I recently participated in a large group conversation about suicide. I sat, actually I stood, on the sidelines rather than joining speakers in the middle. I listened with intent and participated.

The themes and feelings that were expressed of guilt, loss and not understanding, were familiar. There were two points that caused me to call out with a mix of outrage and distress. One was the suggestion that suicide was a selfish act and narcissistic. Three or four recent posts here have been devoted to exploring that view. I don’t seek enlightenment, per se, but I am looking for greater understanding, and empathy.

The other point that brought a strangled sort of howl of ‘No…” from me was when someone suggested that making a suicidal person an involuntary patient saved lives. Saving lives maybe a noble cause but not while removing every gram of self in the process. I couldn’t quite believe that such an oppressive action was possible, involuntary detention is used in the USA and now I know that similar action is also codified in law in Australia.

I am outraged and distressed that someone can be taken into custody and subject to treatment against their will. That this sort of action is deemed to be for their own good, and the very system set up to provide support. Whose good does that serve?

I am outraged that someone who has lost hope can also be made helpless, powerless, and be so disregarded.

I am also indebted to the person who left a comment, on another post, explaining how that combination of hopelessness and helplessness can motivate acts of suicide.

I think of how ill my mother was with an undiagnosed cancer last year and the efforts of my sisters to support her at home until she relented and reluctantly agreed to go to hospital. We wouldn’t we have forced her into treatment, not for her own good or for ours.

At work, where I am responsible for delivering training, I occasionally come up against a corporate imperative to make attendance at training sessions compulsory, and it makes me a little bit ill. I won’t make training compulsory. If somebody wants to come to training I am pleased, and if they don’t I trust they are managing their own learning and career needs. I can try to entice them by making the training more interesting, more relevant, more compelling and delicious but I do not want anyone there who doesn’t want to be there.

I don’t feel that allowing the space for self determination makes me a ‘patsy’, a loser. I don’t feel diminished by allowing someone else to hold onto their own power and the right (it is a right) of self determination. We have choices, each of us must be able to exercise our own power of choice in regard to our needs and treatment.

This is an instance where I can not appreciate or support what was expressed, however well intentioned some are about forcing others into treatment. No. I am one-sided on this issue.