14 ms·

Senior Citizens Struggle with Suicide as Loneliness and Isolation Set In

127 points by wallflower 7y ago

kylehotchkiss 7y ago
This is a issue that many churches in America are uniquely positioned to help with. They often have busses, an army of people willing to volunteer, and wide open spaces totally unused on weekdays. But church leadership would rather spend their resources waging a war against people’s sexual choices and getting involved in political positions. It’s sad to see religious resources so widely unused to help those in society in this time of need.
- nikofeyn 7y ago
  or abusing their tax exempt status.
- dondawest 7y ago
  I think church leadership is helping with the issue of senior citizen loneliness, for those senior citizens who are willing to become bigots, which is a lot of them: Don’t you think that the church-led wars against people’s sexual choices are designed bring fighters on both sides closer together?
  - mistermann 7y ago
    > for those senior citizens who are willing to become bigots, which is a lot of them I wonder if you or the grandparent happen to know of some convincing evidence of this that I'm not aware of? I often wonder when I read claims like this if they are fact-based, and to what degree (usually never mentioned), or if they might instead be examples of the propogation of memes, similar to those related to race.
- calvinmorrison 7y ago
  spew generalisations elsewhere. Churches do work with older adults. Church communities give older adults a way to connect with other people, especially for those who are widowed, or don't have families. For me personally, I have been able to connect to an older generation that I don't have in my family and those are relationships that I treasure. It seems to me that these types of connections are EXACTLY what avoids loneliness and isolation. Churches are a big family, especially for those who are needy and infirmed. Be it going to deliver food to someone who cannot get out, or making sure to call them every week and check in, or picking them up and helping them get to the decons picnic, i think this is just yet another internet athiest with a sharp tongue who should probably sit down and shut up. maybe go to church and see what goes on there. Did you even read the artice?
  - barking 7y ago
    I tend to agree with you and I'm not a churchgoer. Roy Hattersley an atheist former English politician wrote about the relief of Hurricane Katrina The Salvation Army has been given a special status as provider-in-chief of American disaster relief. But its work is being augmented by all sorts of other groups. Almost all of them have a religious origin and character. Notable by their absence are teams from rationalist societies, free thinkers' clubs and atheists' associations - the sort of people who not only scoff at religion's intellectual absurdity but also regard it as a positive force for evil. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2005/sep/12/religion.uk https://www.theguardian.com/world/2005/sep/12/religion.uk
    - Baeocystin 7y ago
      That's an old article. Take a look at current Kiva stats, for example: https://www.kiva.org/teams?queryString=%28A%2B%29+Atheists%2C+Agnostics%2C+Skeptics%2C+Freethinkers%2C+Secular+Humanists+and+the+Non-Religious&search=&category=all&membershipType=all&sortBy=overallLoanedAmount https://www.kiva.org/teams?queryString=%28A%2B%29+Atheists%2... The Atheist team is one of the top donors. There has been a significant surge in secular charity work over the past decade.
  - phamjamstudio 7y ago
    For a long time my church community (mostly in their 20's-40's w/ some folks 60+) frequently worked w/ our local volunteer organizations that specifically reach out to the elderly, disabled, impoverished, etc. This included yard work, resume/career support, counseling, making care packages and so on I posted elsewhere that my first date with my now wife was volunteering at a hospice care center to provide some company to an elderly lady; she ended up dying before our eyes within a few hours. We spent another hour comforting her husband. Sidebar - sometimes it makes me sad to see people stereotype people so easily online. Kind of feels like I have to carry the weight of and associated judgment of all those who did bad things in God's name or whatever. This is probably how good police officer, teachers, oft criticized good public servants feel. Oh well, we all do what we can do. Thanks to all who continue to serve.
- nostromo 7y ago
  I'm an atheist but even I can see that this is an outdated view of churches in at least some of America. It's almost a little strange from my perspective how many churches are now almost secular in nature. Yes, they talk about god, good and evil, and read scripture. But it's much less prescriptive than it used to be and almost sounds like a pep-talk about being a good person, good spouse, and a good parent. Obviously this is from the rare interactions I have with churches -- usually in support of extended family.
- mcgrath_sh 7y ago
  I agree that Churches are in a position to help, but there are lots of obstacles to overcome. Church attendance is shrinking. Older Churches cost a lot of money to maintain, and even more modern Churches still are not free to operate. In the Diocese of Pittsburgh, donations to parishes have shrunk by 20-30% since the AG report came out (rightfully so). Outreach services depend on volunteers (and to a lesser degree, money). There are a lot of Parishes where young people are increasingly hands-off/un-involved. If you don’t have young people, your volunteer pool to provide outreach services continues to get smaller. Add in Parishes merging and your Church building closing, people feel less invested in the “community” of their Church. My mom does volunteer to spend time with people in nursing homes via the local Parish, but a once a week visitor isn’t much. Many of the people tell her that their kids rarely visit (or are too far away to visit) and their friends are also not mobile or have passed away. Even if the Parish had a mountain of volunteers, to visit everyone in even one 90 person home 3 times a week for an hour means 270 hours. That is a part time job for 10 people and that is only one small nursing home!
- xamuel 7y ago
  War against people's sexual choices? Like, with bombs and guns, or a figurative war? It's interesting to look at Jesus's actions in the area. A mob brought him a woman caught cheating on her husband. Asking, should she be put to death? They wanted to trap Jesus: if he said "Yes", he would violate Roman law, if he said "No", he would violate Jewish law. Jesus said, "Let him who is without sin among you be the first to cast a stone at her." (John 8:7). After that disbursed the mob, Jesus told the woman: "Now go and sin no more." There's nothing harder to convince a man of than the fact that he's a sinner. And yet, when I finally realized that fact and asked Jesus for forgiveness, it was more liberating than anything else in this world, more liberating than I could ever have possibly imagined. When you experience something like that, you realize: the kingdom of heaven is near.
  - SolaceQuantum 7y ago
    "War against people's sexual choices? Like, with bombs and guns, or a figurative war?" I guess it depends on what you define conversion therapy and other 'bible camp' type activities.
    - xamuel 7y ago
      Pretty sure that's a vanishingly small minority of churches. BTW, did you know Jesus provided us a protocol for correcting such misguided churchmembers? You can read about it in Matthew 18:15-17. You should accept Christ as Lord and Savior and then apply this protocol against the offending church-leaders. If they refuse to listen to you, Jesus himself sanctions you treating them as outcasts!
      - SolaceQuantum 7y ago
        The sentiment against LGBTQ people is not small at all, which is why I included 'and other bible camp activities'. Just because there is a religious tenent for it doesn't mean that religion is practicing that. Catholic institutions regularly commit systematic oppression of minority demographics, most notably by depriving women of necessary healthcare and medication. Protestant institutions in many places drive systems of oppression and ostracizing of vulnerable groups- victims of domestic violence, removing agency from women, labeling LGBTQ identities as morally wrong, etc.
- mymythisisthis 7y ago
  You can't reform churches. There beliefs are false, and they refuse to accept that.
- dang 7y ago
  Please don't take HN threads into religious flamewar, the last thing we want here. Your comment would have been fine without the second paragraph.
- tathougies 7y ago
  Well I belong to the supposedly sexually obsessed catholic church and our relatively small catholic parish mostly does poor ministries, and elder visits due to the local community needs. I dont think its an outdated view at all... The church provides disproportionate amounts of companionship even for non catholics
seibelj 7y ago
Most important things in life are family, friends, and health. If you have those 3 things consider yourself blessed. I always try and put those 3 things above work, even though I work a lot, because having those 3 things is so vitally important.
- CNJ7654 7y ago
  Wise words, although I would also count work as a blessing in itself. Having a real sense of purpose and usefulness in the world is important. Being forced out of the workforce by advanced aging must be rough
  - bufferoverflow 7y ago
    1) Not necessarily work, but something that drives you. A good hobby can be much more fulfilling than the work for money 2) Helping others is another thing that is incredibly rewarding, mentally at least.
    - davidjnelson 7y ago
      If you can mix the two that’s great too. Creating a product and seeing people use it is an amazing feeling. Even if it’s not “perfect” and you’d love to have time to add another 10 features ;-)
  - harimau777 7y ago
    Talking just from the perspective of having work that contributes to society (as opposed to the economic aspects of work) I think volunteering is a good idea. There was a man at the church I grew up in who was seriously disabled in an industrial accident who volunteered 40 hours a week at the local library. Similarly my grandmother volunteered at a hospital into her 90s. In her case it actually saved her life when she had an aortic aneurysm that almost certainly would have killed her if she hadn't already been at the hospital when it happened!
  - tonyedgecombe 7y ago
    If you only find purpose and usefulness through work then you are going to find it painful when it inevitably comes to an end.
hkmurakami 7y ago
Community is unfortunately increasingly hard to find in this world, especially as we pile on the decades.
- subhobroto 7y ago
  That's not true. You grow a community. Your community is what you make of it I wrote in some details about the challenge, the U.S. faces, here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20557757 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20557757
  - icelancer 7y ago
    Can you not spam your link in EVERY comment here?
    - subhobroto 7y ago
      Hi! It's not "my" link. It's a hyperlink to a comment that I made here elsewhere that I think a person might like. Are you upset that I'm trying to hyperlink to a comment that I made here elsewhere that I feel the person I responded to might find interesting? Or are you upset that the text of the link itself is too long? Or is your concern that the comment I hyperlinked to is irrelevant? I would like the feedback of the person whose response resonated with me and thus placed the link there. I don't like repeating myself over and over again. I prefer not having fragmented conversations if it can be helped. Hyperlinking is the killer feature of the web, I think, so I use it. How would you go about this yourself?
      - dang 7y ago
        Doing it several times is perhaps a bit excessive. It gives the impression that you're using the thread to promote something rather than converse with the specific person you're replying to.
pkaye 7y ago
According to the graph, the 45-54 age group has the highest suicide rate. I'd have never expected that.
- Animats 7y ago
  That's when people realize they've failed at life, their bodies are giving out, and they can't afford to retire. High opiate abuse, too.
  - that_jojo 7y ago
    Really doesn't help that we've somehow created a culture where mediocrity is a sin. It's okay to be average. Most of us are.
    - point78 7y ago
      This I really hate. People make fun of participation awards but that's what it's all about...you tried, you participated...Ok that's fantastic. Pressure that if you're not worth 7 figures or famous is poisonous...
  - pkaye 7y ago
    Then why is the 55-74 range lower?
    - cptskippy 7y ago
      I would say the curre6 55-74 range is baby boomers who benefitted from strong growth in wages, stocks, benefits, and housing and are financially secure. Where as the 45-54 group is the first of Gen X that didn't have those benefits and are in a much worse state financially for the future. I guess the question I have is how have suicide rates changed over the past century.
      - asark 7y ago
        I'd guess retirements (in the US, at least) are gonna get a hell of a lot less comfortable, on average, as the years go on. And probably suicides will keep going up as a result. I'm an early (the term I sometimes see is elder) millennial with excellent household income for my area, but if I ever retire it'll either be on a meager income or very late, because I had kids. Took me from probably a comfortable, but not extravagant, early retirement or a pretty good "normal"-timed retirement to maybe-never retirement. Those with lower income (so, most) aren't even getting that choice. Kids and lifelong near-poverty and debt struggles, or maybe, maybe a so-so retirement more or less on time, but no kids.
Tiktaalik 7y ago
NA has designed its cities to require a car and has not paid any thought to how this isolates and erodes the quality of life of the elderly once they cannot legally drive due to health reasons. Whoops. As boomers age it'll get worse. Yet another reason we need to redesign our cities.
- r00fus 7y ago
  Economics of profiting from misery will prevent any effective change as numerous industries actually make more money from this state of affairs. This won't change until/unless civic participation in government increases.
  - that_jojo 7y ago
    Jesus christ, this is the most depressingly real comment I've read in my life.
  - drcross 7y ago
    I don't completely agree. As Camus once said: "hell is other people". As prosperity increased people fled each others company thinking that being in isolation would rid them of social anxiety. There was little consideration for the results, which is profound loneliness.
    - r00fus 7y ago
      Great, I agree - now do a bit more analysis and regress one step further - who profits from this? Why is this a problem now, rather than say, 50 years ago?
      - drcross 7y ago
        >do a bit more analysis and regress one step further - who profits from this? Home builders making individual houses and possibly therapists and pharma making anti depression pills. Did I miss any? >Why is this a problem now, rather than say, 50 years ago? People shared bedrooms, went to communal bath houses for example and there was a stronger family unit most likely due to societal customs.
subhobroto 7y ago
I would like to see how the numbers stack up to other countries that have a better work life balance. Here's my hypothesis - the work life "balance" in the U.S. is incredibly messed up - like real bad. The assumption most people make is "Let's work real hard while we are young so we have all the money we need when we are older. We will have fun then". So right out of college, with six figures in debt, people are working 40+ hours/week (typically 60+ hours/week), working weekends without blinking an eye. Everyone's doing it, it's the norm, so what's wrong with doing what everyone is doing. No one has time to make meaningful relationships. Most people spend less than 3 years at a job, so what's the point anyways. You can't get a good salary hike without quitting your existing and joining a new company. That model bleeds into one's personal life as well - people are so busy working hard that they miss the opportunities to build a meaningful relationship with their spouse and children. Guilt sets in so the spouse and children get showered with expensive gifts and vacations but they have nothing much to talk about during those vacations either so they spend most of their time visiting random places, taking tons of photos, posting them on social and handling the barrage of comments they get for those photos. The emptiness does not resolve though - and when it gets intolerable the spouses file for divorce. Maybe it will work out with someone else. Once they retire - they have two big problems: 1. yes, they do have money, but don't know what to do with it 2. they also don't know what to do with the free hours they now have available! As a result, they hand over their money to fund managers who proceed to loose all or most of that money because they are sure they can beat the market. In the meantime, they have been so frigging busy most of their adult life with the one thing they did for their employers that they did not develop social skills (outside the fake "professional" facade) or general skills - and everyone's so fake that it gets down under your skin because deep inside you can feel the fakeness so you hesitate to make more social ties. With the money depleted and being bored out of their minds, what's the next step? It's easy to blame everyone else for this, but the reality is the time is past for deep introspection.
- neogodless 7y ago
  If I understand you correctly, we don't have our priorities straight. Money and consumption is put above relationships and growth. (I almost said "experiences" but, in my opinion, people use that term to justify shallow, expensive pursuits like traveling so they can show off how great their lives are. I think experience is valuable, particular leaving your comfort zone so that you can adapt, learn and grow.) Instead of leaning on relationships to provide for each other, and enduring hardships together, we want to individually achieve for ourselves, and remove any sense of inconvenience or boredom from our lives.
b_tterc_p 7y ago
Idk, I think we should make assisted suicide options more prevalent for older people. The reality is that life sucks for many of them. The article says that many of them feel like they’re a burden. That doesn’t mean they’re wrong. You’re going to be aware that you provide little value to people’s lives if you’re unable to do anything and are personally in general discomfort from your decaying body. Suicide does not need to be seen as a terrible thing. It’s totally reasonable to celebrate the end of life. To leave on your own terms sounds much less scary. The normal ideal way to die seems to be surrounded by loved ones but most people don’t get that. They get a scary bodily failure alone and in pain. Not to mention the psychological benefits that might come from a healthier image of dying for young people.
- defined 7y ago
  This is spot on. I say this as an aging person living in irreversible and progressively increasing discomfort. To quote an old film title, whose life is it, anyway?
- whatshisface 7y ago
  Instead of changing society so that unhappy people die, why not change society so that they're happy?
  - michaelbuckbee 7y ago
    My family has a history of dementia and it's terrifying. Currently my grandmother is 95 and more or less can't remember anything from the past 30 years. She doesn't know who I am when I visit because I don't look like I did 30 years ago. She requires 24/7 caretaking and most conversations with her end with "I don't know why the lord hasn't taken me yet". She's very physically weak and struggles to just walk around the house, etc. This has been more or less her state for the past 15 years. Despite the best efforts of the family she is 95 and ready to go and not sure what else we can do.
  - snegu 7y ago
    Because it's not about society; it's about the body (and mind) failing.
40acres 7y ago
Look to Japan for insights on the effects of an aging population on an advanced economy. While immigration acts as a buffer within the United States many trends we are currently experiencing can be seen in Japan as well. With current societal trends, I suspect that human interaction and emotional labor will become quantified and decoupled from the health care sector. A large fraction of the population - from children, to teens, working adults and the elderly - need more face to face interaction. Volunteer organizations, social clubs and other forms of physical 'social infrastructure' (parks, libraries) need additional funding to help fill the gap in so many of our lives.
- mymythisisthis 7y ago
  Look to medieval society. Everyone was in some form of guild. Guilds determined how you dressed, who you socialized with, held ceremonies and parties. It wasn't just a trade union, it was a whole way of life.
  - jbattle 7y ago
    Tocqueville wrote about something similar in Democracy in America (this is talking about American society around 1830). He talks at length how he was struck by American's social connections. Everyone was in at least one social club. Organized for every purpose conceivable. Some were purely social, others were for some political advocacy. One huge difference between this and the medieval guilds is these associations weren't (near as I can tell) exclusive. People might belong to several. It sounded a bit ... intense, but I do think we've lost something in the intervening centuries https://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/805328.html https://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/805328.html
  - vectorEQ 7y ago
    people still had sense of community then, because there were challenges that needed cooperation from everyone. In areas of the world where this still holds true, often there is still more care for each-other.
    - 7y ago
ardani 7y ago
Ugh, fell for it again.
- harimau777 7y ago
  Read the first sentence and thought it might be an interesting discussion of how Jewish culture handles social connections across generations. Read the rest of the post and am disappointed (and kind of confused).
- wyldfire 7y ago
  I am not sure what you're saying here, it seems like it's really subtle, playing off of stereotypes. How do Jews relate here?
  - ardani 7y ago
    Sorry, I can't be more clear here without performing conversions, which I'm not allowed to do.
- tzakrajs 7y ago
  How about we calm down on the Jewish stereotypes and you try to write that again in a way that isn’t a word salad.
- dang 7y ago
  We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20558122 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20558122 and marked it off-topic.
gnulinux 7y ago
I'm in my 20s and struggling with excessive social isolation. God knows what will happen when I'm in my 70s.
- subhobroto 7y ago
  > what will happen when I'm in my 70s Well, grow a community. Your community is what you make of it! The community you need might not thrive right now where you live, so look around and move to where you find real genuine happiness I wrote in some details about the challenge, the U.S. faces, here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20557757 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20557757
11thEarlOfMar 7y ago
I'd like to develop a blueprint for a cookie-cutter community for social security recipients. The blueprint would include design and construction for physical structures such as community spaces, bedroom spaces, land size, possibly food gardening areas, and activity areas. Then, design a type of self-governing community 'constitution' that would direct operation of the community by the community. An expanded home owners association of sorts. The community would be funded by the social security income of the residents. All residents who are still able work in some capacity to offset the costs of operation. Those who are no longer able to work would still remain and be assisted by other members and skilled nurses. Professional services such as legal and counseling can be provided on site. Perhaps add a medication dispensary. A single community could have, I don't know, 1,000 people? The average social security benefit in 2019 is $1,461. This would yield a $17,500,000 annual budget for the community to operate [3]. This is a similar concept as a Kibbutz, which works as an organizing approach in Israel [1]. One difference is that this community would be primarily funded by social security receipts, rather than industrial or business activities. Many costs of operation can be offset by growing their own food, making their own beer and wine, doing their own maintenance, managing the finances using standard corporate control policies. Such an arrangement would have all the opportunities that seniors need: Social engagement, valued work, friendships, privacy when they want it, people watching out for each other, a feeling of contributing. More importantly, it would be available to seniors who hit retirement with no wealth, and no income other than their social security check. There are 25 million Americans in this situation today [2]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kibbutz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kibbutz [2] https://www.ncoa.org/news/resources-for-reporters/get-the-facts/economic-security-facts/ https://www.ncoa.org/news/resources-for-reporters/get-the-fa... [3] https://www.aarp.org/retirement/social-security/questions-answers/how-much-social-security-will-i-get.html https://www.aarp.org/retirement/social-security/questions-an...
- subhobroto 7y ago
  Your idea is very well placed and your vision has a lot of value but I think you're trying to achieve it in a very painful way. You cannot force people to like something: for any initiative to be successful long term, it has to be accepted naturally and organically. What you are proposing, your idea of a community, counseling, engagement, friendships are very good and a natural way of living life - that's how it used to be forever and still remains to this day, across most of the world where people live truly fulfilling and meaningful lives. Except mostly for the U.S. and the countries that try to emulate it. I wrote in some details about the challenge, the U.S. faces, here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20557757 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20557757
subsaharancoder 7y ago
Keep your friends close and your grand parents closer
autoexec 7y ago
I know people in their 30s who have suicide as their ultimate end of life plan. They don't have retirement savings beyond a 401k, they live paycheck to paycheck, retirement and pensions aren't an option for them so they know they'll work until they are too old or sick. They're hoping that assisted suicide will be legal by the time they are overwhelmed by medical expenses or pain, but all them are willing to put a gun in their mouths if it comes to that.
- _eht 7y ago
  I’ve seen this Futurama episode...
- mktmkr 7y ago
  Curious what you think is deficient about only having a 401k (and, presumably, Social Security) as a retirement plan. Isn't this the entire sales pitch of Vanguard, that you put a couple of bucks in your 401k every week and then you retire? I'm not personally all-in on IRAs, but it seems like an accepted strategy.
  - e40 7y ago
    Presumably their 401k's are not that beefy. That's the way I read the comment.
  - yardie 7y ago
    There is an entire class of people who are living paycheck to paycheck. And have a lifetime of part-time, minimum wage work. How much do you think they have in savings and 401k?
    - autoexec 7y ago
      > There is an entire class of people who are living paycheck to paycheck. Like over 75% of all full time workers in America. If you aren't living paycheck to paycheck you're much better off than the vast majority of the nation.
  - autoexec 7y ago
FillardMillmore 7y ago
I pessimistically think this problem is only going to get worse as young people today grow older and people/politicians today largely ignore the current problem. In Western cultures, people have become isolated and atomized - by trends such as technology, changing social norms (and family structures), diversification of demographics, and the gradual decline of social structures like religion - as a result, people feel more lonely and feel as if they have less support or purpose. It seems as if people are more genuinely kind in places that are remote and not densely populated. Folks in cities have so many interactions on daily basis and see so many people (some of those people in dire situations, like homeless people or drug addicts) that they seem to become almost numb to it. If you fell on the sidewalk in New York City, how many people would step over you and how many people would offer to help you up and/or see if you're okay? Would this change depending on the age of the person who fell? I have a grandfather who is old enough to remember betting with friends on Nazi battles with the Soviets that were broadcast over the radio (details of the battles and the progression). So much has changed since he was a young man - I imagine it's startling and quite unsettling for older people. The rate of change seems now faster than it's ever been and they certainly can't keep up with it. I've talked with older people that simply feel like for this reason, among many others, they've been left behind and forgotten about. This could be a possible contributor to elderly suicide rates as well.
- mjevans 7y ago
  It shouldn't be religion. It also shouldn't be hanging out in a bar, or smoking, or some inane stadium event where people don't really mingle. There needs to be a third place# where it's expected to have polite conversation and interactions that can lead to "being social". In smaller communities maybe that's a town square or a park between things, but that just doesn't scale and can't cope with decentralization (which is one of the driving forces behind the tech revolution). I don't really have an answer, but I do know that actual civic planning a re-organizing society so that we actually move towards having more free time and less "work time" will be beneficial to this and many other problems. # https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_place https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_place
totesmaslany 7y ago
MFW I've been suicidal for 4 years (since I was 24)...
logfromblammo 7y ago
Article elides over the fact that in the US, suicide may be the result of rational analysis, including consideration of pros and cons, in response to specific and relevant factors. Particularly economic factors. Looming large is the idea that healthcare costs can burn down an entire lifetime of toil, saving, and planning in a matter of months. Some people would prefer to leave something of value to their survivors, rather than give everything that's left to their last physician, and then be a charity case or family burden for all their remaining days. Gen X and Millennial cohorts are even less secure than Boomers financially as they age, so the problem will only grow worse. If you have a tiny nest egg, and a fixed income, it doesn't take much math to calculate the amount of time one can afford to continue to live, given a certain expense profile. When the choices come down to the number of additional weeks you can eke out by switching from Spam to store-brand cat food, it may also become attractive to look into eating a nice steak dinner, saving the last big chunk of meat to be aspirated, so your survivors don't know, for certain, that you committed suicide. If you were staring down the barrel of a life where nothing joyful or worthwhile will ever happen to you again, and every day will be slightly worse than the last, and is marked only by the angle of the shadows and the color of the pills, with no hope of reversal, I can't reasonably argue against suicide. In that sense, denying the methods and opportunities for suicide without addressing the root causes of motive, as the facility is paid for every day the person lives, seems a bit like torture for profit. I have personally changed domicile cities four times in my career, looking for gainful employment, and each time I came away with fewer people that would even notice if I die this evening. I expect that my children will soon leave me, hopefully to find work that allows them to support themselves, and if I don't die first, I will one day lose my spouse as well. I see no way to avoid this. I can't afford now to worry about whether I will be lonely later. My lack of lifetime financial security has translated into a smaller social support network of friends, and has definitely resulted in choosing to have fewer children. And it has reduced the amount of time I can spend renewing family relationships. My parents see less of me when I am 400 miles away than they did when I was 150 miles away. I'm certainly not alleviating their loneliness. If either committed suicide, I'm not certain how I would even find out about it.
- davidjnelson 7y ago
  Would zoom calls help with long distance relationships like this?
DanBC 7y ago
> while adults 85 and older, regardless of gender, are the second most likely age group to die from suicide. The rate is high, but the actual numbers are very low, because there aren't many people over the age of 85. https://imgur.com/a/iktpfjS https://imgur.com/a/iktpfjS This is an ongoing tragedy, but not because the rate is high. It's because suicide is mostly preventable, and many of these people will be in closer contact with health care providers. It seems like there are years and years where action could be taken. I can't speak to the US's approach to suicide prevention (other than to say it appears mostly incoherent from outside) but they should be paying some attention to depression, social isolation, and suicidal thinking in older people, and I'd be surprised if this was absent from the strategies. But they will be putting it in context: not many people over the age of 85 die by suicide. Thousands and thousands of people between the ages of 25 - 50 die by suicide. So, from what I can tell over the age of 80 there were about 2500 deaths by suicide in 2017. For the ages 45-49 it was over 4000 people. For 50-54 it was over 4000 people. And for 55-59 it was nearly 4500 people. https://imgur.com/a/iktpfjS https://imgur.com/a/iktpfjS One of the problems with suicide articles being posted to HN is that most people here have no idea how suicide is defined across the US, nor how it varies by counties and states. I certainly don't, and it makes talking about the data really hard.
andygcook 7y ago
I know promotional posts are annoying and I'm risking downvotes by posting this... but decided it's relevant enough to share a service my older brother built called NanaGram.co that helps with elder loneliness. The product's pretty simple: you SMS in your photos to a phone number and then then once a month they get printed and shipped to your loved ones in the mail. It's honestly a very good way to keep your loved ones updated on your life and deliver some joy to their day. From experience, phone calls with my grandma before she passed away were much more interesting once she started getting regular photos too because we had new topics to talk about each time. Want to be up front that I have no financial incentive to post this and am not involved with the product at all apart from helping to build the initial prototype. Just a proud of younger brother and happy customer.
- hestipod 7y ago
  Good on your brother for building something with a kind purpose at it's core. We need to use tech more for things like that, and less for things that take data/attention/money just to make someone rich.
qwerty456127 7y ago
Every person should be taught mindfulness in their adolescence or as soon as possible during their later life. People struggling from loneliness because they have never learnt to use their minds the proper way are like people struggling from immobility because they have never learnt to walk.
algaeontoast 7y ago
Honestly, if I pass a certain age and my mental or physical faculties start to go, I'd rather opt for some form of suicide than suffering myself or making my family pay to watch...
jibla 7y ago
An interesting and inspiring case in Switzerland -http://politicindia.com/news-details.php?newsid=1059 http://politicindia.com/news-details.php?newsid=1059 They've introduced a novel banking scheme in which retired care volunteers “deposit” hours worked looking after elderly people. In return they can use any time saved up for their own care provision later in life.

127 points by wallflower 7y ago

This is a issue that many churches in America are uniquely positioned to help with. They often have busses, an army of people willing to volunteer, and wide open spaces totally unused on weekdays. But church leadership would rather spend their resources waging a war against people’s sexual choices and getting involved in political positions. It’s sad to see religious resources so widely unused to help those in society in this time of need.

nikofeyn 7y ago
or abusing their tax exempt status.
dondawest 7y ago
I think church leadership is helping with the issue of senior citizen loneliness, for those senior citizens who are willing to become bigots, which is a lot of them: Don’t you think that the church-led wars against people’s sexual choices are designed bring fighters on both sides closer together?
- mistermann 7y ago
  > for those senior citizens who are willing to become bigots, which is a lot of them I wonder if you or the grandparent happen to know of some convincing evidence of this that I'm not aware of? I often wonder when I read claims like this if they are fact-based, and to what degree (usually never mentioned), or if they might instead be examples of the propogation of memes, similar to those related to race.
calvinmorrison 7y ago
spew generalisations elsewhere. Churches do work with older adults. Church communities give older adults a way to connect with other people, especially for those who are widowed, or don't have families. For me personally, I have been able to connect to an older generation that I don't have in my family and those are relationships that I treasure. It seems to me that these types of connections are EXACTLY what avoids loneliness and isolation. Churches are a big family, especially for those who are needy and infirmed. Be it going to deliver food to someone who cannot get out, or making sure to call them every week and check in, or picking them up and helping them get to the decons picnic, i think this is just yet another internet athiest with a sharp tongue who should probably sit down and shut up. maybe go to church and see what goes on there. Did you even read the artice?
- barking 7y ago
  I tend to agree with you and I'm not a churchgoer. Roy Hattersley an atheist former English politician wrote about the relief of Hurricane Katrina The Salvation Army has been given a special status as provider-in-chief of American disaster relief. But its work is being augmented by all sorts of other groups. Almost all of them have a religious origin and character. Notable by their absence are teams from rationalist societies, free thinkers' clubs and atheists' associations - the sort of people who not only scoff at religion's intellectual absurdity but also regard it as a positive force for evil. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2005/sep/12/religion.uk https://www.theguardian.com/world/2005/sep/12/religion.uk
  - Baeocystin 7y ago
    That's an old article. Take a look at current Kiva stats, for example: https://www.kiva.org/teams?queryString=%28A%2B%29+Atheists%2C+Agnostics%2C+Skeptics%2C+Freethinkers%2C+Secular+Humanists+and+the+Non-Religious&search=&category=all&membershipType=all&sortBy=overallLoanedAmount https://www.kiva.org/teams?queryString=%28A%2B%29+Atheists%2... The Atheist team is one of the top donors. There has been a significant surge in secular charity work over the past decade.
- phamjamstudio 7y ago
  For a long time my church community (mostly in their 20's-40's w/ some folks 60+) frequently worked w/ our local volunteer organizations that specifically reach out to the elderly, disabled, impoverished, etc. This included yard work, resume/career support, counseling, making care packages and so on I posted elsewhere that my first date with my now wife was volunteering at a hospice care center to provide some company to an elderly lady; she ended up dying before our eyes within a few hours. We spent another hour comforting her husband. Sidebar - sometimes it makes me sad to see people stereotype people so easily online. Kind of feels like I have to carry the weight of and associated judgment of all those who did bad things in God's name or whatever. This is probably how good police officer, teachers, oft criticized good public servants feel. Oh well, we all do what we can do. Thanks to all who continue to serve.
nostromo 7y ago
I'm an atheist but even I can see that this is an outdated view of churches in at least some of America. It's almost a little strange from my perspective how many churches are now almost secular in nature. Yes, they talk about god, good and evil, and read scripture. But it's much less prescriptive than it used to be and almost sounds like a pep-talk about being a good person, good spouse, and a good parent. Obviously this is from the rare interactions I have with churches -- usually in support of extended family.
mcgrath_sh 7y ago
I agree that Churches are in a position to help, but there are lots of obstacles to overcome. Church attendance is shrinking. Older Churches cost a lot of money to maintain, and even more modern Churches still are not free to operate. In the Diocese of Pittsburgh, donations to parishes have shrunk by 20-30% since the AG report came out (rightfully so). Outreach services depend on volunteers (and to a lesser degree, money). There are a lot of Parishes where young people are increasingly hands-off/un-involved. If you don’t have young people, your volunteer pool to provide outreach services continues to get smaller. Add in Parishes merging and your Church building closing, people feel less invested in the “community” of their Church. My mom does volunteer to spend time with people in nursing homes via the local Parish, but a once a week visitor isn’t much. Many of the people tell her that their kids rarely visit (or are too far away to visit) and their friends are also not mobile or have passed away. Even if the Parish had a mountain of volunteers, to visit everyone in even one 90 person home 3 times a week for an hour means 270 hours. That is a part time job for 10 people and that is only one small nursing home!
xamuel 7y ago
War against people's sexual choices? Like, with bombs and guns, or a figurative war? It's interesting to look at Jesus's actions in the area. A mob brought him a woman caught cheating on her husband. Asking, should she be put to death? They wanted to trap Jesus: if he said "Yes", he would violate Roman law, if he said "No", he would violate Jewish law. Jesus said, "Let him who is without sin among you be the first to cast a stone at her." (John 8:7). After that disbursed the mob, Jesus told the woman: "Now go and sin no more." There's nothing harder to convince a man of than the fact that he's a sinner. And yet, when I finally realized that fact and asked Jesus for forgiveness, it was more liberating than anything else in this world, more liberating than I could ever have possibly imagined. When you experience something like that, you realize: the kingdom of heaven is near.
- SolaceQuantum 7y ago
  "War against people's sexual choices? Like, with bombs and guns, or a figurative war?" I guess it depends on what you define conversion therapy and other 'bible camp' type activities.
  - xamuel 7y ago
    Pretty sure that's a vanishingly small minority of churches. BTW, did you know Jesus provided us a protocol for correcting such misguided churchmembers? You can read about it in Matthew 18:15-17. You should accept Christ as Lord and Savior and then apply this protocol against the offending church-leaders. If they refuse to listen to you, Jesus himself sanctions you treating them as outcasts!
    - SolaceQuantum 7y ago
      The sentiment against LGBTQ people is not small at all, which is why I included 'and other bible camp activities'. Just because there is a religious tenent for it doesn't mean that religion is practicing that. Catholic institutions regularly commit systematic oppression of minority demographics, most notably by depriving women of necessary healthcare and medication. Protestant institutions in many places drive systems of oppression and ostracizing of vulnerable groups- victims of domestic violence, removing agency from women, labeling LGBTQ identities as morally wrong, etc.
mymythisisthis 7y ago
You can't reform churches. There beliefs are false, and they refuse to accept that.
dang 7y ago
Please don't take HN threads into religious flamewar, the last thing we want here. Your comment would have been fine without the second paragraph.
tathougies 7y ago
Well I belong to the supposedly sexually obsessed catholic church and our relatively small catholic parish mostly does poor ministries, and elder visits due to the local community needs. I dont think its an outdated view at all... The church provides disproportionate amounts of companionship even for non catholics

seibelj 7y ago

Most important things in life are family, friends, and health. If you have those 3 things consider yourself blessed. I always try and put those 3 things above work, even though I work a lot, because having those 3 things is so vitally important.

CNJ7654 7y ago
Wise words, although I would also count work as a blessing in itself. Having a real sense of purpose and usefulness in the world is important. Being forced out of the workforce by advanced aging must be rough
- bufferoverflow 7y ago
  1) Not necessarily work, but something that drives you. A good hobby can be much more fulfilling than the work for money 2) Helping others is another thing that is incredibly rewarding, mentally at least.
  - davidjnelson 7y ago
    If you can mix the two that’s great too. Creating a product and seeing people use it is an amazing feeling. Even if it’s not “perfect” and you’d love to have time to add another 10 features ;-)
- harimau777 7y ago
  Talking just from the perspective of having work that contributes to society (as opposed to the economic aspects of work) I think volunteering is a good idea. There was a man at the church I grew up in who was seriously disabled in an industrial accident who volunteered 40 hours a week at the local library. Similarly my grandmother volunteered at a hospital into her 90s. In her case it actually saved her life when she had an aortic aneurysm that almost certainly would have killed her if she hadn't already been at the hospital when it happened!
- tonyedgecombe 7y ago
  If you only find purpose and usefulness through work then you are going to find it painful when it inevitably comes to an end.

hkmurakami 7y ago

Community is unfortunately increasingly hard to find in this world, especially as we pile on the decades.

subhobroto 7y ago
That's not true. You grow a community. Your community is what you make of it I wrote in some details about the challenge, the U.S. faces, here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20557757 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20557757
- icelancer 7y ago
  Can you not spam your link in EVERY comment here?
  - subhobroto 7y ago
    Hi! It's not "my" link. It's a hyperlink to a comment that I made here elsewhere that I think a person might like. Are you upset that I'm trying to hyperlink to a comment that I made here elsewhere that I feel the person I responded to might find interesting? Or are you upset that the text of the link itself is too long? Or is your concern that the comment I hyperlinked to is irrelevant? I would like the feedback of the person whose response resonated with me and thus placed the link there. I don't like repeating myself over and over again. I prefer not having fragmented conversations if it can be helped. Hyperlinking is the killer feature of the web, I think, so I use it. How would you go about this yourself?
    - dang 7y ago
      Doing it several times is perhaps a bit excessive. It gives the impression that you're using the thread to promote something rather than converse with the specific person you're replying to.

pkaye 7y ago

According to the graph, the 45-54 age group has the highest suicide rate. I'd have never expected that.

Animats 7y ago
That's when people realize they've failed at life, their bodies are giving out, and they can't afford to retire. High opiate abuse, too.
- that_jojo 7y ago
  Really doesn't help that we've somehow created a culture where mediocrity is a sin. It's okay to be average. Most of us are.
  - point78 7y ago
    This I really hate. People make fun of participation awards but that's what it's all about...you tried, you participated...Ok that's fantastic. Pressure that if you're not worth 7 figures or famous is poisonous...
- pkaye 7y ago
  Then why is the 55-74 range lower?
  - cptskippy 7y ago
    I would say the curre6 55-74 range is baby boomers who benefitted from strong growth in wages, stocks, benefits, and housing and are financially secure. Where as the 45-54 group is the first of Gen X that didn't have those benefits and are in a much worse state financially for the future. I guess the question I have is how have suicide rates changed over the past century.
    - asark 7y ago
      I'd guess retirements (in the US, at least) are gonna get a hell of a lot less comfortable, on average, as the years go on. And probably suicides will keep going up as a result. I'm an early (the term I sometimes see is elder) millennial with excellent household income for my area, but if I ever retire it'll either be on a meager income or very late, because I had kids. Took me from probably a comfortable, but not extravagant, early retirement or a pretty good "normal"-timed retirement to maybe-never retirement. Those with lower income (so, most) aren't even getting that choice. Kids and lifelong near-poverty and debt struggles, or maybe, maybe a so-so retirement more or less on time, but no kids.

Tiktaalik 7y ago

NA has designed its cities to require a car and has not paid any thought to how this isolates and erodes the quality of life of the elderly once they cannot legally drive due to health reasons. Whoops. As boomers age it'll get worse. Yet another reason we need to redesign our cities.

r00fus 7y ago
Economics of profiting from misery will prevent any effective change as numerous industries actually make more money from this state of affairs. This won't change until/unless civic participation in government increases.
- that_jojo 7y ago
  Jesus christ, this is the most depressingly real comment I've read in my life.
- drcross 7y ago
  I don't completely agree. As Camus once said: "hell is other people". As prosperity increased people fled each others company thinking that being in isolation would rid them of social anxiety. There was little consideration for the results, which is profound loneliness.
  - r00fus 7y ago
    Great, I agree - now do a bit more analysis and regress one step further - who profits from this? Why is this a problem now, rather than say, 50 years ago?
    - drcross 7y ago
      >do a bit more analysis and regress one step further - who profits from this? Home builders making individual houses and possibly therapists and pharma making anti depression pills. Did I miss any? >Why is this a problem now, rather than say, 50 years ago? People shared bedrooms, went to communal bath houses for example and there was a stronger family unit most likely due to societal customs.

subhobroto 7y ago

I would like to see how the numbers stack up to other countries that have a better work life balance. Here's my hypothesis - the work life "balance" in the U.S. is incredibly messed up - like real bad. The assumption most people make is "Let's work real hard while we are young so we have all the money we need when we are older. We will have fun then". So right out of college, with six figures in debt, people are working 40+ hours/week (typically 60+ hours/week), working weekends without blinking an eye. Everyone's doing it, it's the norm, so what's wrong with doing what everyone is doing. No one has time to make meaningful relationships. Most people spend less than 3 years at a job, so what's the point anyways. You can't get a good salary hike without quitting your existing and joining a new company. That model bleeds into one's personal life as well - people are so busy working hard that they miss the opportunities to build a meaningful relationship with their spouse and children. Guilt sets in so the spouse and children get showered with expensive gifts and vacations but they have nothing much to talk about during those vacations either so they spend most of their time visiting random places, taking tons of photos, posting them on social and handling the barrage of comments they get for those photos. The emptiness does not resolve though - and when it gets intolerable the spouses file for divorce. Maybe it will work out with someone else. Once they retire - they have two big problems: 1. yes, they do have money, but don't know what to do with it 2. they also don't know what to do with the free hours they now have available! As a result, they hand over their money to fund managers who proceed to loose all or most of that money because they are sure they can beat the market. In the meantime, they have been so frigging busy most of their adult life with the one thing they did for their employers that they did not develop social skills (outside the fake "professional" facade) or general skills - and everyone's so fake that it gets down under your skin because deep inside you can feel the fakeness so you hesitate to make more social ties. With the money depleted and being bored out of their minds, what's the next step? It's easy to blame everyone else for this, but the reality is the time is past for deep introspection.

neogodless 7y ago
If I understand you correctly, we don't have our priorities straight. Money and consumption is put above relationships and growth. (I almost said "experiences" but, in my opinion, people use that term to justify shallow, expensive pursuits like traveling so they can show off how great their lives are. I think experience is valuable, particular leaving your comfort zone so that you can adapt, learn and grow.) Instead of leaning on relationships to provide for each other, and enduring hardships together, we want to individually achieve for ourselves, and remove any sense of inconvenience or boredom from our lives.

b_tterc_p 7y ago

Idk, I think we should make assisted suicide options more prevalent for older people. The reality is that life sucks for many of them. The article says that many of them feel like they’re a burden. That doesn’t mean they’re wrong. You’re going to be aware that you provide little value to people’s lives if you’re unable to do anything and are personally in general discomfort from your decaying body. Suicide does not need to be seen as a terrible thing. It’s totally reasonable to celebrate the end of life. To leave on your own terms sounds much less scary. The normal ideal way to die seems to be surrounded by loved ones but most people don’t get that. They get a scary bodily failure alone and in pain. Not to mention the psychological benefits that might come from a healthier image of dying for young people.

defined 7y ago
This is spot on. I say this as an aging person living in irreversible and progressively increasing discomfort. To quote an old film title, whose life is it, anyway?
whatshisface 7y ago
Instead of changing society so that unhappy people die, why not change society so that they're happy?
- michaelbuckbee 7y ago
  My family has a history of dementia and it's terrifying. Currently my grandmother is 95 and more or less can't remember anything from the past 30 years. She doesn't know who I am when I visit because I don't look like I did 30 years ago. She requires 24/7 caretaking and most conversations with her end with "I don't know why the lord hasn't taken me yet". She's very physically weak and struggles to just walk around the house, etc. This has been more or less her state for the past 15 years. Despite the best efforts of the family she is 95 and ready to go and not sure what else we can do.
- snegu 7y ago
  Because it's not about society; it's about the body (and mind) failing.

40acres 7y ago

Look to Japan for insights on the effects of an aging population on an advanced economy. While immigration acts as a buffer within the United States many trends we are currently experiencing can be seen in Japan as well. With current societal trends, I suspect that human interaction and emotional labor will become quantified and decoupled from the health care sector. A large fraction of the population - from children, to teens, working adults and the elderly - need more face to face interaction. Volunteer organizations, social clubs and other forms of physical 'social infrastructure' (parks, libraries) need additional funding to help fill the gap in so many of our lives.

mymythisisthis 7y ago
Look to medieval society. Everyone was in some form of guild. Guilds determined how you dressed, who you socialized with, held ceremonies and parties. It wasn't just a trade union, it was a whole way of life.
- jbattle 7y ago
  Tocqueville wrote about something similar in Democracy in America (this is talking about American society around 1830). He talks at length how he was struck by American's social connections. Everyone was in at least one social club. Organized for every purpose conceivable. Some were purely social, others were for some political advocacy. One huge difference between this and the medieval guilds is these associations weren't (near as I can tell) exclusive. People might belong to several. It sounded a bit ... intense, but I do think we've lost something in the intervening centuries https://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/805328.html https://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/805328.html
- vectorEQ 7y ago
  people still had sense of community then, because there were challenges that needed cooperation from everyone. In areas of the world where this still holds true, often there is still more care for each-other.
  - 7y ago

ardani 7y ago

Ugh, fell for it again.

harimau777 7y ago
Read the first sentence and thought it might be an interesting discussion of how Jewish culture handles social connections across generations. Read the rest of the post and am disappointed (and kind of confused).
wyldfire 7y ago
I am not sure what you're saying here, it seems like it's really subtle, playing off of stereotypes. How do Jews relate here?
- ardani 7y ago
  Sorry, I can't be more clear here without performing conversions, which I'm not allowed to do.
tzakrajs 7y ago
How about we calm down on the Jewish stereotypes and you try to write that again in a way that isn’t a word salad.
dang 7y ago
We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20558122 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20558122 and marked it off-topic.

gnulinux 7y ago

I'm in my 20s and struggling with excessive social isolation. God knows what will happen when I'm in my 70s.

subhobroto 7y ago
> what will happen when I'm in my 70s Well, grow a community. Your community is what you make of it! The community you need might not thrive right now where you live, so look around and move to where you find real genuine happiness I wrote in some details about the challenge, the U.S. faces, here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20557757 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20557757

11thEarlOfMar 7y ago

I'd like to develop a blueprint for a cookie-cutter community for social security recipients. The blueprint would include design and construction for physical structures such as community spaces, bedroom spaces, land size, possibly food gardening areas, and activity areas. Then, design a type of self-governing community 'constitution' that would direct operation of the community by the community. An expanded home owners association of sorts. The community would be funded by the social security income of the residents. All residents who are still able work in some capacity to offset the costs of operation. Those who are no longer able to work would still remain and be assisted by other members and skilled nurses. Professional services such as legal and counseling can be provided on site. Perhaps add a medication dispensary. A single community could have, I don't know, 1,000 people? The average social security benefit in 2019 is $1,461. This would yield a $17,500,000 annual budget for the community to operate [3]. This is a similar concept as a Kibbutz, which works as an organizing approach in Israel [1]. One difference is that this community would be primarily funded by social security receipts, rather than industrial or business activities. Many costs of operation can be offset by growing their own food, making their own beer and wine, doing their own maintenance, managing the finances using standard corporate control policies. Such an arrangement would have all the opportunities that seniors need: Social engagement, valued work, friendships, privacy when they want it, people watching out for each other, a feeling of contributing. More importantly, it would be available to seniors who hit retirement with no wealth, and no income other than their social security check. There are 25 million Americans in this situation today [2]. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kibbutz https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kibbutz [2] https://www.ncoa.org/news/resources-for-reporters/get-the-facts/economic-security-facts/ https://www.ncoa.org/news/resources-for-reporters/get-the-fa... [3] https://www.aarp.org/retirement/social-security/questions-answers/how-much-social-security-will-i-get.html https://www.aarp.org/retirement/social-security/questions-an...

subhobroto 7y ago
Your idea is very well placed and your vision has a lot of value but I think you're trying to achieve it in a very painful way. You cannot force people to like something: for any initiative to be successful long term, it has to be accepted naturally and organically. What you are proposing, your idea of a community, counseling, engagement, friendships are very good and a natural way of living life - that's how it used to be forever and still remains to this day, across most of the world where people live truly fulfilling and meaningful lives. Except mostly for the U.S. and the countries that try to emulate it. I wrote in some details about the challenge, the U.S. faces, here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20557757 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20557757

subsaharancoder 7y ago

Keep your friends close and your grand parents closer

autoexec 7y ago

I know people in their 30s who have suicide as their ultimate end of life plan. They don't have retirement savings beyond a 401k, they live paycheck to paycheck, retirement and pensions aren't an option for them so they know they'll work until they are too old or sick. They're hoping that assisted suicide will be legal by the time they are overwhelmed by medical expenses or pain, but all them are willing to put a gun in their mouths if it comes to that.

_eht 7y ago
I’ve seen this Futurama episode...
mktmkr 7y ago
Curious what you think is deficient about only having a 401k (and, presumably, Social Security) as a retirement plan. Isn't this the entire sales pitch of Vanguard, that you put a couple of bucks in your 401k every week and then you retire? I'm not personally all-in on IRAs, but it seems like an accepted strategy.
- e40 7y ago
  Presumably their 401k's are not that beefy. That's the way I read the comment.
- yardie 7y ago
  There is an entire class of people who are living paycheck to paycheck. And have a lifetime of part-time, minimum wage work. How much do you think they have in savings and 401k?
  - autoexec 7y ago
    > There is an entire class of people who are living paycheck to paycheck. Like over 75% of all full time workers in America. If you aren't living paycheck to paycheck you're much better off than the vast majority of the nation.
- autoexec 7y ago

FillardMillmore 7y ago

I pessimistically think this problem is only going to get worse as young people today grow older and people/politicians today largely ignore the current problem. In Western cultures, people have become isolated and atomized - by trends such as technology, changing social norms (and family structures), diversification of demographics, and the gradual decline of social structures like religion - as a result, people feel more lonely and feel as if they have less support or purpose. It seems as if people are more genuinely kind in places that are remote and not densely populated. Folks in cities have so many interactions on daily basis and see so many people (some of those people in dire situations, like homeless people or drug addicts) that they seem to become almost numb to it. If you fell on the sidewalk in New York City, how many people would step over you and how many people would offer to help you up and/or see if you're okay? Would this change depending on the age of the person who fell? I have a grandfather who is old enough to remember betting with friends on Nazi battles with the Soviets that were broadcast over the radio (details of the battles and the progression). So much has changed since he was a young man - I imagine it's startling and quite unsettling for older people. The rate of change seems now faster than it's ever been and they certainly can't keep up with it. I've talked with older people that simply feel like for this reason, among many others, they've been left behind and forgotten about. This could be a possible contributor to elderly suicide rates as well.

mjevans 7y ago
It shouldn't be religion. It also shouldn't be hanging out in a bar, or smoking, or some inane stadium event where people don't really mingle. There needs to be a third place# where it's expected to have polite conversation and interactions that can lead to "being social". In smaller communities maybe that's a town square or a park between things, but that just doesn't scale and can't cope with decentralization (which is one of the driving forces behind the tech revolution). I don't really have an answer, but I do know that actual civic planning a re-organizing society so that we actually move towards having more free time and less "work time" will be beneficial to this and many other problems. # https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_place https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_place

totesmaslany 7y ago

MFW I've been suicidal for 4 years (since I was 24)...

logfromblammo 7y ago

Article elides over the fact that in the US, suicide may be the result of rational analysis, including consideration of pros and cons, in response to specific and relevant factors. Particularly economic factors. Looming large is the idea that healthcare costs can burn down an entire lifetime of toil, saving, and planning in a matter of months. Some people would prefer to leave something of value to their survivors, rather than give everything that's left to their last physician, and then be a charity case or family burden for all their remaining days. Gen X and Millennial cohorts are even less secure than Boomers financially as they age, so the problem will only grow worse. If you have a tiny nest egg, and a fixed income, it doesn't take much math to calculate the amount of time one can afford to continue to live, given a certain expense profile. When the choices come down to the number of additional weeks you can eke out by switching from Spam to store-brand cat food, it may also become attractive to look into eating a nice steak dinner, saving the last big chunk of meat to be aspirated, so your survivors don't know, for certain, that you committed suicide. If you were staring down the barrel of a life where nothing joyful or worthwhile will ever happen to you again, and every day will be slightly worse than the last, and is marked only by the angle of the shadows and the color of the pills, with no hope of reversal, I can't reasonably argue against suicide. In that sense, denying the methods and opportunities for suicide without addressing the root causes of motive, as the facility is paid for every day the person lives, seems a bit like torture for profit. I have personally changed domicile cities four times in my career, looking for gainful employment, and each time I came away with fewer people that would even notice if I die this evening. I expect that my children will soon leave me, hopefully to find work that allows them to support themselves, and if I don't die first, I will one day lose my spouse as well. I see no way to avoid this. I can't afford now to worry about whether I will be lonely later. My lack of lifetime financial security has translated into a smaller social support network of friends, and has definitely resulted in choosing to have fewer children. And it has reduced the amount of time I can spend renewing family relationships. My parents see less of me when I am 400 miles away than they did when I was 150 miles away. I'm certainly not alleviating their loneliness. If either committed suicide, I'm not certain how I would even find out about it.

davidjnelson 7y ago
Would zoom calls help with long distance relationships like this?

DanBC 7y ago

> while adults 85 and older, regardless of gender, are the second most likely age group to die from suicide. The rate is high, but the actual numbers are very low, because there aren't many people over the age of 85. https://imgur.com/a/iktpfjS https://imgur.com/a/iktpfjS This is an ongoing tragedy, but not because the rate is high. It's because suicide is mostly preventable, and many of these people will be in closer contact with health care providers. It seems like there are years and years where action could be taken. I can't speak to the US's approach to suicide prevention (other than to say it appears mostly incoherent from outside) but they should be paying some attention to depression, social isolation, and suicidal thinking in older people, and I'd be surprised if this was absent from the strategies. But they will be putting it in context: not many people over the age of 85 die by suicide. Thousands and thousands of people between the ages of 25 - 50 die by suicide. So, from what I can tell over the age of 80 there were about 2500 deaths by suicide in 2017. For the ages 45-49 it was over 4000 people. For 50-54 it was over 4000 people. And for 55-59 it was nearly 4500 people. https://imgur.com/a/iktpfjS https://imgur.com/a/iktpfjS One of the problems with suicide articles being posted to HN is that most people here have no idea how suicide is defined across the US, nor how it varies by counties and states. I certainly don't, and it makes talking about the data really hard.

andygcook 7y ago

I know promotional posts are annoying and I'm risking downvotes by posting this... but decided it's relevant enough to share a service my older brother built called NanaGram.co that helps with elder loneliness. The product's pretty simple: you SMS in your photos to a phone number and then then once a month they get printed and shipped to your loved ones in the mail. It's honestly a very good way to keep your loved ones updated on your life and deliver some joy to their day. From experience, phone calls with my grandma before she passed away were much more interesting once she started getting regular photos too because we had new topics to talk about each time. Want to be up front that I have no financial incentive to post this and am not involved with the product at all apart from helping to build the initial prototype. Just a proud of younger brother and happy customer.

hestipod 7y ago
Good on your brother for building something with a kind purpose at it's core. We need to use tech more for things like that, and less for things that take data/attention/money just to make someone rich.

qwerty456127 7y ago

Every person should be taught mindfulness in their adolescence or as soon as possible during their later life. People struggling from loneliness because they have never learnt to use their minds the proper way are like people struggling from immobility because they have never learnt to walk.

algaeontoast 7y ago

Honestly, if I pass a certain age and my mental or physical faculties start to go, I'd rather opt for some form of suicide than suffering myself or making my family pay to watch...

jibla 7y ago

An interesting and inspiring case in Switzerland -http://politicindia.com/news-details.php?newsid=1059 http://politicindia.com/news-details.php?newsid=1059 They've introduced a novel banking scheme in which retired care volunteers “deposit” hours worked looking after elderly people. In return they can use any time saved up for their own care provision later in life.