In Memory of Vid

I'm not sure why I'm thinking about him so much these past couple of days, but I keep thinking about a fellow blogger who used to comment on my blogs.  His name was David, but he went by Vid.  He was a teenager, I think about 17 years old, but his political views were more mature than his years.

I hadn't heard from him on my blog for some time, but I didn't think much about it because he was a teenager after all, and I didn't really know him.  I'm sure there are many people who stopped reading my blog and I never noticed.  But one day I got an email from his Dad.  He told me that Vid had passed away.  Sometime before he passed, he deleted his blog.  Another fellow blogger did some searching and found a news article about a teen who had committed suicide.  David, Vid, had committed suicide.  With respect to his memory, I won't talk about how.  But his Dad was searching to find out why.

I went back through every comment that I could find from him and put it in a document to share with his Dad.  There really was no clue among the comments.  I also asked fellow bloggers to share any comments they might have from him.  The comments were well thought out and David had an interesting perspective.  But nothing spoke of depression, or suicidal thoughts.

Today I went back and re-read the email his father had sent.  I don't remember this now, but I told his father then that David had mentioned some suicidal thoughts, I think on his own blog.  I wish he hadn't taken it down so that I could re-read them.  At the time, I told him that he should hang in there and talk to his parents, that most troubles don't last forever.  But he chose not to take my advice.  These past few days as I have thought about him, I remembered vaguely him talking about how some kids at school bullied him.  He had kind of a small physique, and said that he wasn't very physically gifted, so maybe that made him a target.  Is that why he chose to take his own life?  I would think if that were the case, he would have spoken more about it.

This is one of the hard realities to face when confronted with suicide.  Unless the person left some kind of note, we really never know exactly what was going on in their mind.  I could probably come up with some different scenarios, but I don't think it would be helpful to offer those because really I have no proof.  Conjecture, although perhaps well meaning, could cause even more heartbreak.  My ideas might just add salt to the wound.

So today I sort of talked out loud to Vid and asked what he thought.   I can't even imagine the pain his parents feel these 6 (?) years later.  I wish he could answer back.  I wish he could help relieve his parents' burden a little by letting them know why he did it.  Was there a specific reason, or was he just so depressed that he couldn't see any other way?  This is the burden we all carry.