Last week we introduced ourselves to why people commit suicide. This week we shall round up by discussing African traditional rites, research in United Kingdom, age and sex as they relate to suicide.
What are the traditional rites after suicide?
• In Old Bende Division of Abia State, traditional reactions to suicide are almost the same. In my home town Igbere, as well as others like Ohafia, Arochuku, Abiriba, Item, Nkporo, Alayi, Ugwueke, Uzuakoli etc etc – some traditionalists insist that a suicide victim must not be touched, until reparation are made for the propitiation(appeasement) of the land.
• In my area a bizarre thing happened recently. A colleague – a retired Permanent Secretary committed suicide. He was a knight of the Catholic church. Hell was let loose. The traditionalists in his village insisted that his body would not be touched until the land had been appeased. His corpse which was discovered two days after his death was already undergoing rigor mortis, They insisted that the land must be propitiated before he could be buried. It took the intervention of  the Catholic Archbishop before truce could be brokered. Which was ‘ give Caesar what belongs to Caesar and God what belongs to God. The traditionalists did their appeasement and the Church buried their dead, in this 21st century.
• Think back, it was deja vu again. As happened in “Things Fall Apart” by Chinua Achebe – when Okonkwo committed suicide and his body was dangling on a tree. Obierika(Okonkwo’s friend) told the white man(District Commissioner) – ‘Perhaps your men can help us bring him down and bury him, we have sent for strangers from another village to do it for us, but they may be long in coming’. ‘Why can’t you take him down yourselves? ‘, the the District Commissioner asked. ‘It is against our custom’, said one of them.
• ‘It is an abomination for a man to take his own life. It is an offence against the Earth, and a man who commits it will not be buried by his clans men. His body is evil, and only strangers may touch it. That is why we ask your people to bring him down, because you are strangers?’
• ‘Will you bury him like any other man?’ asked the District Commissioner. Obierika replied – ‘we cannot bury him. Only strangers can. We shall pay your men to do it. When he has been buried we will do our duty by him. We shall make sacrifices to cleanse the desecrated land’. This tradition is applicable in all Nigeria villages with little variations.
What is the suicide rate, sex wise in U. K.?
¤ On Easter Monday – April 17, 2017. CNN reported the research conducted in United Kingdom by a Professor of Mental Health – which stated that in 2016, 78% of suicide was committed by men and only 22% by women. When asked ‘why?’, he said men were less likely to seek help or discuss their emotional issues than women. Which means men bottle-up their emotions, and subsequently blow themselves up metaphorically speaking by committing suicide. Men why?
¤ This study came up while they were discussing Prince Harry’s mental status, and trauma when her mother Princess Diana died. If you recall, Prince Harry was only 12-years-old when his mother Princess Diana  died, on that Easter Sunday Harry gave an interview stating ‘at 12, I could not mentally process my mother’s death till I was about 20’. That meant, he bottled-up, his mental agony of bereavement for 8 years.
¤ Harry was however lucky, that a wise Nanny of his, surreptitiously took him for a quiet and private counseling. At a less endowed family, this type of catastrophic and fatal bereavement at such tender age, could be a time-bomb for future mental derangement  and probably suicide.
¤ The Professor of Mental Health said they are now using Prince Harry’s experience as a case study, to analyze our youth, that is to study how Harry was able at such tender age, to survive the mind-bogging death of his mother through a fatal car crash.
Sex and suicide
Successful suicide, ironically, is a male achievement. Today, and historically men are thrice as likely to kill themselves as women. Example, United Kingdom where it is even quadrupled ; 78%-male and 22%-female.
Age and suicide.
In some societies – such as Imperial China and Africa, suicide among the old was very rare, because the old were revered. Compared to the West, where they callously bundle their “oldies” to the old-peoples-home like logs of wood, where they remain till they kick the bucket.
Now in most cultures, the likelihood of suicide grows with age. Suicide is rare in children. Then from 15 to 25 age-group, suicide suddenly leaps to prominence as the 4th main cause of death in most countries – this is because there is no much else except road accidents they could die from. The exception is among the students, where the suicide rate is genuinely high. Thereafter suicide rate rises steadily.
What is our take this week?
Whatever you do, there must be something you can live for, so no matter your condition or your situation, just note that it will be be better, because it could have been worse and then trudge on.

Related News

► Please follow me on twitter ; @ _DRSUN.