Due to my lifelong struggles with addiction, I have often contemplated suicide. Actually, one of my closest ex-girlfriends off-handily remarked 20 years ago that she thought suicide might be the only answer for me, after doing everything in her power to help me over a 3 year period.
You see, she intimately saw the pain that my self-inflicted junkie lifestyle dispensed to others and, on a much deeper level, myself.
Today, I continue to live in the wreckage that I so carelessly created, with a brother whom will not talk to me no matter what I do and old friends whom don't return calls, and I'll be honest...life is pretty bleak when family and friends no longer exist.
Why is it that some, often ancient, cultures not-only-tolerate but almost-glorify suicide when an individual has lost their self respect or has been publicly shamed?
Maybe suicide isn't the worst possible option there is.