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Originally Posted by wolf
Suicide is an inherently selfish act.
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You are right, of course, but sometimes the person's selfishness is quite understandable. I have complete sympathy for someone in the final stages of a terminal illness who has no quality left to their life and who quietly OD's on their pain meds. Makes sense to me and doesn't leave too much of a mess for anyone to clean up.
A friend of mine ("Joe") had a truely horrific experience with the deaths of his elderly father and step mother a couple of years back. Both of them had been experiencing steadily increasing health difficulties for quite some time and were in their early 80's. The step mother had reached the point where she was completely bed ridden and in constant pain. Joe's father had been diagnosed with terminal cancer, so he was little better off than his wife.
Apparently, the two of them made some sort of murder/suicide pact and Joe's father shot first the stepmother and then himself. Amazingly, no one in their upscale neighborhood heard the shots go off, and it was a week before Joe discovered their bodies (he lives in another town and when he couldn't reach them by phone, he drove down to check on them).
Apparently, the mess and the smell was terrible, Joe had to go through the process of an inquest because no suicide note was left behind and the local cops were extremely suspicious that Joe might have knocked 'em off to get his inheritance before the medical bills ate all the money up.
The forensic evidence made it pretty clear what had happened, but Joe was put through a great deal of needless stress at a time when he already had plenty to deal with.
I have always wondered if this wasn't some sort of strange "payback" to Joe by his Dad. I've known Joe since we were both about 20 or so, and back then Joe's Dad would always get the two of us to join him for his annual fall hunting trip. Joe's Dad who had worked for the Forest Service all his life considered Joe a sort of "wussy boy" because Joe was intent on an academic career in philosophy, and these hunting trips were his way of trying to make a "man" out of Joe.
I was always uncomfortable watching the interaction between the two men. Joe seemed to lose all self confidence around his Dad and his skin would even break out if he made contact with the blood of a deer or an elk that we had brought down.
I think in some very fucked up way, Joe's Dad was taking one final chance to show Joe how to be a "real Man."