In the dark abyss of life, suicide sometimes beckons

Dear nephew Milambo

GREETINGS from this land where life is too fast and people are becoming dishonest by the day.

I hope that by the grace of Limatunda you and your family are doing okay and all the people in my beloved Ukumbisiganga.

Here in the city, things are not bad my son, I can say that we are in good health and for once enjoying a perfect weather.

Your aunt sends her warm greetings to you and your family and she told me to apologise to you once again because she did not come to Tabora as she had promised and I had to remind her once again that it was not her fault.

I don’t know why she wants to take the blame while she knows that it is her office which cancelled the event they were going to host there.

But she says that because we are slowly approaching end of the year, she will make her personal effort of coming there before December, because as she told me, she misses that daughter of yours very much.

Just the other day I was talking to your cousin Yassin, and he told me that he is planning to come to Tanzania in December.

I don’t know who bewitched that boy of mine, because in the course of conversation, I learned that he is still unemployed and he depends on what his mother sends him every month.

I have told him time and time again that if he thinks that life in the US is tough for him, he should just come back and engage in other activities, but that boy never listens.

And I am also sure that he fears coming home because he will not have access to his drugs that he loves to take with his white wife.

I really pity my grandson, because being raised by two drug addicts will definitely leave a negative footprint in the life of that poor boy and I will not be surprised if he also starts taking drugs at a very young age.

I have practically begged him all these years to bring the boy so that we can raise him up for him, but he refuses, even after his mother pleaded with him.

I just hope and pray to Liwelelo and the ancestors to protect that boy, because after everything has been said and done, he is still a Nyamwezi, with the blood of Chief Mirambo flowing through his veins.

My dear son, a few days ago I sat at that local bar near our place, where you love to play pool and I was talking to a certain fellow called Robert, who is a regular patron.

This chap was telling me about the challenges he was going through and I have to admit that there are people who really endure tough times, because apart from losing his multimillion shilling business, his wife of 22 years eloped with a bodaboda guy.

What made me start talking to him was because I watched him as he sat forlornly at a corner table, downing hard liquor as if it was water, while all the while talking to himself.

Because I was familiar to him, I approached his table and asked him whether I can join him and he looked at me as if I was a total stranger, before his mind finally registered and he motioned me to sit.

I asked him if he was okay and it was as if I had opened a floodgate, because his story came tumbling out.

He told me that after he was swindled of his business, he found out that his wife was having an affair with a bodaboda guy and when he went to confront her, he met a note telling him that she had left town with her new lover, never to return.

He said that as he was still reeling from the shock of losing his wife to a younger fellow, he discovered that his only son was gay.

My dear boy, at first I did not know what to tell the fellow, because I could just imagine the mental anguish he was going through, because he practically looked depressed.

I finally convinced him to take it easy and go home to rest and he left that place staggering like a headless chicken and everyone was concerned whether he would reach home safely.

You will not believe it my dear nephew, but yesterday morning I received a call telling me that Robert had committed suicide and I was really devastated my dear boy.

I was told that he woke up very early in the morning, entered his car and drove to town, where he went to the building which used to house his offices, went to the top floor, which was the 24^th floor, opened a window and jumped out, just like that.

The idea that someone is feeling suicidal and wants to end their life can be a very confronting and difficult concept for many people my son and having talked to the fellow, I knew what he was going through.

It can be very hard to understand why someone has reached the point where they are considering ending their life, but from my limited knowledge, just like Robert, I think people who contemplate suicide are experiencing intense emotional pain and may view suicide as a way to end this pain.

In the case of Robert, the fellow was contending with several stressful life events or circumstances at once, where his thoughts and emotions connected to these experiences became overwhelming for him.

The common link among people who kill themselves my son is the belief that suicide is the only solution to a set of overwhelming feelings. The attraction of suicide is that it will finally end these unbearable feelings.

But the tragedy of suicide is that intense emotional distress often blinds people to alternative solutions… yet other solutions are almost always available.

Anyway, that is life my dear boy, I believe we all differ when it comes to mental strength, although sometimes the pressure might become too much.

They will bury the chap tomorrow and I am planning to attend the funeral, because somehow I think I failed to read the signs and stop the fellow from ending his life.