Recently someone wrote a post on our discussions boards saying they were considering suicide over a $22,000 medical debt. The members of the board immediately rushed to comfort the poster and offered advice and encouragement. Are you feeling this way about your own finances due to job lost or massive debt? If you do feel this way, you need to seek immediate professional help.
Remember the suicide of Rene-Thierry Magon de la Villehuchet, the French aristocrat who lost more than a billion dollars through the Madoff scandal? Sure, that’s more money than I can imagine, but I still don’t think it’s worth killing yourself over. There were many victims of Madoff’s Ponzi scheme and most did not commit suicide. What causes someone to get to this kind of breaking point?
I contacted Dr. Robert Williams, a psychiatrist in Phoenix, Arizona and asked him what would drive people to this kind of extreme? He explained that it’s not just the events in a person’s life that cause this kind of behavior; physical characteristics of brain structure play an equally large role.
Emotional stability is a manifestation of a physical part of the brain, the cerebral cortex. Some studies have suggested a relationship between depression and the thinning of the cerebral cortex. The cerebral cortex is the region of the brain centrally involved in reasoning, planning and mood, and thinning of the cortex may affect an individual’s ability to pay attention to and interpret social and emotional cues. Everyone has different levels of emotional stability, and and it may be due to this physical characteristic.
Dr. Williams also said that another physical part of the brain which could play a part in suicide is the limbic system, commonly known as the primitive brain, which triggers the “flight or fight” mechanism. This part of the brain is involved in setting a person’s emotional tone. When the deep limbic system is less active there is generally a positive, more hopeful state of mind. When it is heated up, or overactive, negativity can take over. If the limbic system is over stimulated by threats to financial survival, the combination of this heightened negativity and a thin cerebral cortex can lead a person to experience a sense of hopelessness and begin having suicidal thoughts. Of course, not everyone who has suicidal thoughts will follow through with them, but you can’t be too careful.
What to do if you or someone you know are stressed to the limit or has suicidal thoughts? Here are some things that will help:
- Get help immediately! If you can’t afford a counselor, there are many free services available. You could also try a religious organization – they usually have support groups or advisement available.
- Get a family or friend ot stay with you until the thoughts of suicide or stress has passed.
- It’s hard to stay positive at times like this, but tell yourself that this, too, shall pass. In my experience with credit and debt counseling over the years, things eventually turn around for the better for everyone in the end. Really.
- Exercise is highly beneficial and can help sweep out the hormones flooding your body from your limbic system.
- Dr. Williams advises people having suicidal thoughts to tell themselves that that their thoughts are not real, they are a manifestation of what’s physically going on in their brains. Human brains are not wired for self-destruction. Evolution has developed our brains for for procreation and survival. Suicidal is an indication that there could be something medically wrong.
- Avoid the guilt and shame self-talk, which is only going to make you feel worse. In this economy you’re not alone. It happens to the best of us, so don’t beat yourself up.
Having gone through extreme financial distress myself, come out of the tunnel of debt and gone through the long rebuild process myself, I can tell all of you out there who are stretched to the limit, there is always hope. And our poster? He’s taking action on his debt and seems to be doing just fine.
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Great information. It is much needed in this situation that we are going through. I’ve been broke and bankrupt and had these feelings myself. I just refuse to let a slimy credit card company take my life from me. Keep your chin up. You will be fine.
How sad that as a society, many of us have let the banks, credit card companies and Fair Issac determine whether we are “okay” or not and whether our life is worth living or not. Flawless credit is not the be all to end all….. so someone has a $22,000 medical bill that he cannot pay….. That’s okay. I use this technique when facing a problem that seems like it could do me in – try it: Think about, “What’s the WORST thing that could happen if I don’t pay this bill?” Okay, so it goes to a collection agency. So what? Use Kristy’s advice on how to dispute the account with the CA and work like mad to get it off your credit report. But what if I can’t get it off my credit report? Again, so what? So your FICO score takes a hit – just maintain good payment history with your other creditors and in a year or two, that collection agency line item will matter very little in your overall FICO score. In a couple of more years, the statute of limitations will be up and it will be uncollectible, and in 7 years, the collection account will be gone altogether. So the worst would be you are stuck with a collection account entry on your report for the next 7 years. Big deal. That is definitely NOT worth considering suicide over – it’s only 7 years – TOPS. Even if the CA took you to court and won a judgment against you, just educate yourself about how to protect your bank account and income against them trying to attach anything to collect their judgment. A large part of your income and assets are exempt from attachment anyway. I’ve had judgments against me in the past, and believe me, the judgment creditor never collected a dime because I protected everything. Or you could file chapter 7, wipe out the judgment altogether, and then work like crazy to rebuild your credit after BK. Again, for about 2 years you’ll be persona non grata in banks’ and credit card issuers’ eyes, but so what? About 2 years. And all that is only if the collection agency even went to court….since the $22,000 debt is beyond the small claims amount, they may not even file because regular civil court gets expensive for them, especially if they suspect you are judgment/collection-proof.
Just hang in there – the worst that can happen usually won’t, and in a few years you’ll be past this. It’s just a small blip on the screen. The other posters are all so right – this, too, will pass. No money problem is ever worth ending your life over. That’s just the crap that the financial industry wants you to believe…. don’t listen to the noise. Live your life, focus on what is good in your life and don’t worry about the medical bill. It’s only a temporary setback, and learn to work around it. I did.
Hope this helps put it all in perspective.
Yeah, but sometimes it’s the grinding away these filthy debt collectors engage in. We’re currently being harrassed by NCO Financial for a debt that was paid in full 18 years ago and they disregard cease communications and validation letters and keep grinding away and bullying and I have seriously taken out my gun and thought it’s either them or me and it’s a lot easier for it to be me.
I don’t even owe this money, it was only ever about two hundred bucks, which I’ve easily spent in postage the last several weeks, but I find myself thinking I just don’t want to live in this crap world where the courts and lawyers and government agencies aid and abet these vermin in their thievery of the innocent.
It feels like rape over and over and over again.
The attorney generals of the states involved don’t care, the FTC doesn’t care — no one cares. And then you look at the campaign contributions records for various involved politicians and they’re all taking money from NCO, and you think you’re just zero to anyone in this world.
It’s rape. NCO is scum, the AG of PA is scum,
Ed Rendell is scum — they’re all in bed together laughing their asses off at innocent people who are being threatened and harrassed and essentially held up by these thugs.
These guys are the same as the hooded, faceless scum who hang out in dark parking lots looking for victims to rob, rape and murder. The only difference is instead of using a knife or a gun, they use the corrupt politicians and the corrupt courts and the general laziness and incompetence of the government as their weapons of choice.
Why would anyone want to live in such a world? If you’re a good person, you’re screwed. Evil is beginning to win more and more.