Oct 25 2008
Tragedy hits home
Too close to home
On Thursday, I heard an awful item on the news (I was listening to music on the radio, and just this once, I listened when the news came on): A man had shot and killed his wife and two children, then he shot and killed himself. Both the man and his wife were police officers, one child was three years old, the other, not even two months. What initially brought this close to home was the fact that it happened in their apartment, which is only a few minutes away from where I live. All of a sudden, it was a little more than just another tragic news item. I was shocked, but after a while, only astonishment remained. I thought, “What a horrible thing.”
Not too close to home
Late Friday, the information came through–the man who had done this is the son of someone I know. I had met him, his wife and his children at another tragic event just over a year ago, the shiva for his father, who had just committed suicide. All of a sudden, it wasn’t too close to home–it WAS home.
The father, among other things, was a member of our very close-knit folk-music community. I got to know him personally when he was diagnosed with the same nasty brain tumor that my husband had (his was operable, my husband’s was not). We exchanged a lot of information and at one point, he actually appeared to have been cured, but the emotional toll was too heavy and so one morning early, he went outside and shot himself in the head. We’ll never know if his emotional state was a result of all the medication and radiation he had received or something else–he chose not to speak about it. We were all shocked and saddened when we heard but somehow, we understood. At the shiva, I met his entire family. They were all lovely people who, aside from having to cope with this man’s illness and death, seemed to be in wonderful shape.
Like father, like son?
After recovering somewhat from the initial shock of Friday’s news, and with the horrible details still fresh in my mind, I had to ask myself, what could make a father do something like this? I’ve heard it said that suicide is contagious, so that might, in some far-fetched manner, explain something…and after everything I’ve been through, I really can understand why someone might decide to end his or her life, but what could possibly make a man decide to take his wife’s life and, even more senseless, the life of a toddler and an infant?
In all my ponderings, I can come up with only two possible explanations:
- He felt pure desperation and for some reason, couldn’t look for, find, or get help, or,
- He broke….snapped…whatever you want to call it. I’m thinking that there must have been some element of rage involved because I cannot, for my life, understand what depths of desperation would cause someone to take someone else’s–and an infant’s! life.
Getting help
I don’t know if this man had sought help, or even if he needed help. I guess that people can, without warning, just suddenly lose their minds, but in today’s world, we have so many options. I decided to blog about this because I know how difficult it is to seek help when your in the thick of things. I was an abused child from the age of 9 or so and it never occurred to me to seek outside help. As an adult, I stayed in an abusive marriage for 20 years before walking out and during that time, I had made only feeble attempts at getting help. Over the following years, the help I received has mainly been self help, but I’ve been able to do it because my children have been so open in discussing so many things with me….difficult things. And there was one therapist who was profoundly helpful in a very short period of time. (If you live in Israel and would like his contact information, just email me or leave a comment here. You don’t need to put your email address in the body of the comment.)
When it seems impossible, that’s when it’s the most urgent.
When you’re spiraling or trudging through muck that seems impossible to escape, it’s almost impossible to shake your head and decide that you’re either going to pour your heart out to someone you trust, or shop for a therapist. But it is essential that you do just that. It’s essential so that you can get started on creating a safe environment for yourself, so that you can live the good, happy life you’re entitled to, and most importantly, it’s essential so that you will not cause harm to those you love.
Make no mistake, going through life as a victim, or as an angry or unhappy person does harm the people you love. And that’s where the tragedy really hits home.
Heartbreaking. What a tragedy for all the extended family left. Makes me wonder if he was on some kind of medication. I hear so many stories now of people on MOD’s (mood altering drugs) who snap. Many of the school shootings in the USA are because of this. I have seen someone coming off of them before, and they were on a 2 week suicide watch. They are not something you can just stop taking, they have to wean off slowly. Just wondering.
Hi Tammy. Thank you for your comment. You’re so right, its’ absolutely heartbreaking.
It’s still such a mystery. Because he was a police officer, he wouldn’t be allowed to have a weapon if he were taking MOD’s (both he and his wife had their weapons at home) . Ditto if he had shown signs of severe depression or something that might lead to harmful behavior. No one has a clue, but the pathologists are still working to find out if there were any drugs in his system.
The home was filled with police officers yesterday. I have never seen such sadness in my life. They were completely dumbfounded and their faces sagged with frowns.
Like you, we’re all wondering.
Nevertheless there will always be a minority who will not get the point you are trying to make….