ABSTRACT
Every 85 minutes someone in the UK takes their own life and the suicide rate is currently the highest since 2004. Society often reacts with unease, fear and even disapproval but what happens to those bereaved by a self-inflicted death? The reasons leading someone to take their own life are complex, and the bereavement reactions of survivors of suicide can also be complex, including shame, guilt, sadness and the effects of trauma, stigma and social isolation.
It can be difficult for those personally affected by a suicide death to come to terms with their loss and seek help and support. A Special Scar looks in detail at the impact of suicide and offers practical help for survivors, relatives and friends of people who have taken their own life. Fifty bereaved people tell their stories, showing us that, by not hiding the truth from themselves and others they have been able to learn to live with the suicide, offering hope to others facing this traumatic loss.
This Classic Edition includes a brand-new introduction to the work and will be an invaluable resource for survivors of suicide as well as for all those who are in contact with them, including police and coroner's officers, bereavement services, self-help organisations for survivors, mental health professionals, social workers, GPs, counsellors and therapists.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
part 1|32 pages
Introduction
chapter 1|14 pages
Suicide: an introduction
chapter 2|16 pages
Survivors of suicide
part 2|146 pages
Aspects of suicide bereavement
chapter 3|4 pages
Meeting the survivors
chapter 4|14 pages
When the suicide happens
chapter 5|13 pages
Looking back
chapter 6|13 pages
Why did it happen? The search for understanding
chapter 7|11 pages
The inquest
chapter 8|5 pages
Funerals
chapter 9|13 pages
Facing suicide as a family
chapter 10|16 pages
The impact of suicide on individual family members
chapter 11|12 pages
Facing the world
chapter 12|13 pages
Looking for support*
chapter 13|17 pages
Facing the feelings
chapter 14|13 pages
Finding a way through
part 3|58 pages
Responding to people bereaved by suicide