I had to know more about the rats, remember the rats? They’re Norwegian it seems, interesting but of no consequence. Poor rats without hope, remind me of dear Mottsu, who was also bereft of hope. Here’s an article with the full (and horrible) detail of the drowned rats study.
A couple of compelling excerpts:
…whether they are restrained in the hand or confined in the swimming jar, the rats are in a situation against which they have no defense. This reaction of hopelessness is shown by some wild rats very soon after being grasped in the hand and prevented from moving; they seem literally to “give up.”
…after elimination of the hopelessness the rats do not die. This is achieved by repeatedly holding the rats briefly and then freeing them, and by immersing them in water for a few minutes on several occasions. In this way the rats quickly learn that the situation is not actually hopeless; thereafter they again become aggressive, try to escape, and show no signs of giving up.
Richter, C.P. On the Phenomenon of Sudden Death in Animals and Man. Psychosomatic Medicine Vol. XIX, no. 3, 1957
Hope can be learned, hedgehog.
Hope for me is holding someone’s hand.
Hold on to hope.
In the Australian election suicide prevention has been identified as a priority. I can’t help but wonder if the investment wouldn’t be better made in supporting or developing mental resilience than preventing suicide. Earlier support rather than later I mean.
I am indebted to journalist Susan Maushart for talking about the drowned rat study of 1957. Resilience or determination was developed in rats or maybe it was just hope.
Rats that were trained to hope swam, while locked in jars filled with water, for 60 or more hours. Inexperienced, or un-hopeful, rats would sometime persevere for as little as 15 minutes before giving up and drowning. It’s a horrifying and compelling study.
Why did some keep on swimming in a Nemo-esque fashion while others chose to give up? Hope?
I hope our government invests in ways to build hope in addition to rescuing the drowning. Both are needed but one has more power, and allows for greater self determination. For now keep on swimming, just keep swimming Nemo.
Hold on to hope.
When things start to happen to happen,
don’t worry. Don’t stew.
Just go right along.
You’ll start happening too.
Dr. Suess: Oh, The Places You’ll Go!
That someone chooses to die creates a sense of unease. It’s not the natural order (just ask the church) and increasingly suicide is talked about as preventable.
I often wondered how different my experience of loss might have been if Mottsu had died some other way. Would I have been offered more solace if he had died accidentally rather than quite so deliberately? Could I have talked more (not that I could have talked any less than I did) if he had been taken by some indiscriminate fatal illness?
In many religions killing oneself is as serious a sin as killing another. Apparently only God may take a life.
Apart from what God might or might not condone, there seems to be a deeper existential threat to society at large when someone dies by suicide.
“Affronted and confronted” is the phrase Colin Tatz coined this week to describe our reaction to suicide. He says, “We are, in many senses, as much affronted as confronted by each such event. But this is essentially because we view the individual as belonging to us, to our society. For some religions, life and death belong only to God.”
It’s not easy to understand suicide and I am not sure we try hard enough. The act is shocking and distressing for we who are left to piece together the story and, even so, there could more reflection about why react the way we do.
We could also reflect more about the desperation, the pain, the loneliness and angst that might compel someone to chose not to live.
Madalina Manole a popular Romanian singer was found dead on her 43rd birthday.
The Romanian Orthodox Church would not allow her a full burial service because she committed suicide. Is it only me who is distressed and astounded that the church might be so punitive? Unusually for me, I am lost for words.
I am also sad for Madalina Manole’s husband and one year old son. Suicide is hard on families and only more difficult, I imagine, without the support of the church.
It seems so wrong to me. There is nothing gained by making sinners of the dead for having for dying as they did. Is there?
There’s a name for how we die, the manner, the ease. There’s even a global ranking for the quality of end of life care “quality of death“. I am reassured that there are many with a concern for how we die. There is a need to better support the dying through that transition.
Apparently few countries have palliative care strategies as part of their overall health care policies. The result, the report claims is “…is an incalculable surfeit of suffering, not just for those about to die but also for their loved ones.”
We’re born to die, that’s not all we’re born for, but it is our existential reality. I don’t know how to die, I’ll try to learn it even though conversations on the topic will be rare, and direct experience will be limited.
I hope to rage rage, even outrageously rage, while I can and then be allowed to die with peace, going gently into the night.
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rage at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Dylan Thomas 1951 (or 1952)
Since reading this passage I can’t shake the image of the sick ape…
“It was absolutely uncanny, gave me the creeps. That woman actually thought I’d been thinking of suicide.
I had been thinking of it right enough, often do, always have the idea of it huddled like a sick ape in the back of my mind. But I’d never do it. Well, that’s not true either. I can imagine the state of mind, I’ve been in it often enough. no place for the self to sit down and catch its breath. Just being hurried, hurried out of existence. When I feel like that even such a thing as posting a letter or going to the laundrette wears me out. The mind moves ahead of every action making me tired in advance of what I do. Even a thing as simple as changing trains in the Underground becomes terribly heavy…”
Hoban, R. (1975) Turtle Diary p. 75. London: Bloomsbury Publishing
Oh, thanks Russell Hoban, finally I can feel how suicidal thoughts reside in one’s head, quietly omnipresent and huddled. Oh my, Hoban’s description of ‘it’ is haunting.
I am reminded of Mottsu’s lethargy, how he was weighed down by his depression and how he barely plodded through his last days. I didn’t quite see it then but now, with 20/20 hindsight; I can see how he struggled and he did not (could not) find the space to sit down and catch his breath.
Having said that I will also say that help is at hand. Around the world there are services dedicated to supporting people keep living. In Australia those seeking support and information about suicide prevention can contact Lifeline on 13 11 14
The Australian of the Year, Professor McGorry, told the National Press Club last week that there were over 2,000 (and mostly preventable) deaths from suicide every year.
Apparently figures report that more Australians die by suicide than die due to road accidents. 
I am startled as I recall that suicide statistics are widely regarded as under-reported. It is accepted that many more die by suicide than is recorded, and the misrepresentation in reporting is largely for reasons around the unwanted stigma of suicide for affected families.
In taking to task the misguided reticence of newspapers to publish suicide statistics, Professor McGorry said “People aren’t aware of these facts and figures because of this shroud of silence over this issue.”
I support Professor McGorry’s stance that, “It should be on the news every night. There should be a toll on the front of every newspaper, every day.”
In effect someone dies of suicide every four hours, the real hidden toll is the destructive affect on family members and friends. The more we talk about suicide the more understanding can be shared and the more support and treatment options can be openly discussed.
“May you live all the days of your life.” Jonathan Swift
For a lucky some of us, depression is difficult to fathom as a potentially fatal affliction. For others is an omnipresent shadow, that is difficult to explain and impossible to share.
“For me, depression is kind of like the Jimi Hendrix experience without the Jimi Hendrix. It’s the big black hole at the end of the universe, and it’s sucking all the colour and majesty out of life like a late-night ShamWow commercial. All the happiness there ever was and all the joy that will ever be; all the smiles you ever saw and all the light you’ll ever see – flushed like a dead goldfish down a rusty drain pipe.”
Richard Parker writes with eloquence about depression from the inside.
http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/stories/s2942107.htm
…and then there are times you are:
- bursting with happiness
- overcome with joy
You can be carried away by emotional forces less adversarial, less oppositional but just as controlling
