Meet Jono
In February of 2024 I lost my father to suicide. He was 67 years old. Sadly, my father’s story is not unique. His story of depression with the all-too-common ending of suicide is the story of countless others in this country, and it’s about time we start talking about it.
Over the last several decades, America is averaging one suicide every eleven minutes…
Let that sink in for a second... one suicide every eleven minutes.
As a point of reference, suicide is currently the 9th leading cause of death in this country -- more people die by suicide than auto accidents every year.
And the total number of "Deaths of Despair" -- in addition to suicide, "Deaths of Despair" are those associated with depression and substance abuse like alcohol-related diseases and drug overdoses -- makes depression the 4th leading cause of death in this country. Only heart disease, cancer, and COVID-19 have killed more Americans over the past 5 years.
1/5 Americans has a mental illness -- that's only counting the reported cases. And I'm willing to bet that everyone reading this has either experienced a mental health issue personally (I have depression) or knows of someone who has. At most, each of us is just two degrees removed from someone suffering from a mental illness.
Now, it’s important to remember that depression is a disease, like anything else. And yet it is the only disease in which suicide is a common and even predictable outcome. Heart disease, cancer, diabetes, Alzheimer’s; no other disease results in suicide at the same rate as depression.
That’s because depression is a parasite of the mind. It feeds on its host and only grows in strength as the host weakens. And in many instances, this parasite grows and grows until it fulfills its goal of killing its host.
It’s no coincidence that when people end their lives using a gun, like my father did, they typically shoot themselves in the head - not the heart, or the gut, but the head. They are, in fact, shooting at the depression, they’re trying to kill the parasite.
OK, so what do we do? We can start by removing the stigma around depression and suicide and discuss it like we do any other disease. If my father had died of brain cancer, would I feel shame about it? Of course not. And when it comes to his suicide, while he may have pulled the trigger, his depression is what killed him. Suicide is merely a symptom of depression and trust me when I say my father had no agency in his final moments. He did not kill himself, his depression killed him. He lost his battle with depression and surrendered to the final manifestation of his illness.
You may have noticed that I’ve repeatedly said my father died by suicide, rather than say he committed suicide. This is very much intentional for he did not commit a crime or action; he had no real choice in the matter at all. He died by suicide and phrasing it in this way helps illustrate that he was a victim of a disease. When someone dies from cancer, we don’t say they committed organ failure. They died from complications of their disease, and the same is true for those who die by suicide.
We should also be better about how we discuss depression, absent suicide. Our society often says, 'someone is depressed' when we should say 'they have depression'. We say, 'a person is bipolar' when we should say ‘that person has bipolar disorder'. What’s the difference? The proper phrasing doesn’t conflate the illness with the person’s identity. The disease does not define who they are. That’s why we say someone has cancer, not someone is cancer.
Depression and suicide are all too common to still be ignored. Join me and The Good Life Movement in our efforts to change the public conversation and raise awareness about these issues. We will work to educate the public and inspire action – all in the name of people like my father. May his story become less and less common.
