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A Guide to Helping the Suicide-Bereaved

How can you best offer support to someone who is bereaved by suicide? What attitudes, translatedinto caring actions, can best facilitate the bereaved persons coping in the immediate and short term,and their healing in the longer term?

Because of the remaining societal stigma and also the lack of knowledge about how to be with thesuicide-bereaved in a sensitive way, many friends and even family members simply avoid thesituation including the bereaved person altogether. So how can you help? What is your best roleas support person? Below is a guide to clarify what you can do to help the suicide-bereaved.

Accept the intense, back-and-forward nature of grieving

Because grief from suicide is more complicated than grief from other death, survivors need more timeto work through the experience. Their task is to reconcile themselves to the new reality. They may begoing along, and you and they both think that they are making progress, then: BANG! They get hitwith sudden, uncontrollable intense emotions; guilt fear, shame, rejection, sadness, and anger mayexplode all at once sometimes when they least expect it.

Your urgemay be to tell them to get over it. In a way, they never will; the death will always be part

of their experience. What is more helpfulis to listen to the explosion of emotions with patience,compassion, and understanding, truly accepting what they are dealing with.

Listen with your heart

Your help begins with your physical presence and your active, non-judgmental listening; these aid inbreaking down the barrier of silence that stalls survivors healing. Your supported person might relatea story about the deathand then relate it again, and again and again Listening attentively eachtime helps to progress your persons healing.

Your urgecould be to worry about what you will say, trying very hard to get it right.What is morehelpfulis to focus on what is being shared with you, resting in the knowledge that you do not need tohave the answers, just the ability to acknowledge the pain, the feelings, and the questions.

Avoid clichs and simplistic explanations

Some words and phrases will be experienced by survivors as extremely painful. Use of clichdphrases such as Hes in a better place now or Think of all that you have to be grateful for donothing to help the survivor. Minimising or trivialising their experience may help to lessen the pain foryou, but that is not why you are there. Offering simplistic explanations or statements with a veiledjudgment in them make your friends journey through grief more difficult. Even saying supposedlypositive things, such as Youre coping very well with this have a tendency to restrict the freedomyour supported person may feel to express what is really happening with them.

Your urgemay be to say something like, She was out of her mind or It was an insane thing to do.Again, this may serve your needs (providing some way of making meaning, perhaps?). It does nothelp the survivor. What is more helpfulis to encourage the survivors own search for meaning and

understanding.

Be compassionate

You do not know exactly how your supported person is feeling (they can teach you), but in allowingyour friend the full spectrum of experience as intense and difficult as it may be for both of you to bepresent for thatyou are helping without judgment, criticism, or expectation of how they shouldheal. You are truly walking beside them, rather than in front or behind.

Your urgecould be to say I know just how you feel. You dont; dont ever say that.What is morehelpfulis to become the learner here, not the teacher.

Respect the need to grieve

Because of the stigma we have spoken about, the nature of a suicide death is sometimes kept secret.Wounds that are not allowed the light of day are wounds that are very slow to heal. If the need to

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grieve of parents, siblings, grandparents, aunts, uncles, spouses, children, and friends is ignored,their journey to a restored sense of self is retarded. As a caring person in their lives, you may be theonly one available to listen non-judgmentally. Making yourself available physically through yourpresence and emotionally through your receptivity is a wonderful gift to give.

Your urgemay be to strongly encourage them to talk, but if you do that they may feel pushed. What

is more helpfulis to back off and wait until you get a signal that they are ready to talk; then yourreadiness to listen and your availability are maximally effective.

Respect the Under re-construction sign

Have you ever gone to a website only to see with disappointment that you cannot have theexperience of the site that you hoped: it is under re-construction? The individual nature of the griefresponse means that each person approaches the task of healing differently and in their own time,according to the experiences and influences that have shaped their life. The person may be takinglonger than you thought they should to heal; their behaviour may seem inappropriate at times. Butremember, the death has been a shattering experience for the person; their life is now under re-construction.

Your urgemay be to criticise how they are going about the re-construction, or to guide them to do it

differently. What is more helpfulis to merely accept their pace, their way. The website of their lifewill come back online when they are ready, once re-construction has gained serious traction.

Be aware of holidays and anniversaries

Events such as birthdays, anniversaries, and holidays used to be special, and for the suicide-bereaved, they still are: special and potent reminders that the loved one is no longer with them. It ishard. Their pain and hurt is a natural part of the grieving, but it may fall to you as support person to bethere when the bereaved person is most in touch with grief over the loved ones absence.

Your urgecould be to try to take the hurt away, make it immediately better for the survivor. What ismore helpfulis to allow the expression of grief, and not shrink from remembering the person, as thatcan be a comforting confirmation that the person who was so much a part of the bereaved persons

life is not forgotten.

Suggest a support group

Connecting with other people who have had the same traumatic experience is one of the best ways toaccelerate healing. Generally, survivors in a support group are allowed, even encouraged, to tell theirstories as often as they like while the group listens patiently.

Your urgemay be to help your supported person find such a group. If so, indulge in it!What mayalso be helpfulis to offer any assistance necessary to help the bereaved arrive at the meeting. Thiscould include offers of a ride to the meeting, looking after children while the person attends themeeting, or something else.

Respect faith and spirituality

If the bereaved person has access to a spiritual holding of some sort a religion, stillness practice, orsome sort of faith-based path they follow it may help them to face the death. Because theirphilosophy may be different from yours, it may be more difficult for you to support them when youhear them make statements emanating from a spiritual tradition that seems invalid to you.

One way this can manifest is in a person getting angry with God. Your religious or spiritual path mayfind that objectionable, but remember: getting angry with God means having a relationship with God.The person might also need to explore how religion complicated their life: for example, by beingbrought up to believe that those who suicide will go to hell.

Your urgemight be to explore the finer points of theology, helping them to understand more. Stifleit. What is more helpfulis to listen and learn, allowing the expression of feelings about religion andspirituality. Its all part of the process of working out what has meaning.

Understand that without love there is no grief

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The grief arises because the bereaved person loved, because they were in relationship with thedeceased. The need for loving support still goes on, so wherever possible, the bereaved family canheal better if they can join forces with others, such as other family members and friends who are alsogrieving, and grieve together in healthy ways: not alone, not in silence.

Your urgemight be to underestimate just how much energy, time, and caring it takes to support aperson bereaved by suicide: probably more than you ever dreamed possible.What is helpfulis tounderstand that, ultimately, your effort will be more than worth it, in terms of your relationship

Helping survivors cope

While the above understandings and attitudes towards the suicide-bereaved will help ensure that yoursupport is sensitive and compassionate, bereaved people looking to you for support may also want toknow about basic coping actions that they can take right now, immediately, even in early stages of thehealing process. Here is a list of suggestions which may be useful.

1. Encourage them to set aside time each day for grieving. During this time, they are free to cry,think of the deceased, meditate, or pray.

2. Suggest the keeping of a journal. Writing may give them some control over the most intenseemotions. Writing down obsessive thoughts may cause those thoughts to lose some of theirpower.

3. Encourage the expression of feelings through creative outlets such as painting, poetry,cooking, gardening, or woodwork. These can be immensely restorative.

4. Back the person going for support from activities such as massage, meditation, listening tomusic, or practicing relaxation techniques. These can help reduce both the physical andemotional stress of bereavement.

5. Remind them that exercise can help them to feel better emotionally and also render themphysically tired, so that they can sleep.

6. Urge good self-care: eating enough (and well), resting sufficiently, and setting aside time forenjoyable activities are all important. Engaging them is not disloyal to the dead person.

7. Suggest that they not make any major decisions for a while, like moving house or getting ridof the deceased persons possessions.

8. Warn them that they may very well hit a low spot sometime after the funeral, and that if theydo, asking for help is the best thing that they can do.

9. Discourage them from believing that alcohol or drug usage will provide more than a verytemporary escape, after which they will probably feel worse. Substance usage can causedepression and poor health. If they feel the need for drugs, you can encourage them to get intouch with their G.P., or perhaps an organisation such as Alcoholics Anonymous.

10. Tell them how important it is, if they are feeling depressed with sleep, appetite, and energyissues, to seek help from their doctor. (Hawton & Simkin, 2010)

This article is an extract of the Mental Health Social Support Specialty Supporting theSuicidal and Suicide-Bereaved. For more information on MHSS, visitwww.mhss.net.au.

References:

Hawton, K., & Simkin, S. (2010). Help is at hand: A resource for people bereaved by suicide and other sudden,traumatic death. National Health Service (UK): copyright: Crown. Retrieved on 28 March, 2012, fromweblink.

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