Father who lost son to suicide wants you to know the signs

I'm sorry but you did not miss any warning sings, you flat out refused to accept that your son was having difficulties. 

There are two very sad tragedies here:

 

A) This handsome young man is dead, that is just beyond sad to me and my heart aches for what he must have been going through to feel this was his only way out.  I understand all to well the pain of depression. 

 

B) This father may love his child but as this story is written he was to busy to be close to his child.  If my child said to me that he wanted to be dead not once, not twice but three times?  And I do nothing?  I can not comprehend such a thing.  Your career and hobbies and free time are not more important than your child.  That is your child.

 

I hope that for the rest of your life, Sir, that you reflect on your unwillingness to STOP and listen when your child spoke.  I also commend you on your zeal to educate and inform others. 

.Even though they can look you in the eye at age 14, they are still children. They can't see tomorrow. They don't believe it will get better. They live in the moment, that wonderful quality that makes us all smile and wish we were young again. It's also the thing that contributes to their decision to use such a permanent solution to their temporary problems. They don't feel that the problems are temporary. Add a little self medication like alcohol or drugs and you get alcohol or drug abuse which just cause more problems like having to going to counseling (which AJ did). The adults in his life have perspective and can see that he will work through it. He did not. Again, at 14 you don't see tomorrow just the big mess you're in today. The next piece of the puzzle you need is the idea that suicide is a solution. That's why clusters of suicides happen like in Battle Ground. At 14 or 15, or even older, a child or young person is overwhelmingly caught up in their own problems and can't see a future. Having suicide introduced as a solution to "make the pain end", especially in your own community or maybe in your own school, they consider the option and sometimes they take that option.

 

A Solution:  talk to your kids and every child or young person you come into contact with about the aftermath of suicide and the possibilities of the future. Things change. They get better. Wonderful things can happen. You need to be there to experience them.

I can give you information right now on who to contact for information on suicide prevention ....American Foundation For Suicide Prevention. Look up the Washington Chapter of AFSP- Northwest.

 

I don't wish to be disrespectful. I have a middle age school child, who will be a freshman next year. I can't imagine the anguish, despair, guilt and grief this man feels. However, with that prefaced, this is not about missing signs. When I saw the headline and something about missing signs, I thought they would be a lot more subtle. I can't imagine what this man was thinking, not getting this kid a psychological evaluation, and dropping everything in his life to care for his son.

 

For a 72 hour psych hold, the law requires evidence that someone is potentially a danger to themselves or to others. Clearly, this young man had documented evidence that he was a danger to himself. I wonder what lengths Mr. Hazen went to, in order to get his son into counseling, get medication for a chemical imbalance, or some other form of treatment. Again, I don't mean to sound disrespectful, but this goes way beyond missing the signs, and into full-on negligence.

 

Each generation has a duty of stewardship; Stewardship of the community, of the country, of the planet, and most importantly, of our young. Collectively, we are not doing a very good job, and the world seems to be getting scarier for each generation coming up. There is not near as much hope out there as there seemed to be generations ago. No wonder more and more young people are self medicating, and others simply checking out, because their Life Pain, just becomes too overwhelming.

 

Coping skills. We need to do a better job of duplication, when it comes to teaching coping skills. We need to show our young more reason to feel hopeful..instead of hopeless. When they lose hope..we've lost them. Peace n Blessings..  

Mental illness can start in puberty. people who thimk they know everything don't as for the influx of Russisns ,I never had issues. with them. here in our area

I can tell you what's going on in Battle Ground and some may say I'm racist but I'm not, its the truth.  There has been an enormous influx of Russians into BG for some reason.  These Russians are intolerant, look down on everybody and have absolutely no respect for anyone who isnt Russian.  I live in a neighborhood which is predominantly Russian and they told my 8 year old daughter that we were all going to hell because we don't believe in Jesus and won't allow her to play with the other girls in neighborhood.  This was a parent telling my daughter this.  Add this mentality to the already enormous amount of Old Apostolic Lutherns in this town and you get a bunch of ignorant Othordox/Apostolics running around making fun of everyone else who isnt one of them. I went to school here my whole life and the Apostolics were bad enough and I had my fair share of run ins with them.  My step son has been in at least one fight per year for the last 5 years (that we know of) because of both the Russians and the Apostolics.  I can't tell you how many variations of Asian slurs they have come up with but I've never punished him once for the fighting.  They started it with him and he finished it.  Plain and simple, ignorance and intolerance is to blame here.

It's not overreacting if you sit a child down after they say they want to die about something; you can usually tell by the one of their voice, the look on their face and their body language if they're being overdramatic about it (in the "that was so embarrassing, why did I do/say that?" kind of way, you know, the one that comes with the self-deprecating groan that we've all done.), if they're trying to slip out of being in trouble (I've seen this happen before on many an occasion, you can tell with the signs I indicated above), or if they're actually being serious about it.

 

Yes, the father had signs that went over his head. So do the friends and family members of others who have chosen to take their own lives; that's why there are suicide awareness groups, programs and websites for people to look into. There's also the fact that, while parents are aware of suicide, every parent has the "thank God my child isn't like that" complex right up until their child actually does go through with it or has a failed attempt. 

 

Personally, I think less money should be spent on football/baseball programs and more should be done to spread awareness of suicide and how to prevent it- because it IS preventable if you reach out and you're able to break through/get through to the person and get them the QUALITY help they need in time.

 

Other, more rare times, unfortunately; there are the people who will go through with suicide even with the best efforts made to help them. 

 

 

Why do people find it necessary to make nasty comments?? The man is trying to help others and is and has been in pain. He is only human as we all are. It is easy for some of you to Monday morning quartback and hindsight is 20/20 right? This man is not the only parent who overlooked those comments. I would hope that we can learn from this rather than throw stones or make assumptions. I pity anyone who is confronted with this situation and am glad that so many of you are Perfect and would never make a mistake.

So now there has been 3 different kids, all from Battle Ground who have commited suicide. Whats going on in that town

My heart breaks for Mr. Hazen as losing a child is probably the most painful thing on this earth..... but with that said I think we should take a collection for Mr. Haze and see if we can't buy him a clue as those were some mighty big red flags that just flew over his head

Schools ignore bullying for the most part. They need to be held responsible if they know about it and don't do anything.

Wow, was the fourth sign when he held a gun to his head and said, "I'm thinking about pulling the trigger?"

 

Sorry to be crass here, but..."warning signs?"  More like red flags -- no, make that red BANNERS -- 100' high, with the words "I am going to kill myself" on it in big, bold contrasting letters, waving like a flag at the end of a WW2 propaganda film.

bikegeek 0 pts I am so sorry for you. I hope you can find some way to come to peace.