suicide's a complex thing for the friends and family of a person who takes their own life.

it's different than losing them to a car accident, or a murder even, or a terminal disease.

emotionally speaking, it's probably the most vexing tragedy of human existence that we have to deal with. cause it's so unexplained, even when we have all the reasons before us why a person felt that was their only option. and once it happens, it leaves so many questions, so many gaps in our own lives that we scramble to fill, and we pull our hair out trying to find ways to supplant the intense feelings of confusion and pain.

it can crush our equilibriums, it can stain the fabric of our sanity forever. it definitely leaves a mark that wont go away. because there's a feeling that we didn't do enough, that we didn't exert enough energy, that we weren't there at the right time.

"if i had been there..."

"if she would have just called me..."

"i could have done something."

the ifs and whys and hows and all other questions start piling up, and we just break down in the process.

suicide is hardest on the people forced to deal with the aftermath, though. and it's the closest we can come to the pain the person felt before he or she reached the brink.

there aren't very many positives to be taken from something as tragic as this, but something that's helped me is that... well. she's not dealing with it anymore.

peeping nik's writings over the years, her blog entries and her poetry, her statements, it takes on new meaning now that she's gone. she was struggling with stuff longer than any of us probably could have wanted to notice.

i can't remember the last time we talked, but when we did, i remember getting the feeling of a darkness on her heart that she wasn't fully sharing with me, and i tried to respect it, even though i like it when my friends open up to me. adding it all up together, she was dealing with something bigger than hugs and pats on the back and lighthearted reassurance.

was there something we could have done?

possibly. who knows.

is there anything we can do for her now?

well.
i seriously doubt that she would have wanted us to take this burden on ourselves, as a personal failure. there's a few of us here that she loved. i can't say i'm one, lol... but my niggas KnowOne and Amazin and Kisszion and a Lefrak... y'all were close.

i know it's hard, but i woke up this morning thinking about nikki.

the hardest part of this whole thing for her was getting to this point. she was enduring an incredible pain and now she's not, anymore.

if you can bring yourself to look at it like that, you can kind of close a difficult chapter and start moving toward the next. im not suggesting that we stop mourning at all, i surely havent, but the thought that she's not suffering anymore has a calming effect that had been amiss the other times ive had to deal with similar situations.

i don't believe that suicide is ever the only answer. but once it's happened, the question of whether or not it was the only resort left is really a moot point, and it becomes encumbent on all of us to work our way out of the aftermath with as much personal damage control as possible.

i hope i'm not stepping on any toes, or offending anyone with this post. i just know alot of us are taking it way harder than we'd care to share on a message board. and sometimes it helps to have a perspective we may not have thought of.

the thing now is, there's more than likely, somebody else in each of our lives who's closing in on the same sort of pain. if we've got a hunch, let's holler at em. do what we can til it hurts.

that's all, yo.

everybody hold your heads.

:)

-ae