Suicide is not a disease of the young

On the anniversary of Kate Spade’s death I wanted to share the thoughts I had this time last year.

I realised I wasn’t going to be the only person with mental health issues to be writing not only about the suicide of Kate Spade but also of Anthony Bourdain, who killed himself just three days later.

And I wasn’t the only novelist who writes about suicide to be writing about the suicides of Kate Spade and Anthony Bourdain either.

But it isn’t about being the only one: it’s about adding my voice.

And the slant I want to look is why an article in USA Today referred to their deaths as part of an increased suicide rate of what they called “an unexpected group” — the middle-aged.

But it shouldn’t be unexpected: suicides peak in middle-age.

An article in The Guardian from September 2017 on this very subject suggests that we want those who die to be “worthy and innocent victims”, for the decision to be related to “naivety and immaturity”.

Mental health blogger Mark Brown who wrote the article says: “Placing all the emphasis on young people and suicide allows us to think in terms of the race yet to be run.

“To address those in middle age who are at risk of dying by suicide would require us to do something about the ways people feel they have already run their race, and lost.”

As someone in their early 40s, I’m aware that my risk of suicide is increasing as I get older and I need to find more ways to feel connected to the world to stop me from taking this path.

In the meantime, I can only ponder what it means to be alive and decide each that I’m going to make it to the end still being alive.

To pay homage to both Kate Spade and Anthony Bourdain, I dedicated my second novel, The Victoria Lie, to them.

But it wasn’t just to them; it was to all those people who decide they’ve reached their own finish line.