Editorial Review:Product Description:Suicide haunts our literature and our culture, claiming the lives of ordinary people and celebrities alike. It is now the third leading cause of death for fifteen- to twenty-four-year-olds in the United States, raising alarms across the nation about the rising tide of hopelessness seen in our young people. It is a taboo subtext to our successes and our happiness, a dark issue that is often euphemized, avoided, and little understood. In our century, psychology and psychiatry alike have attempted to understand, prevent, and medicalize these phenomena. But they have failed, argues Dr. Edwin Shneidman, because they have lost sight of the plain language, the ordinary everyday words, the pain and frustrated psychological needs of the suicidal individual.
In The Suicidal Mind, Dr. Shneidman has written a groundbreaking work for every person who has ever thought about suicide or knows anybody who has contemplated it. The book brims with insight into the suicidal impulse and with helpful suggestions on how to counteract it. Shneidman presents a bold and simple premise: the main cause of suicide is psychological pain or 'psychache.' Thus the key to preventing suicide is not so much the study of the structure of the brain, or the study of social statistics, or the study of mental diseases, as it is the direct study of human emotions. To treat a suicidal individual, we need to identify, address, and reduce the individual's psychache. Shneidman shares with the reader his knowledge, both as a clinician and researcher, of the psychological drama that plays itself out in the suicidal mind through the exploration of three moving case studies. We meet Ariel, who set herself on fire; Beatrice, who cut herself with the intent to die; and Castro, a young man who meant to shoot his brains out but survived, horribly disfigured. These cases are presented in the person's own words to reveal the details of the suicidal drama, to show that the purpose of suicide is to seek a solution, to illustrate the pain at the core of suicide, and to isolate the common stressor in suicide: frustrated psychological needs. Throughout, Shneidman offers practical, explicit maneuvers to assist in treating a suicidal individual--steps that can be taken by concerned friends or family and professionals alike.
Suicide is an exclusively human response to extreme psychological pain, a lonely and desperate solution for the sufferer who can no longer see any alternatives. In this landmark and elegantly written book, Shneidman provides the language, not only for understanding the suicidal mind, but for understanding ourselves. Anyone who has ever considered suicide, or knows someone who has, will find here a wealth of insights to help understand and to prevent suicide.
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Customer Reviews
Average Rating:
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An important book for family members of the mentally disturbed
Shneidman saves lives. He is a thanatologist: he studies death and specializes in suicide. He shares his decades of experience with his readers in this groundbreaking book.
If I could have read this material 14 years ago, I might have been able to save my mother's life. Instead, I depended on our local Department of Human Resources who sent out the police to check on my mother who I now know was suffering from some type of psychosis. She committed suicide two days after the police attempted to intervene. Their intervention caused her psychological frustrations (as outline in Shneidman's clusters of needs) mainly related to her self-image and her avoidance of shame/defeat/humilation/disgrace. To my mom in her diminished capacity, her story was out, and she could no longer hide her psychosis from her family. I wish I could have had the knowledge then that I have now; hindsight is 20/20.
Read this book if you have someone in your life who is mentally ill. You could save a life.
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Keen insight into a difficult topic
When I first picked up this book, I hated it. I thought Dr. Shneidman was merely throwing out new terms to cover a topic which is often very difficult to discuss. However as I gave him time to develop his thought, I was drawn into his book, not only does he have a very clear understanding of suicidality and its surrounding causes, but he presents it in a very accessible manner. The case histories that he shares with the reader also serve to illustrate his ideas and to put a face on this often taboo topic.
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Fascinating Book!
I've already leant it to two friends and they're buying copies of their own. Useful for consumers AND mental health professionals.
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excellent look into the suicidal mind
This was by far the best book I have ever read on this subject. The author explains that not unlike physical pain the suicidal mind is dealing with "psyche" ache, which they believe they cannot live with. He also explains that suicidal individuals have basically a one track mind in which they can see no alternatives. When thought about it this way one can see why some do choose to end their suffering in this manner. It definitely made me more sympathetic than I was before but I have always believed that it was not up to me to judge a person who ultimately makes this decision since I have no clue as to what they are suffering. Who am I to judge?
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The Suicidal Mind, Autopsy of the Suicidal Mind
Both of these books written by Edwin Shneidman Ph.D are insightful and stimulating reading. They make for good starter texts for people interested in suicide because they are so well written. Dr. Shneidman is arguably the dean of American Sucidology. They are just very informative and accessible. These are must reads.
