“Impulsive” suicide is a silent threat to the youngest

After sharing with his family the traditional birthday cake for having turned 18, Inma left his home in Mexico City and went to the center by Metro. Upon arriving, that young man accustomed to similar walks and who had never had suicidal ideas, suddenly felt the desire to end his life. “I told a couple who was close to me because all he wanted was someone to know; And then I tried, ”he explained in an interview with Telemundo news.

Inma, who is now 33 years old, took a decade to start talking about what happened that day. Today he knows that it was an impulsive suicide attempt: “It was spontaneous, almost like a physical need.” When he regained consciousness, he didn’t know where he was. “It was a totally foreign place. After a couple of days I knew it was a psychiatric hospital. ”

The World Health Organization (WHO) ensures on its website that more than 720,000 people die for suicide every year, placing it as the third cause of death among young people aged 15 and 29. He adds that, for each person who takes his life, there are many who try to do it.

The causes of suicide, adds WHO, “are multifaceted and influenced by social, cultural, biological, psychological and environmental issues present throughout life.” But talking about impulsive suicide usually escapes the detection of causes prior to the event.

The study ‘Characteristics of impulsive suicide attempts and who tries it’, published In the National Library of Medicine, it considers impulsive suicide when only less than five minutes are passed between the decision to commit suicide and the attempt or consummation, without prior planning. A phenomenon that various specialists associate – although not exclusively – with minors and young adults; Many who were never diagnosed with a problem related to mental health.

The lack of diagnosis, they consider several experts, is common when talking about impulsive suicide. A factor that is aggravated in various communities where rooted idiosyncratic aspects minimize or invisible signals – many already difficult to detect – that something can be happening with the affected person.

The newspaper El País de Madrid published on January 3, in its section letters to the director, a short letter entitled ‘The importance of talking about suicide’, in which a woman said that, just over a year ago, her Son had spent the afternoon laughing, eating pizza and joking with her and her best friend; The next day he took his life. He was 14 years old.

“The psychiatrist called him ‘suicide for impulse’,” wrote Beatriz Hidalgo Velasco, mother of Daniel and resident of the municipality of Arroyomolinos in the Community of Madrid. In addition, he added that the specialists who later helped the family told that “these types of suicides were increasing alarmingly,” without apparent signs or sadness. “Silence killed him. If we could know, we would have gotten help. ”

About the difficulty of recognizing the signals

Dr. Christine Moutier, Medical Director for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention (AFSP), coincides in an interview with Telemundo news that it is difficult to recognize signs that warn about the possibility of suicide, coupled with the fact that, when you They present – very slight that can be – there is also the risk of being misunderstood.

“If a child expresses that he is angry, frustrated or sad at home, they often confuse him with bad behavior,” explains the specialist, who points out the need to act in this regard. “We can teach young people to process their negative emotions in a healthy way, instead of repressing or hiding them.”

Although he accepts that more research on impulsive suicide is needed, Dr. Moutier believes that, even in those cases, there are problems that were not previously detected, many times – Coincide – with cultural aspects referring to idiosyncrasy.

Gabriela Vargas arrived in the United States with only 5 years with her family, from her native Zacatecas, Mexico. Wrapped in a conservative and religious environment, getting pregnant at age 18, without being married, it was a hard blow to his own and had to leave his home when he was in the last year of High School.

Vargas, now the founder of the organization National Hispanic Suicide Prevention Network And active volunteer with the AFSP, told Telemundo news that any situation that could affect them were issues that simply at home and in their family nucleus were not spoken. “There was never really a conversation about mental health (…) there was no adult who told me that I had not made a mistake and that life followed,” he explains.

The first time Vargas tried to commit suicide was totally impulsive; I would plan in detail two more over the years. The Mexican who grew up in Illinois remembers that she was with her children, of two and nine years, in a Drive Thru of an Mc’donalds waiting for her food when she decided, while crying inconsolated, that she was going to take her life with the two children. “Mommy, you cry because you are hungry? One of them asked.

The first time Vargas tried to commit suicide was totally impulsive. Then, he tried on two other occasions.

“It was an outburst and told God: ‘Forgive me, but I’m going to take my life with children because no one cares,” he said. So determined that, when his turn came to collect his order, he passed by. It was his son’s voice that reminded him of what he had forgotten and what made her out of the trance. He immediately addressed his uncle Bucho, to whom he asked for help and helped her containing her. “It was an intervention of God who was at home. I always think what would have happened if I hadn’t been. ”

Decide in less than five minutes

Dr. Alexander Crosby, professor and vice president of Community Health and Preventive Medicine at the Morehouse School of Medicine, participated in a study ago more than a decade ago in Harris County (Texas), in which 20% of adolescents and young adults – 15 to 34 years old, who had survived an attempt at suicide – said they had taken less than five minutes to decide to attempt against their life.

Crosby said in a telephone interview with Telemundo news that, due to the very little time available to intervene in impulsive suicide, “you have to emphasize prevention.” The specialist points out that they have to develop, especially in minority communities, “skills to cope with situations and resilience.”

“So, when a person is in a circumstance that can make him think of suicide, he can use the tools that we have given them, especially in adolescence or among young adults,” he says.

A problem that affects young people

A study published in The Journal of the American Medical Associationcalled ‘Youth Suicide and Previous Diagnosis of Mental Health’, points out that of 40,618 young people aged 20 to 24 years and who tried to commit suicide in 2023 in the United States, according to the National System of Notification of Violent Deaths of the Centers for Control and Disease prevention (CDC), 24,192 (59.6%) did not previously have a documented mental health diagnosis.

In addition, it also establishes that these attempts were more likely to happen in a physical and less probable altercation among those who presented some sign of depression, which concluded in the importance of having conversations about the management of negative emotions, as well as about the Risks of firearms, given the ease with which they perceive to be able to access one of them in a short time.

Dr. Ruby Castilla-Puentes, president of Warmi International, a community of mental health and collaborator of the American Psychiatric Association (APA), coincides, in an interview with Telemundo News, that not all suicides have a depressive correlate. “There are people who are not and, nevertheless, try or consume suicide,” he says.

For the specialist, the impulsive suicide “responds to internal or external stimuli (…) without taking into account the consequences, so it is very frequent among young people and adolescents.” The specialist believes that this sector of the population “lacks experiences that allow him to face moments and situations of anguish.”

Castilla-Pentes also states that a lot of research is needed around impulsivity in suicide. And although he says that it is a complex issue, “if it is important to put it on the table, because there are many people who are in this spectrum (…) and, although they are not destined to attempt against their life, you have to be more careful.”

The importance of speaking and listening

Inma says that he never suffered any abuse in his childhood, but there were other factors that he understood today created a fatalistic culture broth that was difficult to detect, in large part because it was not considered that there was a problem. “There was disintegration inside the family, coupled with the fact that I consumed enough alcohol at that time of my life.”

But even after his attempt at impulsive suicide, Inma had to live a very strong stigma. “Now I understand that it was part of my education: these types of situations had to be silenced by grief or because they could affect you in the future,” he said. The man affirms that he took ten years to be able to talk to his mother of all this, “although we had lived.”

Dr. Castilla-Puentes said that it is important to speak and listen to the communities. After participating in a study of digital conversations with Hispanics, the specialist says that, compared to other races and ethnicities, “Latinos definitely do not believe in depression as a disease, but we believe that it is part of life and we must continue; It is important to educate our community in this regard. ”

Vargas would live the suicide of a close friend and a very dear cousin, who took his life with 18 years and without much of the family knowing that he was going through difficult times. These experiences motivated her to specialize and work with her community “because every time I find out that someone took my life I get very sad.”

Survive, he says, helped create a link with his children. “The elder is going to turn 20 and the little boy has 13. The two help me in my training (with the community). We have found a purpose. I feel that I am changing the history of my family and breaking patterns. ”

Inma has also been able to find a purpose after the lived. Now, with 33 years, he is a filmmaker and is co -producing a documentary about the importance of awareness about suicide. On what I would say to the Inma of that time, if I could do it, he answers without hesitation: “Do not shut up, that there was no need to remain silent. And I would give him a big hug. ”

If you or someone you know may be at risk, to the number of the suicide prevention line, which offers free support, And confidential 24 hours a day, seven days a week.