Yesterday, we learned about the loss of MLB slugger, Jeremy Giambi, at only 47 years old. Jeremy was the brother of Yankees first baseman, Jason Giambi (both pictured here).
Today is going to be a shorter one than usual, to make an important point: we are still at a place in society where “cause of death,” when it is a possible suicide, becomes so covered in secrecy.
As I’m writing this, we have media outlets who are saying – it WAS suicide according to authorities they spoke to…we have some saying that – it MAY have been…& we have some saying – we DON’T know for sure, so stop speculating.
There may be many different opinions on the above – from those reading this and from society generally, as to what should/shouldn’t be released. But what I think we all can agree on is – NO OTHER cause of death is treated by the media/by society, like suicide is. And in an attempt to try to be respectful – we may be further shaming those we lost TO suicide….keeping things mysterious & like – if it gets out there, it’s a shameful “act.”
Until we get to the point where we as a society treat suicide like – a heart attack of the brain…like any other death that happens TO us, we are going to be playing this cat/mouse game where the shame never goes away.
Suicide is a system break down – where thoughts of self harm become impulse error messages. For many, they are overpowering. If we continue to shame causes of deaths like this – we never make it more comfortable for those struggling with the SAME in the future, to easily ask for help. We must do better, normalizing the convo and educating around this topic.