Suicide Season

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So last week I witnessed a suicide. I was getting lunch from a local eatery when I heard a child scream. A man appeared out of no where and lay unresponsive in the street. We found out later that he jumped. There was....no blood. I noticed that his ankles were crossed. I was frozen in shock just staring at his ankles...his head of thick black hair. He was a young guy...couldn't have been over 30. I froze. I am a nurse. I was trained to respond in emergencies but I was planted where I stood as the trauma team ran out and began working on him immediately. The nurse that came out gave the best set of chest compressions I've ever seen. I remember thinking to myself that she deserved some type of award.

They asked me what I saw. They asked me to tell people to move back. But I was frozen you guys. I, too, was unresponsive. Why is there no blood? Why didn't his body make a sound as it hit the concrete? Why is his ankles crossed? He wet himself.

All weekend all I could do was think of him. See his face. His hair. Instead of responding immediately and naturally as nurses are supposed to (right) all I wanted to do was walk over to him and brush the hair out of his face. Stroke his cheek and ask him...why? What happened to you sweetie? What hurt so much...that you needed to do this? I suppose it's a good thing I couldn't move.

I seriously questioned myself and am now...can I do this? Can I nurse? Death of the elderly is expected. Can I accept that it discriminates against no one? I don't know. All I know is that I hurt for him...and I cried on and off this weekend for him. This young black haired stranger. Tomorrow I have to go back there and my stomach is so queasy. I was too cowardly to move to his immediate aid and am feeling so inadequate.

Thanks for reading.

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Specializes in Pediatrics, Emergency, Trauma.

Please make sure you contact your EAP that your facility provides in or for you to get through this ordeal-you owe it to yourself to seek out professional help.

Best wishes.

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I am so sorry you had to witness this. I don't think your response has anything to do with your ability to be a nurse. When you get patients at work you didn't witness first hand how they were injured. You just have to treat them. Witnessing a suicide is not something you were trained for and shock seems like a perfectly normal response to me. I can't imagine seeing that. You were not a coward you are simply human.

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Please make sure you contact your EAP that your facility provides in or for you to get through this ordeal-you owe it to yourself to seek out professional help.

Best wishes.

I hadn't even thought of EAP. Thank you. I think I will call them tomorrow.

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Specializes in PICU.

I think witnessing a trauma and responding to one can be totally different. While you won't forget it soon, please lift the burden from your shoulders. Separate this from who you are as a nurse. And please take care of yourself. Talk about it (coming here is great). Don't bottle that up. We all need to talk sometimes.

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I am so sorry you had to witness this. I don't think your response has anything to do with your ability to be a nurse. When you get patients at work you didn't witness first hand how they were injured. You just have to treat them. Witnessing a suicide is not something you were trained for and shock seems like a perfectly normal response to me. I can't imagine seeing that. You were not a coward you are simply human.

Thank you for your kind reply and reminding me that I am human. New grads have the habit of thinking they'll be super nurse and I am no exception. This experience startled and humbled me.

Death...swift and so final...It's nothing like TV. His body wasn't his body anymore. He was gone and left the body behind. I cannot quite explain it.

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I think witnessing a trauma and responding to one can be totally different. While you won't forget it soon, please lift the burden from your shoulders. Separate this from who you are as a nurse. And please take care of yourself. Talk about it (coming here is great). Don't bottle that up. We all need to talk sometimes.

Yes I think I need to speak to a professional. My co workers kept trying to get me to tell them what happened but not in a way that was helpful for me. They just needed first hand details. I would not discuss it with them. Thankfully my supervisor mentioned HIPAA and everyone fell away. I won't talk about him like that. Like some sort of spectacle. He was someone's son, brother, friend, love. People who loved him are in a world of pain right now. I will never make him office gossip nor my badge.

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Sudden and swift demise is upsetting and startling to anyone. Including seasoned nurses.

It takes processing. Without the "tell me the gory details so I am in the know" crowd's 2 cents.

Get some help processing. You did nothing incorrectly. In my experience with suicide (and it is part of what I do) there are some people that no matter the intervention, their mind is made up. With devastating results.

So please do not use this time of shock for you to make life decisions on whether to be a nurse or not.

Wishing you the best.

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Specializes in Emergency Department.
Thank you for your kind reply and reminding me that I am human. New grads have the habit of thinking they'll be super nurse and I am no exception. This experience startled and humbled me.

Death...swift and so final...It's nothing like TV. His body wasn't his body anymore. He was gone and left the body behind. I cannot quite explain it.

I have been a first responder and now I'm an RN. Yes, death can be very swift and final. It's very different witnessing events first-hand versus responding to them.

It's also very different working in that first responder capacity, after a while, you do change. I am not the same person I was before I started down the path to where I am. Believe me, I'm no superman nor am I immune to some of the horrible things I have seen. Some people are naturally more resilient than others, and I know that I'm one of them from experience.

You should seek out the counsel of someone that can help you process things or this could gnaw at you for a long time. CISD has its merits and problems, but discussing the event in a safe environment is a whole lot better than bottling it up or trying to process this yourself. The first thing you should do, though, is forgive yourself for being stuck in place. That's a normal reaction of many people to events like the one you have witnessed. It's totally normal.

EAP is a good resource to start with. You might also want to contact psychologists/psychiatrists that work with first responders in situations like this.

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I want to thank you all for reaching out with kind words and advice. I really appreciate it. This is one of those times that I love AN.

I made an appointment with a counselor at my EAP. It's tomorrow at noon. I steered clear of the eatery and its path. Feeling a little better today. Again...Thank you.

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Specializes in Allergy/ENT, Occ Health, LTC/Skilled.

I can't imagine witnessing that and am not surprised you feel the way you do. I commend you on reaching out for help. Seeing death outside of the health care environment is hard even more so in your circumstances. Does not mean in any way shape or form that your not a competent nurse.

When I was 16 I was the only witness to a fatal car accident on a country road. I was no way involved in the accident, just sitting at the stop sign waiting for the other person to go before I even went. It shook me up pretty bad and it took me awhile to get the whole thing out of my mind. It was just crazy witnessing life ending just like that. I know talking it out really helped me and I hope it does the same for you. Hugs.

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Specializes in ED, ICU, PSYCH, PP, CEN.

I'm sorry you had to see that. I had something similar happen to me. I was totally stuck too. Now that I've been in nursing for about 15 years I can handle situations like that a little better. I'm glad you're going to talk to someone. What you saw would be very troubling for anyone and I know I would need help processing, even now.

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