
posted by toomuchpete at 6:31 PM on March 4 [2 favorites has favorites]

Everyone, as someone wrote above, needs something a little bit different in coping with emotional trauma. One useful all-purpose tool, in my experience, has been to simply and consistently let him know you are there for him and that he is not alone.

This can take a few different forms. The immediate impulse of many kind and supportive people is to say, "Let me know if there's anything I can do for you." Trouble is, the person who is trying to cope with a terrible situation isn't in a position to decide what they would like or need done for them, and very often feels guilty asking. It's often much more helpful to phrase your desire to be there for him as an offer or a statement rather than a question.

This would obviously be easier if he wasn't so far away. So since you can't do his laundry or bring by groceries -- the kinds of things people have a hard time taking care of when they are under emotional stress -- perhaps you can think of what the equivalents might be for someone who is on a military base overseas. I remember seeing a list of items for soldier care packages, and so many of the requested items were for self-maintenance and hygiene, which is always hard to keep up with when you are coping with this kind of devastating event. This might be a silly example, but maybe it will help you think of others.

I also imagine that it is probably very hard for him not to be there for his dad and family right now. If you already know his family, and if and only if it's appropriate and he feels comfortable with you doing so, perhaps you can be another source of information and perspective on his dad's recovery. This might be especially useful if he doesn't feel like he can necessarily get straight information from his family members.

The most important thing you can offer, however, is contact. Don't wait for him to call or email you. Send a little something or leave a little message every day, even if he doesn't always reply and even if you feel strange writing emails into the ether. Tell him you don't need him to answer and that he shouldn't feel obligated to, but that you'll be calling and writing every day just to let him know you are thinking about him and that you are there if he needs you. Replying or actually getting him to talk isn't the point. He can pick up the phone or write a response in those moments when he's ready. Make it about being there for him, not about making him feel like he has to respond or that the grief has suddenly become about taking on a set of social obligations.

In the end, however, he really needs in-person support. Please encourage him to seek out the resources available to him on base. Some of the support or organizations for soldier's families might help you get a better sense of what he and/or you can do (for example, if you begin to be concerned about his mental state, can you be in touch with this CO, etc.)

If any of this bugs him, he can tell you.

You sound like a supportive and loving friend. He is lucky to have you during this difficult time.
posted by foxy_hedgehog at 12:58 AM on March 5

In my opinion, your goal should not be to impact the process, really, but to serve as a lifeline and resource available if your friend wants or needs it. People are resilient as hell. Be there, let him talk about it if he wants to. If he doesn't want to, find ANYTHING ELSE to talk about. There were hours and days that the last thing I wanted to talk about was my father because I had been obsessing over it for the past god-knows how long . . . but there were also times that there were just things I needed someone -- anyone -- else to hear me say.

This sums things up so well.
posted by foxy_hedgehog at 12:59 AM on March 5