The older sibling of a brother in his 20s, who committed suicide some years back, by hanging, told the 'Herald' that he and the rest of the family would never forget him. In his own case, there was no question of stigma, blame or bitterness against God or anyone else.
There was never an inkling within the family that his brother was thinking of self-harm, although since his death he has been able to string a few indicators together, and is still searching for more.
"Afterwards, we heard indirectly he may have been speaking about it, but the shock and the horror of the whole situation at the time left me to ask questions, and then questions got answered and they revealed that maybe there might have been a history of self-harm.
"You have to question that and ask; is this down to an on-going thing in this person's mind over a long period of time? Sometimes it is and sometimes it's not. Sometimes, it's the first time. But, obviously it has fatal consequences."
Asked what his brother was like, he said he was a younger member of the family and, as such, was close to his mother.
"He was normal as far as I know. He was outgoing and friendly and happy and showed no signs of self-harm. He was a real character, with loads of talent, and he was very popular. In fact, that probably would have been one of the hardest things for his peers to take. Each of them experienced a different type of loss, and some of them would have found that difficult to deal with."
He articulated the impact on the family. "It is very hard for a mother or father or both to bury a child, and you and all the other family members are feeling very different emotions. Those that I felt were shock, the pain of loss and the pain that my parents were suffering at the time. There was the pain of the people who had to go and actually identify him, and then the feeling of obviously losing a member of the family circle who, for all intents and purposes, should have been living long after you.
"It (his death) didn't help mother. It was hard to deal with at the time, for everybody. There is a lot of sadness involved in any kind of death but, with suicide, you get people calling in and, in trying to say the right things, they say the wrong things, things like: 'Why did he do it?'."
Even today, he revealed, people will still ask him that same question.
But, he did try and answer it for us. He listed three or four everyday situations where people's lives tend to get caught up as if in a net: money, relationships and health, etc.
"Why did he do it? One of the reasons why is an accumulation of things in that person's life at the time, and the more they accumulated, the bigger the risk they will carry out their thoughts of self-harm because, at the end of the day in my opinion, suicide is a thought.
"It isn't something that people can ask you to do, it is something that is in your mind and it gets bigger and bigger the whole time and the more you can see the sadness and the things which are causing you that kind of pain, there is a build-up of emotion strong enough to actually commit suicide."
He visits his brother's grave half a dozen times a year, once at the annual Blessing of the Graves in the graveyard. But, the family who are left have found a way of channelling their collective sense of loss, when it comes to his brother's 'anniversary' dates and birthdays, etc.
"Because of the strength of feeling we would have for him, and for our parents who have since died, it was felt that in the light of a remembrance anniversary, that all three are treated as a family member on the one anniversary day and not just as an individual.
"I am not saying the family find it easy to deal with. We still don't. His death had a terrific impact on us, but for those who are left behind, every suicide case is different. You have to have understanding and forgiveness, not that they need forgiveness because they see it as some form of release.
"At the end of the day, when somebody has prepared and thought about suicide over a long period of time, there is nothing you can do about it unless someone is aware of it and they can try and prevent it.
"As I've said, it's a frame of mind. I don't know how you can prevent it. Nothing takes you down as much as depression and self-harm. There were probably symptoms that people didn't recognise at the time, nor did they appreciate what the eventual outcome would be.
"I have no bitterness against God or anybody else. As they say: there but for the grace of God'. It is the person's individual choice. There are lots of things that go wrong that can be restructured, money, relationships and health, but the worst thing that can happen to you in this life is dying.
"Everybody wants to live for as long as they can and that is why people find it difficult to understand why people commit suicide, and that is why some people cannot find it in their hearts to actually forgive the person. But, in my own family, that's certainly not the case. We loved our brother in life and we love him in death."
