One day changes a whole life. Since then, nothing can be taken for granted. Maybe you’re looking for answers and can’t find any. Maybe you’re tired of thinking and still can’t stop pondering. Maybe you carry guilt around with you, although no one could tell you what you are supposed to be guilty of. Maybe you feel a shame for which there is no reasonable reason and which is still there every day. Perhaps you are surrounded by people and at the same time feel more alone than ever.
I offer accompaniment for people who have lost another person to suicide. Partners, children, parents, siblings, friends, work colleagues, neighbours, but also rescue workers, police officers, train drivers or people who happened to be there. Everyone experiences something different, and yet many have the same feeling: to suddenly stand outside the world.
I don’t know how your pain feels, and I’ll never claim that I could either. Every story is different, every person mourns differently. What I can tell you is something else: I know this path from within.
I know how it can feel when the head stops working properly, when sleep is barely possible and when you somehow get through the next day without knowing how. I know how lonely it can get when other people don’t know how to deal with suicide. And I know that sometimes you don’t need hope, but first a person who stays. Who makes nothing smaller. He does not explain anything that cannot be explained. Who endures with you what seems unbearable right now.
This is exactly what I want to offer you: a place where you don’t have to do anything, where you don’t have to be strong or function, where all feelings can have room, even those that contradict each other, even those for which there are no words yet. Maybe we'll talk. Maybe we just sit there for a while. Perhaps together we sort out the chaos that seems unmanageable right now. And perhaps it is enough for today not to know at all how to proceed. That too is acceptable.
This accompaniment can suit you if you have lost a person to suicide, no matter how long ago that was and in what relationship you were with each other. You don’t have to know what you want to say beforehand. You don't have to sort your thoughts. You also don’t have to decide if you’re "ready." You can just come as you can. What matters is not a certain time, but that you feel that you need someone to go with you.
There is one sentence that has accompanied me for many years: I want to be the person I would have wanted at that time. Not because I have answers to everything, but because I have learned how much it can mean if a person stays, listens and asks nothing of one.
I myself lost a person to suicide. And I can tell you something else that I care about. Today I am back in life with both legs. I laugh again. I am happy about small things. I have an everyday life that wears. One did not replace the other, it is not the case that the pain disappeared and the joy came for it. Both are there, side by side, sometimes even at the same moment. I became a different person over the years, not because I wanted it that way, there was nothing else left for me. I’ve walked this path alone for a long time, and I know how lonely and exhausting it can be. You don't have to carry this alone. And over time, something can change, so you can live with it.
I’m not telling you this so you think it has to be the same with you. Your path is yours. But I tell you because I want you to know: There are people who have gone this way and can live again today. Not even though the loss was there, but with him.
I accompany you in my practice in Weilheim or online if the way is too far or it feels safer for you at the moment.
