This Year's New Resolution

I lost my friend in December 2020. He had died sometime in early April, but except only for his immediate family, none of his friends knew about his demise. It is only in December, being fed-up because of his long silence that a few of us common friends decided to find out his whereabouts. All we received was a gist of the news from a school friend. The tragedy in it is that he died in anonymity and alone. He chose to die away from his family and friends. He chose to look for peace and dignity in death, but at a place away from home. I can only reason that he must have been in unfathomable pain to have taken this decision. 

He had turned 37 in 2020. He was a good man, a cheerful son, a supportive brother, a loving husband, a doting father himself to his 3-year old son, and a wonderful friend. Everyone loved him for his sweet, easygoing and polite nature. When he became indifferent after his marriage, we friends unanimously admitted that he was trying to settle down in his new responsibilities. We would often discuss him amongst ourselves and agree to give him space and time. As much as he needed, for as long as it took. While he worked through the disturbances in his personal life, we patiently waited for him to call back or respond to our texts and messages. Even when we felt distanced from him. 3 years flew by, but I still felt him moving away. Whenever I did hear back from him after long gaps, he divulged to me the various problems following him. As a friend, I realized, all I could do was to lend an ear to him, console him and try helping him in any way I could. But now, it all feels less, meagre even compared to the life lost. 

I grieved losing a close friend, coping from my loss, trying only to empathize with his family, not knowing what they must be going through. Ever since I received the news, I have had these questions screaming inside me - “Why did he do it? What happened, that made him give up his life? What must have he been thinking? Why didn’t he call me or reach out to his other friends or even his family and yell out for help? Had he reached out to his family for help?” Questions to which, alas, I will never get an answer. Though even now I console myself saying that he is in a better place, where he no longer is suffering, the major question still remaining in my heart is a ‘What if?’ What if he had reached out to his family for help? What if he had reached out to his friends for support? What if he had only hinted that he is getting such thoughts? Could he have been saved then?

Many of us who experienced similar losses in their lives may have thought of similar questions at some point in time. Mental illness is a more diverse health condition than we give it credit for in our Unconscious Perspectives. We often ignore the initial signs of distress, which if read well in time can save a life. The bipolar behaviors and mood swings, the sudden silence of an extrovert person, the aloofness of a cheerful individual or even the detachment of a ‘party animal’. Often lost in our own personal turmoil and life happenstances, we forget about the rest of the people who exist around us. The family is considered as the first source of support and help for everyone. But sometimes we do take our own family members for granted, diminishing the source of strength it can become for someone.

Even now, I do hear my heart asking this question aloud in my ears that what if I had tried to find him sooner? What if I had called him sooner? What if I had not been afraid of how his wife would react? Would he be alive now? This blog has been tough for me to express and write. But it is my dedication to the friend I lost. This year, instead of making resolutions that are limited only to my ‘I’, I vow to try and save a life. I vow to not lose a life again.