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Showing posts from November, 2018

THE SUICIDE EPIDEMIC

The Suicide Epidemic! Suicide has been an epidemic in this country for decades. And what has been done to prevent it?  Between Kate Spade's suicide on June 5th and Anthony Bourdain's on June 8th, the CDC announced on June 7th that suicide rates were rising and suicide was a tragedy for families and communities. On August 27th, the CDC stated that suicide was a serious public health problem. This was not news if you lost a loved on to suicide. In March 2000, I wrote an article, Let's Stop the Suicide Epidemic - that was published in the Cape Cod Times. Eighteen years later in March 2018, I wrote another article, A Silent Epidemic of Death by Suicide - that was published in the Cape Cod Times. Between those to articles, suicide increased by 50%, from 30,00 to 45,000. And what was done to prevent it? What have you done to prevent it, what have we done to prevent it? I realize suicide is difficult to prevent because people keep their thought and plans to themsel

DREAMS!

Dreams! Oh, the dreams we share with our loved ones and dear friends. Dreams we've talked about with our loved ones and dear friends - the plans we've made about making dreams come true. And we have our secret dreams that we have yet to share but plan to do someday. But suddenly, without warning, those dreams are destroyed. Shocking news, our loved one, dear friend, has died - committed suicide. Grief and disbelief, a life is gone, all dreams destroyed. When a loved one or dear friend commits suicide, they don't realize the consequences of their deaths. A suicide not only steals life from the living, but it also kills their dreams. In an instant, all is lost. What happens to those dreams we shared? They become broken dreams, then disappear, never realized. We are alone in our thoughts and in our feelings of loss and sadness. And as time passes, what do we have, what remains?  In his poem "Broken Dreams," Yeats ends with these words, "Vague memories,