27, Sep. 2014
The Effect Of Suicide
Suicide is a large issue in today’s society, especially when it comes to teen suicide, and the effects on close family members and friends are incomparable to anything else. But people may not realize the effects suicide has on those who did not have a personal relationship with the personcan sometimes cause them to feel guilt and sorrow just as much as those who had a personal interaction. Growing up knowing a family member committed suicide was never something that hit me until I got older. I knew how devastating it was to have a family member go long before it was his time—and in that way—but it never truly affected me until I started to understand the concept of suicide. Jason Flatt was a smart sixteen year old who was active in his youth group, loved to play football, and popular amongst everyone. Everybody thought that he loved life, but on July 16, 1997, Jason Flatt did something that nobody saw coming—he committed suicide. I never had the opportunity to meet Jason, butI always wondered what life would be life if I had known him, or if he had known who I was. It breaks my heart to know that I will never know Jason like the rest of my family and his friends did. Then, in 2011, our family was hit with another teen suicide.
Weston Cole killed himself in 2011; I was in eighth grade and I remember my mom getting a phone call from my older cousin, Ashley. She told us that Weston had written a letter saying that he did not think that he would ever measure up to his older brother—a straight A, popular student—and he felt like he was never going to be “good enough”. This hit me hard and has had a lasting impression on me because not only was I older and more able to understand the situation, I also knew that he was a popular teen in the community. Many people knew him and many of my friends knew him. What hurt me the most, and still continues to hurt me, is that I never got the opportunity to meet him and so many of my...