I know a lot of us have our hands full just trying to take care of our own mental health here in Japan, but staying involved and connected with your friends and loved ones back home could be saving their lives.
In my case I was too focused on myself with work, studying for the N1, going to the gym, trying to start a business, and building a relationship with my fiancé, that I didn’t respond to the numerous signs that presented themselves, and I now I have to live with this pain and regret for the rest of my life.
We are a low income family and don’t even have enough money to cover the expenses of his funeral so we are currently forced to fundraise over social media.
I really don’t want this to happen to anyone else, so I’d like to share a bit of my experience with you all. If this ends saving even one life, it would mean a lot to me.
​
(1) Visit your family and friends every now and then.
I didn’t. I’ve been in Japan for 4 years and haven’t gone back home even once. My brother and I always got along really well in person, but never as much when we were apart, and that’s probably the case with most relationships. Distance slowly kills relationships, even between family. I lived in Hong Kong from 2012 to 2016 and visited my brother only once in 2014. We had a good time hanging out and catching up but we weren’t as close as we used to be since we haven’t been involved in each other’s lives. Seeing each other’s social media doesn’t count as involved. I could say he didn’t hit me up that much either, but that passiveness was just hardwired in his personality, and it used to be part of mine too until a loved one died because of it.
​
(2) Have actual conversations on the phone and video chats as opposed to texting and liking social media all the time.
Even between two men. Don’t be like me and call your brother only once or twice a year and assume that men aren’t supposed to talk about their feelings and that it’s every man for themselves.
​
(3) Follow and pay attention to what your loved ones say on social media.
I followed my brother on Facebook and Instagram social media but I found out after he had passed away that was much more active on Twitter, which I didn’t use. A few weeks before he passed away, on Twitter he said “I guess I’m a retired smasher. Mentally I’m just not all there.” For over 10 years he worked his way up to being a high level sponsored SoCal Smash 4 and Smash Ultimate player respected by players nationwide. It was the most important thing in his life. If I saw him trying to quit his life’s passion, I certainly would have had a very serious talk with him.
​
(4) Do long-distance activities together sometimes.
Even between men. Play online games together while on the phone. Share your thoughts about the newest weekly episode of One Piece or some TV series. Talk about sports matches. Do body weight exercises together over the phone. You gotta be a little creative, but I had really fun times doing these long-distance activities with my friends and my brother.
​
(5) Getting quiet, stoic, introverted, and independent personality types to open up.
I can only say this only from the experience of talking to my brother, but I’ll say opening up about yourself first and talking with as non-judgmental a tone as possible will go a long way.
My brother never talked about his problems even though you could hear it in his voice or see it in his face. We’ve only ever had one really deep conversation with each other, just before I left for Japan in 2019. He had just gotten turned down for a job at my company for leaving the waiting room briefly due to his anxiety without informing anyone. I talked to my boss after and he said he wouldn’t hire anyone who leaves like that without saying anything. My brother was really evasive when I tried to talk to him about it and I could see that the more questions I asked, the more he got pissed. However, when I began to open up my own similar shortcomings, such being fired on the first day for being not being able to collect any donations (canvassing job), when I became the center of ridicule at a former company of mine for just asking a female co-worker out for lunch, how I cried for an hour straight in front of my emotionally abusive ex-girlfriend due to hearing her snarky remarks for 4 years, he started crying and eventually opened up about a few of his own failures, fears, and insecurities. I told him it’s ok to fail, it’s ok to be scared, and it’s ok to talk about this stuff. You aren’t weak for it. I’m not going to judge you. You aren’t alone. All men have these shortcomings and sharing and learning from these war stories is how you level up in life. Seemed like that was the first time he ever had that sort of conversation with anyone. For once I felt like I did something right as his older brother.
​
(6) A friend or loved one deleting their YouTube and other large collection of hard work.
My brother had 2K subscribers commentating about Smash Bros and doing tutorial videos. I know from personal experience of trying to start one that YouTube is extremely difficult to succeed in. Taking a break, I get, but deleting a bunch of hard work like that is huge red flag and I had no idea he had deleted until I found out on Twitter after he passed away.
​
(7) Sudden weight loss/gain.
For most of his life he was about 150lbs until about the last couple years of his life where he maxed out at 225lbs. It was really uncomfortable to see him become that heavy, and I didn’t pay attention to the implications behind it.
​
(8) Prior suicide attempts.
I found out after he passed away that he attempted suicide before. I certainly would have known this if I had been involved more with my friends and family back home. Obviously a serious red flag.
​
There’s a lot more I could talk about but I’ll stop here. If anyone has any questions, feel free to ask and I’ll provide more information.
Be involved. Stay connected. Don’t delay. Make the first move. Make some meaningful calls. Do video chats. Make visits. Even between two men.
32 comments
I’m sorry for your loss, and you must know that it wasn’t your fault, don’t beat yourself up for not noticing any signs. Some things just happen and we have no control over the outcome, as much as we’d like to think otherwise and try to work backwards from it.
I’m very sorry for your loss.
I’m sorry for the loss of your brother. What happened is not your fault.
If you find yourself in need of support, you can use Skype to call any US toll free number for no cost. There are a lot of support groups out there with toll free numbers.
[removed]
So sorry for your loss.
my condolence
Thanks, I don’t have any blood brothers but I have cousins and friends who are like brothers to me, I’ll make sure to check in on them more often.
Obviously, you suffered a heartbreaking loss, I’m tearing up rn thinking about that happening to me. Hopefully your brother is resting easy wherever he is rn.
I’m so sorry this happened to you. The loss of a loved one is devastating, especially before their time. It’s always easy to focus on what we could have done in hindsight. But I wish I could give you a hug.
Thank you for laying your thoughts out for others. I think it’s something everyone could take to heart. My condolences for your loss.
Truth my brother called me two years ago freaking out because his wife was hurting herself in order to get him into trouble. I managed to record the whole conversation because he never put the phone down while they were arguing and of course I recorded her admitting that she was doing it to herself.
I sent him the voice file and he was able to avoid jail.
A big FU to the people who thought I slammed my nonexistent wife into the wall and lying about it to avoid jail time. Especially since I obviously can teleport from Japan to America, I ought to start charging
I’m very sorry for your loss.
Your tips are beautiful and really important for many people, especially men to hear. Make sure you take care of yourself, and remember that grief is not linear.
I’m sorry for your loss. Forgive yourself for something you didn’t see coming and are not responsible for, it sadly was your brother’s choice that he made and I hope that eventually you and your family can make peace with that. Sending you strength.
Very sorry for your loss. I hope you have people around who can support you under these circumstances.
A few years ago my brother was stabbed while at work. He survived, but the perpetrator was never found. His mental health has been very up and down since then, with triggers. Being so far away has been awful at times, but managed to keep an avenue of communication open if he needs to contact me.
You can only be there for someone so much, though. And if you’re not healthy yourself, supporting someone else is even more difficult. Keep good people around, don’t punish yourself and take good care of your mental and physical health. Sometimes easier said than done but absolutely vital.
Disagree. You are not responsible for any other adult. If there’s a choice between them drowning or both of you drowning, pick yourself 100% of the time. I sank many hundreds of hours trying to save my mother from her eventual succumbing to suicidal ideations. In the end, she took her own life and every relationship I had in mine for 3 years. I regret saving her life that first time, and I continually wish I just let her go on that first attempt.
I’m so sorry for your loss. You’re grieving right now so I hope you’ll be kind to yourself while you’re bereaved. Your brain is not in normal mode right now.
None of this is your fault and probably you couldn’t change this if you had known. And that sucks. Please look into grief counseling when you can afford it. Things are going to feel rough for a while.
Sorry for the loss.
And yes I agree with you, when my sister loving in UK had depression after kids birth (twins were born, you can imagine how difficult it was), I almost want to fly there to be with her.
Thank you for sharing this. Undoubtedly your message will help others who read it. I hope you and your family find peace moving forward.
This hit me hard… I have two older brothers about the same age, and they mean the world to me. I’ve been doing alright in calling them up just to chat since I moved here, but it hasn’t been too long. I didn’t get to see my brother for very long before I left the U.S. due to some complexities at home, but I always make sure to check up on him.
OP, I’m truly sorry for your loss. No seriously, words aren’t enough to express how awful this must feel. I’ll take your words to heart as well and do my best.
Or leave them to their own business and live your life. Blood doesn’t not require connection, especially if that connection has no value.
It’s not your fault.
I’m very sorry for your loss, OP. The exact same thing happened to me about 5 years ago. If you ever want someone to vent to, my DMs are open.
It is unfortunate that this happened. Suicide is a dark and lonely place that people venture into for which the living really have no idea what it is like to finish the task. Attempted suicide is not the same as it is often an outreach for help. Seems like multiple times per day someone jumps in front of a train here and the finality of that is chilling. Please try to come to terms with your situation and don’t be too hard on yourself.
I’m so sorry for your loss. I lost a loved one to suicide as well, and I know that there is a tendency to blame oneself. Just know that it is not your fault.
I think your advice is sound and it’s given me a lot to think about. I hope you find peace.
It’s not your fault. I’m currently being held hostage to my brothers feelings against me leaving. He needs to get therapy but decided not to.
You haven’t done anything wrong by moving to Japan, you’re just living your life. Even if you lived at home and he committed suicide, you would still feel like you could have done more.
I’m really sorry to hear about your loss but please don’t blame yourself.
I’m sorry for your loss OP.
You mentioned you guys are fundraising for the funeral. I think everyone here would be OK with you sharing that link in your post and hopefully some of us can help pitch in.
My sincere condolences for both you and your family. I just wanted to point you to a community that also has experience with this kind of loss: r/SuicideBereavement. It’s not the happiest place, but it is filled with kind people who know firsthand the kinds of things you’re going through.
I’m sorry for your loss.
I do try to stay in touch with my family. But it’s hard when we both have different things going on in our lives. I’m not active with my social media, so sometimes I’m very slow in catching up. I would love to visit my family back home but flights are really expensive now so I can’t afford to now. Vice versa my family doesn’t have the time nor money to visit me so all we’re doing is to keep in touch via online.
But this post is a reminder that perhaps I should put more effort.
I’ve gone through this myself. I think your list is good, but I’d caveat that sometimes there’s nothing that the other person(s) can do to prevent someone from taking their own life. I don’t mean this to discourage people from trying to help those in crisis; far from it. We should be there for family, and everything that OP laid out is helpful advice.
I instead mean it as a way to dispel survivor’s guilt, and the sense of failure that people feel when a loved one takes their life. “I should have done more;” “if only I called one more time;” “I should have noticed there was something wrong;” and so on. It’s a terrible thing for survivors to be saddled with and adds to their trauma. Recognizing that sometimes, despite our best efforts, our loved ones will see suicide as the only way out of their pain and willfully choose to leave us is an unfortunate reality of this life.
All that said, call your friends and family. Tell them you love them. Remind them you’re there for them whenever they need. Show them you care and do what you can to help them see the world is brighter with them in it.
Sorry for your loss.
This is good advice. I lost my sister back home to cancer 4 years ago and really regret not having gone back to spend more time with her, or to have called more often, etc. You can easily forget about siblings or take them for granted, but when they are gone you are left with a gaping hole in you – now we can’t visit them, we can’t reminisce about our shared childhood together, our kids won’t ever have cousins back home, we won’t grow old together. Its devastating.
Damndest thing in my case was that I then vowed to start going back more often to see my parents, then just a few months later the pandemic hit and put an end to that. Now we’ve got airfares that are triple what they used to be, making travel (for a family of four in our case) financially almost impossible.
Thanks for sharing and very sorry for your loss.
It’s not your fault, I’m really depressed myself but I can’t blame others, unfortunately everyone has his own shit and life to deal with, and that’s normal.
Sorry for your loss and may him rest in peace.
Very sorry to hear this.
Please take care of yourself as well, and know that what happened is not your fault. I’m sure your brother would tell you the same.
I’m sorry for your loss… Please don’t blame yourself, it is something outside of your control.