Living people can change things, dead people cannot

[ellen_kushner]

Cory Doctorow just lost a young friend.  His memorial post includes this beautiful, beautiful, true writing about depression & suicide:

I don't know for sure whether Aaron understood that any of us, any of his friends, would have taken a call from him at any hour of the day or night. I don't know if he understood that wherever he was, there were

Comments

[huladavid]

I've been pretty badly smacked down by depression a number of times (last September, for example), and I'm working with a lot of good people to pull myself together again.

What Cory writes about, yeah, that's exactly how I felt, but I was lucky that one of the local hospitals has a psych. emergency room (also called Acute Psychiatric Services). They've become more common, and I suggest to everyone to see if something similar's offered where they live.

I also have really good, understanding friends.

[ellen_kushner]

That's what we all need, isn't it? I'm so glad you've got all that.

[vcmw]

The essay that's helped me the most related to this area was Jennifer Michael Hecht's essay Stay, from a few years back. (I think it's Stay in the Boston Globe version and On Suicide in the blog version).

[ellen_kushner]

Thank you.