This Person Counts

I’ve often wondered whether I should talk about suicide online. I’ve tried several times over the years to remove myself from the world. This is not a self-indulgent piece, and it is not a plea for sympathy. I am not asking you to agree with me. But I am asking you to read this with an open mind.

I was listening to a podcast recently. A TV personality interviewing a long-standing presenter. The conversation turned to the loss of her sister. On the surface, it seemed appropriate. Any exposure to the topic is good exposure, right?

No. Not like this.

What followed was familiar. The focus stayed on grief, on loss, on the aftermath. It circled safely around the edges, never quite settling on the more uncomfortable question of why. We say we need to talk about suicide more, but when we do, we dilute it. We soften it. We make it easier to consume.

If anything is going to change, that cannot continue.

Suicide does not appear out of nowhere. It is not a choice people want to make. It is the result of pressure building over time. Days, weeks, months, sometimes years. Sometimes it is one significant event. More often, it is a series of smaller moments, stacking quietly until they become unmanageable.

It is the erosion of trust. Of support. Of confidence. Of relationships. Of self-worth.

It is being told “we all face hardship” when you try to open up.
It is hearing “what have you got to be depressed about?” when you are already struggling to explain yourself.
It is “I’m not going to change for anyone” when you try to explain how someone’s behaviour is affecting you.

These things are often dismissed as minor. They are not.

If someone in your life has felt suicidal, or has died by suicide, you should know it is not your fault they did it. But that does not mean there is nothing to reflect on. Too often, the conversation becomes inward-facing too quickly. It centres personal grief, personal guilt, personal pain, and stops there. It does not ask what might need to change so that someone else does not reach the same point.

The loss becomes the conclusion. It should not be.

And yet, we see suicide reduced to slogans printed on jumpers. Stripped of context. Stripped of meaning. Turned into something wearable.

It should concern all of us.

Because suicide is not a marketing campaign. It is not something that can be improved through branding, or softened by the appearance of awareness. Visibility without substance is not progress. Without action, without support, without meaningful engagement, it becomes performance.

Some will argue that even this kind of visibility helps. That it starts conversations. Perhaps, in isolated cases, it does. But that cannot be the standard we accept. Not for something this serious.

Suicide is not a product. It is not a trend. It demands care, responsibility and honesty.

When I was at my lowest, I knew I could not talk to anyone without being dismissed. I would be told I was being dramatic, or that I was “having an episode,” or that I needed to get on with things. There is a particular kind of exhaustion that comes from knowing something is wrong, while also knowing exactly how people will respond if you try to say it out loud.

It is isolating. It is relentless. And it is not confined to the mind. It is shaped by the responses you receive. By dismissal. By denial. By the quiet suggestion that you are too much, or not worth the effort.

And yet I love life.

I love being alive. I love walking, taking pictures, standing still long enough to notice things most people pass by. I love sunrises and sunsets. I love simplicity. If anything, feeling suicidal has made that clarity sharper.

The problem is not life itself. The problem is how difficult we make it to live.

The pressure. The noise. The expectations. The absence of time and space to exist without being pulled in multiple directions. We expect people to function at a level that leaves very little margin for struggle. Then we express surprise when they cannot sustain it.

We talk about resilience as if people simply need to be stronger. They do not. Most people are already carrying more than they should have to.

What they need is space. Time. Understanding. Communication that is honest and consistent.

Instead, we offer very little. Then we act shocked at the consequences.

So why continue to push this conversation?

Because in 2024, 5,717 people died by suicide. That figure is not abstract. It represents individuals who reached a point where something in their lives became unbearable. Not suddenly, but progressively. Not without warning, but often without being properly heard.

It is easier to believe there was nothing that could have been done. That it was inevitable. But that belief protects us more than it reflects reality. What if more time had been taken to listen? To engage without dismissal? To recognise when something was not right, even if it was inconvenient?

This is why I am writing this.

Because the conversation cannot end at loss. It must continue into understanding. Into reflection. Into change. Not self-pity. Not empty gestures. Not performative awareness. Real engagement with the conditions that lead people to that point.

Until that number is zero, there is work to be done.

And that work begins by refusing to let another death be reduced to a statistic.

It begins by looking at it, directly and without hesitation, and saying:

This person counts.