“I feel it was my fault. I stressed him out beyond his tolerance. My studies, my future, my needs - all of this with his job loss--he couldn’t bear the burden of it anymore and took the drastic step. But why didn’t papa just talk it out with any of us? Why did he have to do this?” said Maria D’mello,  19-year-old daughter of Patrick D’mello who committed suicide due to extreme depression. “I don’t know if I could have helped him in any way. But now I have no one else to look forward to. Papa had always been by my side like a pillar. I thought we were friends and could share almost anything with each other. But now I wonder who my father actually was. What was eating him so much that he thought leaving me alone in this world was the way to make things right?” 

Maria was brought in for therapy as she had gone into a strange silence following her father’s suicide. She wasn’t grieving either as would have been expected by a child who lost her father. She had been too stoic for everyone’s comfort making them worry that she had not accepted the tragedy yet. She had eaten up all the sorrow and wanted to believe that nothing had happened to her father. After being in therapy for two long months, she gradually started to accept that horrible event as a reality, a part of her life. “I can’t forget the image of my father hanging down from the ceiling fan. His tongue was strangely twisted and so were his eyes...half closed and half open. The image has taken hold of my mind in a strange cold, clammy grip that I am unable to shake off. 

And then started all the talking and guess works about why he did what he did. I heard people saying that he owed a debt to a few people but it wasn’t more than 1lac rupees. But I also know that Papa would have paid it off in a span of 1-2 years had he been around. 

I know my father; he was a fighter, he called me a fighter too. He was my inspiration but now, I am not even able to trust myself. If this is what fighters do, maybe I should also hang myself. It seems only fair and logical to me...I think it would’ve been better if I wasn’t born in the first place. Mama and Papa would live together happily without any burdens. 

I have had this urge of killing myself so many times in the past two months--I have even imagined myself exactly as I found papa that afternoon...me also hanging from that fan. Wouldn’t it be bliss? Wouldn’t it simply end everything and I would be free. 

But then, I was counselled on the importance of life and I am half convinced on the importance of it...I may not believe that my life is worth anything, but I do agree that I should not give up without a good fight first. I am only 19 years old. I have to live so many more years but how can I without my father, my pillar and inspiration besides me? Did he ever think about what I might go through after his death? He escaped the evils, but what about me? I sometimes doubt whether he loved me at all...if he did he would have let me die first so that I would be spared the pain of loneliness,” cried Maria.

For Maria, her father’s suicide not only is a huge trauma but in a warped way, it justifies the action of suicide itself. She sometimes feels that if her dad could do it, so can she. She is struggling to understand and justify to herself why suicide is wrong. While she laments the loss of her father, she is also part angry with him...a strange anger that is simmering just below the surface that tells her that her dad was selfish in leaving her behind alone..she is angry with him and desperate with herself...an anguish she shares with most people whose loved ones have committed suicide, leaving them behind with questions unanswered.

Maria was lucky to have found professional help timely and her therapist is helping her cope up with the loss and look forward to her life again.

(Pic credit: freepik)