Sloane Crosley
Ms. Crosley is the author of seven books, most recently the memoir “Grief Is for People.”
When the letters first arrived, the thing that surprised me most was their length. Having published several books of personal essays, I’d received letters from readers before. The senders alternated between laudatory and confessional, insulting by accident and insulting on purpose. They shared a sense of camaraderie between some unsavory aspect of themselves and some unsavory aspect of me. Reading them, I did not develop a thick skin so much as a better awareness of the skin I have, the calluses and soft spots.
But these letters were different. These were sent after I published a memoir about losing a friend to suicide.
None of their authors wanted anything. No coffee dates, no contacts, no advice. I have never understood why anyone would attempt to “pick the brains” of people whose skills remain hazy, even to themselves, but these were not such requests. They were flares. Missives of grief sent by envelope as well as email, containing pages of pure loss. Many came offering further reading: obituaries, that saddest of attached documents. There were stories of lost parents, siblings and friends. The deaths were recent or dated, but the pain remained fresh for the writers long after it had been shelved by others as biographical fact.
At one point, I was getting about eight letters and emails a day. I am not the sort of author who writes with the intention of helping people. So eight is a lot. That number is not a measurement of the book’s success. It’s a measurement of our need to unburden ourselves about loss, about suicide in particular, and our struggle about how to do it in a way that feels honest and useful.
We’d better start learning. In 2022, the last year the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention published finalized statistics for suicides, over 49,000 Americans died by their own hand, an uptick from over 48,100 of these deaths in 2021. Statistics tend to create a distancing effect, especially when it comes to suicide. Halve the number or double it, and you would still be reading this, wondering: Is that a lot or a little? What does it have to do with my person, my loss?
Sign up for the Opinion Today newsletter Get expert analysis of the news and a guide to the big ideas shaping the world every weekday morning.
From an institutional standpoint, there are plenty of vital initiatives such as the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, which provides support for people in distress. But after a year of daily exposure to the broader conversation, it’s clear to me that our best shot at reducing the number is only partly in encouraging people in pain to contact faceless entities. The rest of the onus is on us. It’s in preparing ourselves for when people in either danger or in mourning come to us.
Subscribe to The Times to read as many articles as you like.
Advertisement