Marie Osmonds son takes own life

[Jana]

Some of these remarks on here stun me, and I notice they're mostly from the men. Thank God for a mother's love and compassion, I guess, if some of you guys have a severely depressed child. This boy jumped from a building. Do you really think he was in his right mind? He was in some kind of emotional hell and wasn't thinking clearly. It's not a matter of "feeling sad."

[Ehwmatt]

There's just no excuse or rationalizing it. It's simply people who don't possess the ordinary average resiliency of being a human who resort to suicidal measures.

Just because some has-been celeb's pill box has gone empty isn't a good reason to off yourself. Neither are the average every day interpersonal relationship, economic, and physical health trials and tribulations of life. Those really aren't even excuses to spend sulking too long. It's simply selfish, and more pressing, very immature. Grown adults that lack foresight to look two seconds down the road or move on from a broken relationship or adverse event in life for the sake of those who care about them simply just fail at life. It's pathetic.

[Voyager]

Most people who are depressed are not that way by choice - if any of them. It's no more a choice to become depressed than it is to have a disease or a mental illness. They are all real afflictions. Some lead to death. No one wanted it that way. People who take their own life while depressed are no different than people who take their own life due to the pain of cancer or other diseases. Sometimes ending it all seems to be the only answer to them at the time and they snap.

My aunt killed herself and left five kids behind. Three of them came home from school and found her hanging in the basement. My grandmother took those kids into her home, along with me, my brother, and my mom after my dad left us. We all grew up in that home together. I was 1½ years old when it happened, and my mom was so affected by her aunt's death (they were very close) that she spent two weeks in a psych ward. My uncle ended up drinking himself to death due to the grief of losing his wife and his kids' mother. My cousins all turned out okay, but several of them suffer from depression. It can be hereditary - and I'm sure that losing their mother at such a young age didn't make them feel like all will be good in life.

[portland]

Some of these remarks on here stun me, and I notice they're mostly from the men. Thank God for a mother's love and compassion, I guess. This boy jumped from a building. Do you really think he was in his right mind? He was in some kind of emotional hell and wasn't thinking clearly. It's not a matter of "feeling sad."

Agreed.....there are people here that have had to deal with this personally.

[Angel]

There's just no excuse or rationalizing it. It's simply people who don't possess the ordinary average resiliency of being a human who resort to suicidal measures.

Just because some has-been celeb's pill box has gone empty isn't a good reason to off yourself. Neither are the average every day interpersonal relationship, economic, and physical health trials and tribulations of life. Those really aren't even excuses to spend sulking too long. It's simply selfish, and more pressing, very immature. Grown adults that lack foresight to look two seconds down the road or move on from a broken relationship or adverse event in life for the sake of those who care about them simply just fail at life. It's pathetic.

Matt, you are absolutely correct, however, people with depression lack the abilty to see things the way they really are. They have a distorted sense of reality and they truly believe that they will be better off dead, they also often believe that their families will be better off without them. It is a true mental illness. Would you say that someone with schizophrenia is just making it up?

[JH'sTXfan]

Angel, you're a sweet, compassionate person. There should be more people like you in the world. I lost my brother last year to depression. You're right. It is a mental illness and people who suffer with it are UNABLE to think rationally and clearly.

[Saint John]

Dan, I'm just wondering where you got your credentials to be able to say that depression is not real? A Cracker Jack box?

I'm just not one of these pussies that labels everything a "disease." Alcoholism ... not a disease. Drug addiction ... not a disease. Cancer ... is a disease! I refuse to spit in the faces of people with real diseases like cancer by calling the choices people make "diseases." You choose to drink, you choose to be a junkie and you choose to sit around feeling sorry for yourself. Because, in the end, that's really what these people are doing. Everyone goes through shit in their lives, but the unselfish people show resilience and bounce back.

[Saint John]

My aunt killed herself and left five kids behind. Three of them came home from school and found her hanging in the basement.

This is selfishness at its finest. How could you do that to your fucking children?!?!?! Attention and pity. That's just fucking gruesome, man.

[Angel]

Dan, I'm just wondering where you got your credentials to be able to say that depression is not real? A Cracker Jack box?

I'm just not one of these pussies that labels everything a "disease." Alcoholism ... not a disease. Drug addiction ... not a disease. Cancer ... is a disease! I refuse to spit in the faces of people with real diseases like cancer by calling the choices people make "diseases." You choose to drink, you choose to be a junkie and you choose to sit around feeling sorry for yourself. Because, in the end, that's really what these people are doing. Everyone goes through shit in their lives, but the unselfish people show resilience and bounce back.

Oh, how wrong you are.

[WalkInMyShoes]

Clinical depression can vary from mild to severe. I've seen people in that severe category where they are totally unable to function in life, and the only way they can see out of that pain is death. We've all been down-in-the dumps and have situational depression, i.e. loss of job, family member, etc but the type of depression that leads to suicide is totally different. There are people who also have personality disorders in combination with depression and they can be unreasonable, want attention and all those other things that you mention, but severe depression is biochemical, and there is no way to "snap out of it". It's hard to understand someone being that hopeless that he wants to take his life. And then there's all the guilt in the family for not recognizing it or thinking that they haven't done everything they could. It is a terrible medical problem to have.

[Angel]

My aunt killed herself and left five kids behind. Three of them came home from school and found her hanging in the basement.

This is selfishness at its finest. How could you do that to your fucking children?!?!?! Attention and pity. That's just fucking gruesome, man.

You just don't get it. People that are depressed and commit suicide cannot see things they way they are and the way they will be. They can't see past the fact that they will be gone. The fact that their children may find the body never enters their mind-as I said before, they have a distorted sense of reality.

[Jana]

Angel, you're a sweet, compassionate person. There should be more people like you in the world. I lost my brother last year to depression. You're right. It is a mental illness and people who suffer with it are UNABLE to think rationally and clearly.

The key words.

Ask Mike Wallace from 60 Minutes, who was a strong man all his life, and shocked when he entered into a severe clinical depression and was unable to come out of it. He became suicidal. Maybe even tried (I can't remember). He, I doubt, had any compassion to the degree he should have until it happened to him. He was lucky. The right medication regimen ultimately helped him and he eventually pulled out of it. But he knew he could have not been so lucky.

[Ehwmatt]

There's just no excuse or rationalizing it. It's simply people who don't possess the ordinary average resiliency of being a human who resort to suicidal measures.

Just because some has-been celeb's pill box has gone empty isn't a good reason to off yourself. Neither are the average every day interpersonal relationship, economic, and physical health trials and tribulations of life. Those really aren't even excuses to spend sulking too long. It's simply selfish, and more pressing, very immature. Grown adults that lack foresight to look two seconds down the road or move on from a broken relationship or adverse event in life for the sake of those who care about them simply just fail at life. It's pathetic.

Matt, you are absolutely correct, however, people with depression lack the abilty to see things the way they really are. They have a distorted sense of reality and they truly believe that they will be better off dead, they also often believe that their families will be better off without them. It is a true mental illness. Would you say that someone with schizophrenia is just making it up?

No I wouldn't. I would also wonder why lithium seems to be so effective in treating schizophrenia, yet these anti-depressants don't really seem to do the trick long-term (or at all for some) for many so-called depressed people. Perhaps because there are some mental illnesses with a much larger degree of legitimacy and basis in medical fact and some that are self-fulfilling prophecies resulting from medical overdiagnosis?

Another query: Is every one who commits suicide depressed? How about Cliff Baxter, the disgraced Enron executive, who offed himself? Depressed or just selfish and embarrassed? How about the mentally stable criminal who hangs himself in jail rather than face hard time? Depressed?

Let me be clear here, suicide is the vile act I hate. Depression is the alleged illness that I doubt more often than not that I think is applied far too sweepingly when someone does the irrational, vile, and selfish act of killing himself or herself. It's a classic chicken and egg question and too many people in love with diagnosing every personal problem with an excuse want to make depression the egg. It's not, more often than not.

[StevePerryHair]

There's just no excuse or rationalizing it. It's simply people who don't possess the ordinary average resiliency of being a human who resort to suicidal measures.

Just because some has-been celeb's pill box has gone empty isn't a good reason to off yourself. Neither are the average every day interpersonal relationship, economic, and physical health trials and tribulations of life. Those really aren't even excuses to spend sulking too long. It's simply selfish, and more pressing, very immature. Grown adults that lack foresight to look two seconds down the road or move on from a broken relationship or adverse event in life for the sake of those who care about them simply just fail at life. It's pathetic.

Matt, you are absolutely correct, however, people with depression lack the abilty to see things the way they really are. They have a distorted sense of reality and they truly believe that they will be better off dead, they also often believe that their families will be better off without them. It is a true mental illness. Would you say that someone with schizophrenia is just making it up?

No I wouldn't. I would also wonder why lithium seems to be so effective in treating schizophrenia, yet these anti-depressants don't really seem to do the trick long-term (or at all for some) for many so-called depressed people. Perhaps because there are some mental illnesses with a much larger degree of legitimacy and basis in medical fact and some that are self-fulfilling prophecies resulting from medical overdiagnosis?

Another query: Is every one who commits suicide depressed? How about Cliff Baxter, the disgraced Enron executive, who offed himself? Depressed or just selfish and embarrassed? How about the mentally stable criminal who hangs himself in jail rather than face hard time? Depressed?

Let me be clear here, suicide is the vile act I hate. Depression is the alleged illness that I doubt more often than not that I think is applied far too sweepingly when someone does the irrational, vile, and selfish act of killing himself or herself. It's a classic chicken and egg question and too many people in love with diagnosing every personal problem with an excuse want to make depression the egg. It's not, more often than not.

Lithium is not for schizophrenia. It's for bi-polar. And I would never call treatment for schizophrenia highly effective either Their lives are a struggle with or without meds.

edit* and lithium is outdated... though some may still use it. There are much newer and more effective drugs now but they don't make someone "well" necessarily. Just able to function better.

[Saint John]

People that are depressed and commit suicide cannot see things they way they are and the way they will be.

How the fuck do you know??? Can you see through the eyes of other people??? Oh, wait, a book told you so. The same book that says go sit in a fucking chair and pay the dude that's "helping" you about $100 an hour. You dope.

They can't see past the fact that they will be gone. The fact that their children may find the body never enters their mind-as I said before, they have a distorted sense of reality.

Yeah. But they don't seem to ever "have a distorted sense of reality" when it comes to finding the pill bottle!

[Angel]

No I wouldn't. I would also wonder why lithium seems to be so effective in treating schizophrenia, yet these anti-depressants don't really seem to do the trick long-term (or at all for some) for many so-called depressed people. Perhaps because there are some mental illnesses with a much larger degree of legitimacy and basis in medical fact and some that are self-fulfilling prophecies resulting from medical overdiagnosis?

Another query: Is every one who commits suicide depressed? How about Cliff Baxter, the disgraced Enron executive, who offed himself? Depressed or just selfish and embarrassed? How about the mentally stable criminal who hangs himself in jail rather than face hard time? Depressed?

Let me be clear here, suicide is the vile act I hate. Depression is the alleged illness that I doubt more often than not that I think is applied far too sweepingly when someone does the irrational, vile, and selfish act of killing himself or herself. It's a classic chicken and egg question and too many people in love with diagnosing every personal problem with an excuse want to make depression the egg. It's not, more often than not.

Medications alone should never be the treament for depression, therapy should also be involved.

No, I don't think that everyone that commits suicide is depressed-and yes, I do think there are some people that do it-or at least attempt to do it for attention. I also, however, know that there are some people that suffer from depression and cannot see reality the way it is and therefore think that ending their life will solve their problems and often the problems of their family.

I honestly think you are on the right track, just not fully understanding the point. In people that are depressed, I often see a common thread-they think everything is the fault of someone else but at the same time, they think they have no control over what other people "do to them" it requires treatment to get them to understand and see how things really are.

[Ehwmatt]

There's just no excuse or rationalizing it. It's simply people who don't possess the ordinary average resiliency of being a human who resort to suicidal measures.

Just because some has-been celeb's pill box has gone empty isn't a good reason to off yourself. Neither are the average every day interpersonal relationship, economic, and physical health trials and tribulations of life. Those really aren't even excuses to spend sulking too long. It's simply selfish, and more pressing, very immature. Grown adults that lack foresight to look two seconds down the road or move on from a broken relationship or adverse event in life for the sake of those who care about them simply just fail at life. It's pathetic.

Matt, you are absolutely correct, however, people with depression lack the abilty to see things the way they really are. They have a distorted sense of reality and they truly believe that they will be better off dead, they also often believe that their families will be better off without them. It is a true mental illness. Would you say that someone with schizophrenia is just making it up?

No I wouldn't. I would also wonder why lithium seems to be so effective in treating schizophrenia, yet these anti-depressants don't really seem to do the trick long-term (or at all for some) for many so-called depressed people. Perhaps because there are some mental illnesses with a much larger degree of legitimacy and basis in medical fact and some that are self-fulfilling prophecies resulting from medical overdiagnosis?

Another query: Is every one who commits suicide depressed? How about Cliff Baxter, the disgraced Enron executive, who offed himself? Depressed or just selfish and embarrassed? How about the mentally stable criminal who hangs himself in jail rather than face hard time? Depressed?

Let me be clear here, suicide is the vile act I hate. Depression is the alleged illness that I doubt more often than not that I think is applied far too sweepingly when someone does the irrational, vile, and selfish act of killing himself or herself. It's a classic chicken and egg question and too many people in love with diagnosing every personal problem with an excuse want to make depression the egg. It's not, more often than not.

Lithium is not for schizophrenia. It's for bi-polar. And I would never call treatment for schizophrenia highly effective either Their lives are a struggle with or without meds.

edit* and lithium is outdated... though some may still use it. There are much newer and more effective drugs now but they don't make someone "well" necessarily. Just able to function better.

I had bipolar in mind, you're right, but to my understanding, they use it for schizo along with other drugs as well.

My point stands: Why do these drugs seem to help these other afflictions so much more than the anti-depressants help? Seems to me it might be because those other illnesses are more legitimate.

[Angel]

How the fuck do you know??? Can you see through the eyes of other people??? Oh, wait, a book told you so.

Well, yes, years and years of research and continued research, that's where I got my information.

So now, I'll pose the same question to you......How the fuck do YOU know?

[StevePerryHair]

There's just no excuse or rationalizing it. It's simply people who don't possess the ordinary average resiliency of being a human who resort to suicidal measures.

Just because some has-been celeb's pill box has gone empty isn't a good reason to off yourself. Neither are the average every day interpersonal relationship, economic, and physical health trials and tribulations of life. Those really aren't even excuses to spend sulking too long. It's simply selfish, and more pressing, very immature. Grown adults that lack foresight to look two seconds down the road or move on from a broken relationship or adverse event in life for the sake of those who care about them simply just fail at life. It's pathetic.

Matt, you are absolutely correct, however, people with depression lack the abilty to see things the way they really are. They have a distorted sense of reality and they truly believe that they will be better off dead, they also often believe that their families will be better off without them. It is a true mental illness. Would you say that someone with schizophrenia is just making it up?

No I wouldn't. I would also wonder why lithium seems to be so effective in treating schizophrenia, yet these anti-depressants don't really seem to do the trick long-term (or at all for some) for many so-called depressed people. Perhaps because there are some mental illnesses with a much larger degree of legitimacy and basis in medical fact and some that are self-fulfilling prophecies resulting from medical overdiagnosis?

Another query: Is every one who commits suicide depressed? How about Cliff Baxter, the disgraced Enron executive, who offed himself? Depressed or just selfish and embarrassed? How about the mentally stable criminal who hangs himself in jail rather than face hard time? Depressed?

Let me be clear here, suicide is the vile act I hate. Depression is the alleged illness that I doubt more often than not that I think is applied far too sweepingly when someone does the irrational, vile, and selfish act of killing himself or herself. It's a classic chicken and egg question and too many people in love with diagnosing every personal problem with an excuse want to make depression the egg. It's not, more often than not.

Lithium is not for schizophrenia. It's for bi-polar. And I would never call treatment for schizophrenia highly effective either Their lives are a struggle with or without meds.

edit* and lithium is outdated... though some may still use it. There are much newer and more effective drugs now but they don't make someone "well" necessarily. Just able to function better.

I had bipolar in mind, you're right, but to my understanding, they use it for schizo along with other drugs as well.

My point stands: Why do these drugs seem to help these other afflictions so much more than the anti-depressants help? Seems to me it might be because those other illnesses are more legitimate.

But see they don't necessarily. That's what Im telling you. They are able to better function, but their lives are still a problem. There is no drug that actually "cures" mental illness of any type. They help, but not in the way you would think.

[Ehwmatt]

No I wouldn't. I would also wonder why lithium seems to be so effective in treating schizophrenia, yet these anti-depressants don't really seem to do the trick long-term (or at all for some) for many so-called depressed people. Perhaps because there are some mental illnesses with a much larger degree of legitimacy and basis in medical fact and some that are self-fulfilling prophecies resulting from medical overdiagnosis?

Another query: Is every one who commits suicide depressed? How about Cliff Baxter, the disgraced Enron executive, who offed himself? Depressed or just selfish and embarrassed? How about the mentally stable criminal who hangs himself in jail rather than face hard time? Depressed?

Let me be clear here, suicide is the vile act I hate. Depression is the alleged illness that I doubt more often than not that I think is applied far too sweepingly when someone does the irrational, vile, and selfish act of killing himself or herself. It's a classic chicken and egg question and too many people in love with diagnosing every personal problem with an excuse want to make depression the egg. It's not, more often than not.

Medications alone should never be the treament for depression, therapy should also be involved.

No, I don't think that everyone that commits suicide is depressed-and yes, I do think there are some people that do it-or at least attempt to do it for attention. I also, however, know that there are some people that suffer from depression and cannot see reality the way it is and therefore think that ending their life will solve their problems and often the problems of their family.

I honestly think you are on the right track, just not fully understanding the point. In people that are depressed, I often see a common thread-they think everything is the fault of someone else but at the same time, they think they have no control over what other people "do to them" it requires treatment to get them to understand and see how things really are.

WHOA WHOA WHOA, wait a second here. They think that everything is someone else's fault, but then they think killing themselves is going to be for the betterment of every body else? I'm not understanding this.

[Ehwmatt]

How the fuck do you know??? Can you see through the eyes of other people??? Oh, wait, a book told you so.

Well, yes, years and years of research and continued research, that's where I got my information.

So now, I'll pose the same question to you......How the fuck do YOU know?

I thought you were a nurse, not a psychiatric medical professional?

[Angel]

My point stands: Why do these drugs seem to help these other afflictions so much more than the anti-depressants help? Seems to me it might be because those other illnesses are more legitimate.

Antidepressants don't work??? Hmm, that's news to me.

As I stated earlier, using only medication is inappropriate treatment for depression-it should always be combined with counseling. Very few people with depression are treated adequately. That doesn't mean that it is not a legitimate illness.

[Angel]

I'm not understanding this.

Yes, that is very obivous.

[TRAGChick]

you choose to sit around feeling sorry for yourself.

Oh, really??

In my case....why the hell should a CHILD be depressed???

Because, in the end, that's really what these people are doing.
Everyone goes through shit in their lives, but the unselfish people show resilience and bounce back.

Thank GOD I found out it was SAD....Seasonal Affective Disorder....which occurs in the Wintertime, when sunlight is severely diminished here in New England.

NOW that I KNOW what the hell is going on, I can HANDLE IT AS AN ADULT!

[Angel]

How the fuck do you know??? Can you see through the eyes of other people??? Oh, wait, a book told you so.

Well, yes, years and years of research and continued research, that's where I got my information.

So now, I'll pose the same question to you......How the fuck do YOU know?

I thought you were a nurse, not a psychiatric medical professional?

I am an advance practice nurse specializing in women's health-I deal with depression in my patients every day.

And your credentials are....???????

[Ehwmatt]

My point stands: Why do these drugs seem to help these other afflictions so much more than the anti-depressants help? Seems to me it might be because those other illnesses are more legitimate.

Antidepressants don't work??? Hmm, that's news to me.

As I stated earlier, using only medication is inappropriate treatment for depression-it should always be combined with counseling. Very few people with depression are treated adequately. That doesn't mean that it is not a legitimate illness.

lol, You're equivocating more than a hack politician. THE MEDS WORK! THEY WORK!

MEDS DONT WORK BY THEMSELVES! THEY NEED AN HOUR A WEEK ON THE COUCH TOO!

You mean to tell me an hour a week on the doctor's couch is going to help where pills and the intervention/support of loving family, friends, and even fortuitous good life events don't? Come on, please.

[Saint John]

So now, I'll pose the same question to you......How the fuck do YOU know?

Because you don't see this shit in other countries were they haven't been exposed to the bullshit that you have. How could you not be depressed in Africa with no food, flies buzzing around your dome 24/7 and animals waiting for you to fall asleep so they can snack on you? But I don't see people hanging themselves from trees.

And I understand that depression is tough. You just have to be tougher.

[Ehwmatt]

How the fuck do you know??? Can you see through the eyes of other people??? Oh, wait, a book told you so.

Well, yes, years and years of research and continued research, that's where I got my information.

So now, I'll pose the same question to you......How the fuck do YOU know?

I thought you were a nurse, not a psychiatric medical professional?

I am an advance practice nurse specializing in women's health-I deal with depression in my patients every day.

And your credentials are....???????

Dealing with it and seeing it are two different things. From your constant puffery about your job description and the duties you have, it's evident you're as much an expert in the field of psychology as a prison guard is in the field of criminal law.

[Jana]

How the fuck do you know??? Can you see through the eyes of other people??? Oh, wait, a book told you so.

Well, yes, years and years of research and continued research, that's where I got my information.

So now, I'll pose the same question to you......How the fuck do YOU know?

I thought you were a nurse, not a psychiatric medical professional?

I am an advance practice nurse specializing in women's health-I deal with depression in my patients every day.

And your credentials are....???????

[Angel]

You mean to tell me an hour a week on the doctor's couch is going to help where pills and the intervention/support of loving family, friends, and even fortuitous good life events don't? Come on, please.

No, I mean to tell you it takes all of that to treat depression.