Changed Perceptions

I never used to understand why someone would kill themself, if something suicide-related ever crossed my mind at all. But then again, why should it have? I was a bright-eyed kid who viewed the world as an endless opportunity.

I'd like to say that I wasn't one of the ignorant people who go around proclaiming that suicide is completely selfish and anyone who even considers it is a complete loser, but I'm not entirely sure.

I remember once when a guy my older sister's friend went to school with committed suicide. I never knew him, and I don't think my sister's friend really did either. They were just in the same grade and had one class together or something. I think that was the first time it really hit me that suicide does actually happen everywhere, and not just places you hear about in the news. If I remember correctly, I think I figured that he probably had good reason- maybe his parents abused him or something equally unfathomable as suicide to me at the time- and it wasn't really my business anyway.

I try not to judge people until, as the saying goes, I have walked a mile in their shoes. Because then, of course, I'm a mile away when I criticize them and I have some new shoes! But, seriously, especially if it's something that there's not somthing reasonably like it, I make a best effort not to judge. Seeing how depression and suicidal intentions have changed my perceptions of life in general, makes me wonder how people can believe so feverantly that suicide is A Very Bad Thing (or not) without a perspective of what it really is and what suicide really means to everyone involved. I still cannot judge past a certain point because I have only been a friend of a person who committed suicide, and the suicidal, and I very much hope it will stay that way. Or maybe they do know, and they're still insensitive jerks.