This week, the Forum on End of Life in Ireland launched a month-long public consultation period. The Forum aims to develop a vision of how modern Ireland can address the challenges of dying, death and bereavement. One of its main aims is to get people to talk more, to be a little bit more comfortable about breaking the conversational taboo around dying. Invariably, once we do talk about it, the fear that it's a depressing subject often proves unfounded, and the result can be a positive assessment on how we can improve our quality of life, while we are still alive and kicking. 

If we know we don't have much time left, that's when it becomes even more important that we talk about it with our loved ones. However, perhaps inevitably, loved ones build up a mighty wall of silence on the subject around us, because it's too painful for them to address their impending loss; and yet this can result in awful isolation for the person who's dying, who needs to talk about it. By raising the level of discourse on death and dying in the community, it is to be hoped that those sorts of conversations become, if not less painful, at least less fear-filled and strange.
While this consultation period was being promoted by the most excellent Catherine McGuinness on the radio, I was coming home from a two-day suicide prevention workshop. It seemed that the Grim Reaper was hard to avoid. I ate an entire rhubarb crumble that night, in pure comfort-eating mode. With cream.
However, the ASIST workshop is something I would recommend to anyone. It's the emotional equivalent of doing a first-aid course, being prepared if the worst happens. There were nurses, guards, social workers, teachers, youth workers as part of the group - generally, those who come into contact with the public in a more personal way.
I was taken aback by one thing I learned at the workshop, in particular: general training for Gardaí does not include how to deal with suicidal people. Please let that sink in. When you see someone on the ledge of a building, or standing on the wall of a bridge, or a friend isn't answering the door to you, and they'd sounded depressed, you'd call the guards, right? Well, apart from those who have been motivated enough to do this course over the years, and quite a few have, there is no guarantee at all that a guard would have any specific training to deal with the situation. I find that astonishing, and not a little scary.
The main teaching point of the workshop is to learn that, having picked up the clues that someone is thinking of suicide, you find the courage to ask them if it's true. Clearly and directly. Once it's out in the open, and the person starts talking about it, probably for the first time, then it's not rocket science to take sensible, reassuring steps to make sure the person stays safe afterwards.
While we're listening to them stuck in the pit of unhappiness, it may occur to us, it may be just a hunch. We normally shy away from the deep waters of emotional intensity for fear of being carried away by the current. We get anxious that, if we ask it, then we'd have to face our own panic and inadequacies, if our fears were confirmed. What would we do? How would we cope?
We may think it's none of our business. We may never have talked about anything personal with that person before, so it may feel weird to bring it up. We may even be irritated by their self-obsession and want to take to the hills. If someone is depressed or talking strangely about their life, giving away precious things or acting in a way that isn't like their usual selves, we may find ourselves wanting to do the most natural thing - crack a joke, tell them to cheer up, tell them everything will work out.
It does take an emotional sure-footedness to risk asking such a question. And not to phrase it in a counterproductive way. "You're not thinking of doing something silly, are you?" will get you the only answer you want to hear: "no". Which may make you feel better, but will make the suicidal person feel even more isolated and determined to get on with their dark plan, once you've stopped calling them silly, and left them alone.