Lee McKinley Davenport was a complicated individual. I only knew him from his presence on the Internet--on FaceBook and our blogging community. He carried a bigger load of challenges than many of us, but all of his challenges are those faced in one way or another by most of my friends and family: divorce, depression, pain, even terminal illness. I believe there was more to Lee's emotional problems than just depression. In the end, whatever triggered his last tragic decision - to end his life- ultimately it was his own decision. He decided to leave.I think there's a selfishness to suicide. That may sound odd and it may sound painful to those who are feeling particularly raw over the loss of this unique man. Depression is a form of blindness - the dark curtains are drawn and our perceptions are skewed. We cannot see the love that is there or the love we do see we devalue because it is not the love we desire. Just as we pull our bodies in with physical pain, emotionally we wrap ourselves in those stifling dark curtains and cling to our misery.
This is the selfishness I am attempting to describe - it is a self-absorption that may be too painful to crack open - and, tragically, it sometimes ends with death. Those left behind, those who's love was not recognized or was devalued - they are left to mend the void - and too often they lay blame at their own doorsteps. However, there is very little more that one can do once the curtains are that tightly bound - it is like trying to coax a turtle out of it's shell.
Anger is such a powerful emotion - and we have so few ways to adequately express it -- and often it gets stuffed into ourselves and denied. Some say depression is anger turned inward. Others eat their anger through food or drink it through alcohol. I think that much of the emotional firestorm that follows a tragedy like this is misplaced anger. Our anger with Lee for leaving gets displaced onto others who we feel aren't grieving the way we want them to be grieving, it gets turned into guilt, it gets turned into depression (anger turned inward).
Anger is healthy and we should allow it to breathe. Anger is not the denial or debasement of our love. Anger is not the antithesis of love. Anger is not hatred. Be angry with Lee while you mourn him. If God is the Love that joins us together - then Lee deliberately rejected that love from his profound level of pain. We can be angry with that rejection, we can be angry that he chose to leave his two small children behind. We can be angry that he lashed out at individuals as a parting gesture. We can be angry with him and we can still love him and mourn him. It is ok to feel that anger. Release that anger to the heaven's - do not dump it onto each other, do not dump it onto Lee's parents. Nothing is as simple as we would desire it to be.
In closing I would direct you to my good friend, Maria's blog where she had posted some additional thoughts about Lee.
Finally, we are planning a FaceBook memorial service for Friday evening at 8:00 PM EDT. If you have friended me on FB than simply log on and also bookmark Emmanuel Cyber Chapel where the service music and readings will be posted. Peace to you, my brothers and sisters.
10 comments:
You are a gifted writer. This was a comfort to me. Bles you.
Beautifully written. Thanks.
This is a breath of fresh air and truth after the egregious publishing and "analysis" of Lee's private note. Thanks again.
I think it's pointless to be angry with Lee or any other suicide. We canot fathom the pain that made him choose death over life; that caused him to feel that his children were better off without him; that led him to such despair. If we truly understood that pain, that sense of estrangement, than I believe we, too, would choose suicide. It is much greater, much more insidious and depleting than we who call ourselves mentally healthy can imagine. To judge Lee's decision is to usurp the role of God.
I'm sorry you deny your anger, Cheryle. I never called myself mentally healthy and in fact have been on medication for depression and anxiety for years. I also believe that Lee's mental illness was far more complicated than just depression. I think you might be mixing anger with judgement, Lord knows the two often go hand in hand. I am not judging Lee, I am angry with him. In the final moments of his despair he chose himself over his children. He chose himself over his friends. I do believe that suicide is ultimately a selfish act - it may well also be the only path that an individual sees for themselves. In any case it is a tragedy.
This is beautiful - really amazing.
Thank you - you are truly a light Larry.
I'm sorry for the loss of your friend. Lee, and his family, and you and all his friends are in our thoughts and prayers.
I am sorry that I could not be online earlier this evening, but I prayed in my heart with one and all.
What you have done is quite remarkable and may God bless you always. You are a true light indeed.
I did not know Lee but saw him in comment threads. Yet his death touches us all - and that is so because he was alive. It was his life that really touched many and that touch carries on.
Larry, I understand your anger. We feel angry sometimes at people we love who die from disease or accident, not by their own hands. I know that at times I was angry at my beloved sister for leaving us, although she died of pancreatic cancer.
I'd suggest that you read Mark's account of his descent into the blackness of despair brought on by depression at Enough About Me. Mark came out of the depths, still alive, to write about his experience. The depressed person is selfish, but it is a selfishness that is beyond the person's control to fix. Down in the blackest depths of depression, selfishness rules, but, again, we must keep in mind that it is not a culpable selfishness.
Mark's account is amazing, and I learned much from it. Perhaps others will, too. I hope it helps you a little. Suicide is a choice, but it is quite often not a free choice.
I'm sorry I missed the service.
Yes, Mimi, I completely agree. It is a self-absorption, a painful and ugly self-absorption that often cannot be broken. That is what I mean by "selfish." Someone somewhere in all this stated that selfish implies some kind of gain and in the midst of a major depressive episode there is little to gain except what is believed to be a release from the pain. We missed having your steadfast love and wisdom in the midst of all this, glad to have you home and I completely envy you your trip, spooky cabdriver experience, scary train experience, lost wallet and all! :hugs:
Recently an irl friend of mine committed suicide.
I don't think it is selfish. I think when someone is lost in that despair they are too alone to be selfish.
Suicide is not a choice. It happens when our pain outstrips our ability to cope with our pain. I can make you collapse, not by choice, but by putting so much weight on your shoulders that you can no longer stand.
There are two ways out of such a situation. Either reduce the pain or increase your ability to cope with the pain.
It's hard to ask for help.
I guess all any of us can do is try to hear that cry for help, however feeble or buried in rhetoric it may be.
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