Do you feel like death is a taboo topic to discuss?

In the same week there was a Steven Nolan Podcast on his late night 5 live show where it had people ringing in about losing a parent. I think it was the weekend before last, but i think youd find that a good listen.

If you talk about it early then it gets it out of the way and you know people dont have the burden when that time arrives of worrying what to do.

Not really your place to comment then is it?
It’s very taboo to talk about death in the MH community, as it can be triggering. On here comments get removed if you talk about it, elsewhere you’re meant to provide a trigger warning and you can get hurled with abuse even if you do. Generally it’s not accepted if you’re having suicidal thoughts to talk about them to anyone other than to a professional (which takes months of waiting list to get an appointment). Wouldn’t be surprised if this post isn’t allowed since I said the S word.

Yeah, I was brought up to see it that way. My Granddad had (and consequently my Dad has) this conviction that you should do what you want today 'cos ye might be dead t'morra, son'. I think like that most of the time and it means that I'm prepared to get off my arse and go get things. Not out of fear of death, but because of the pragmatic recognition that it always lurks.

Posts talking about suicide should not be on this website. This website attracts young, impressionable people and the readership therefore is especially vulnerable to being influenced by suicidal talk and ideation. I don't think it is quite helpful to conflate aversion to suicidal talk with an aversion to talk of death. OP seems to be talking about the latter, specifically.

I might not engage with MH content as much as you, or have as much as a fixation as you, but it does not mean you are uniquely qualified to comment. Listen to what people have to say and then try to dismiss it; don't get so uppity about it and think your word of disagreement is sufficiently authoritative to dismiss people's opinions. I am not having a go; just think it might be more helpful in the future.



Yep, it's the very reason we have memento mori and death (and death personified) appears so prominently in art. It is natural to be aware of your own mortality and it is not natural to attempt dispel this truth while living the fantasy that you're God. I remember when I was a kid I was terrified of death, but it was simply because I would allow the thought of thinking about it alone do damage. As in, knowing that the thought of death was about to enter my mind would terrify me, and I would shut it down. Of course it would return. When I allowed myself to think about the specifics of what it is, it became a rather mundane rather than a terrifying thought.

I remember a pal saying to me that death allowed him to escape his anxieties about university and life. Suppose you're fixated on the idea you might fail X exam and you cannot get over this fear, it is soothing to know that 100 years from now or 1000 years from now that event you're struggling with will not even be remembered. The Universe does not care; the people around you will be gone and they will not care. Your problem is fleeting and insignificant.

Posts talking about suicide should not be on this website. This website attracts young, impressionable people and the readership therefore is especially vulnerable to being influenced by suicidal talk and ideation. I don't think it is quite helpful to conflate aversion to suicidal talk with an aversion to talk of death. OP seems to be talking about the latter, specifically.

I might not engage with MH content as much as you, or have as much as a fixation as you, but it does not mean you are uniquely qualified to comment. Listen to what people have to say and then try to dismiss it; don't get so uppity about it and think your word of disagreement is sufficiently authoritative to dismiss people's opinions. I am not having a go; just think it might be more helpful in the future.



Yep, it's the very reason we have memento mori and death (and death personified) appears so prominently in art. It is natural to be aware of your own mortality and it is not natural to attempt dispel this truth while living the fantasy that you're God. I remember when I was a kid I was terrified of death, but it was simply because I would allow the thought of thinking about it alone do damage. As in, knowing that the thought of death was about to enter my mind would terrify me, and I would shut it down. Of course it would return. When I allowed myself to think about the specifics of what it is, it became a rather mundane rather than a terrifying thought.

I remember a pal saying to me that death allowed him to escape his anxieties about university and life. Suppose you're fixated on the idea you might fail X exam and you cannot get over this fear, it is soothing to know that 100 years from now or 1000 years from now that event you're struggling with will not even be remembered. The Universe does not care; the people around you will be gone and they will not care. Your problem is fleeting and insignificant.

I do think that is true, i used to get upset that i was being 'censored' as such but i understand now why it's not allowed. It doesn't make for a very pleasant environment and if you come on here for escapism as sort it isn't nice to be reminded. Noone can really help you with that either on here as supportive as people are cos they aren't physically there in that moment. Is better to talk to inrl people if you need immediate help such as that imho

Totally agree that TSR isn’t the place for people with sever mental illness to look for support, didn’t meant for my comments to come across that way! I just feel that in society and all mainstream media, there isn’t anywhere to talk about it. There are only very negative places where it’s okay to talk about that only make it worse. As a teenager with suicidal thoughts, you don’t feel like you can talk to family or friends, you’re scared to go to the doctors, and either they suffer in silence or follow through on those thoughts. I can’t help but feel if people were more open to talking about suicide/death that maybe people would be more likely to ask for help. God knows i’ve needed it.

Oh no dont worry was just adding is all i understand totally where you are coming from (hence the rep ) it can feel really lonely and even now on certain helplines there is an element of censoring so it feels like i can never say what i need to so i get that frustration. Agree with that, i dont approach my parent about it cos i have no idea how they would react and it feels not appropriate some how so it would be helpful to have some other place (other than samaritans cos they really need to have a web chat at this point cos people with anxiety cant phone very easily). Tbh if i ever got 'better' myself and had enough money i would love to set up some specialist charity just for those sorts of thoughts
stay safe

I was brought up in a Sufi household and death was always talked about in a positive light. It is seen as finally being able to meet the creator and gain spiritual peace and harmony.

I think today it has become a taboo subject compared to the past because of how much knowledge we have about mental health. With suicide rates rising across the world, it is not surprising that death is a difficult subject for people to talk about.

I suffered from depression and reading posts about death would certainly introduce more negative thoughts into my head.

I don't think the subject should be taboo but I think it is important to keep in mind that there are suicidal people who could be affected by what you say.

I think so , for sure. I’m doing my masters on healthcare ethics and law , so there’s a LOT of talking about death ... my lecture just today was about assisted dying !
I think we could defiantly benefit from being more open and talking about it , especially in terms of organ donation and medical research participation, talking and educating on the subject could be really beneficial to society as a whole....many simply do not think about what will happen when we die.

Also, the stigma attached to mental health (especially in males) can’t help can it ... I saw a newspaper report about some of the blokes in ‘I’m a celebrity’, a lot of them were emotional and cried and the headline was something like ‘blubfest’ and it was very belittling.

I also remember when Chelsea lost the champions league final and some of the players were crying and they got so much stick !!!! It’s not really hard to see why the suicide rate in males is so high , if they are stigmatised for expressing emotion .

Gladly though , we see more of it in recent times , The importance of talking. Rio Ferdinand for example , was talking on Thismorning about his bereavement and his main message was don’t bottle it up... hopefully we are moving in the right direction eh!

Liverpool have made me cry more than once!

Mental health in general has had more campaigns about speaking about it and I recently watched a radio interview with Martin Lewis talking about the death of his mother but personally I still feel it's a bit of a tabbo for some people. How do you feel?

Mental health in general has had more campaigns about speaking about it and I recently watched a radio interview with Martin Lewis talking about the death of his mother but personally I still feel it's a bit of a tabbo for some people. How do you feel?

First up, I wasn’t talking exclusively about this website, I was talking about social media/life in general. Nothing in the OP indicated to me that they were asking about a taboo on TSR.

Pretending suicide doesn’t exist and not talking about it at all, especially to mentally ill teens, is a huge mistake imo. Too many teenagers are committing suicide without anyone even realising they were suicidal. Feeling suicidal as a teenager is extremely isolating and difficult to talk about. Even more so when there isn’t a space to talk about those urges.

I’m not “fixated” on MH, it’s a big part of my life and what happens in the community effects me and some friends that I care about. I never claimed to be “uniquely qualified to comment”, I just don’t think someone who doesn’t ”spend much time interacting with MH content” is in a position to comment on whether anything is taboo or not in that community. If you have any reasoning to back up your claim that death isn’t a taboo topic in the MH community then i’m all ears.

I could comment that “I think there isn’t an issue of homophobia in football” because i’ve never heard anything about it, but really I have no place to comment on it since I don’t know anything about football other than what I hear guys talk about at work. There could be a huge amount of homophobia in football that I have never heard about because I don’t follow football. Does that make sense? I wasn’t trying to dismiss your opinion, I just don’t see why you have it if you say you don’t know much about the thing you’re commenting on.

I definitely feel in British society, death is a taboo subject. it's not something we like to discuss, nor do we know how to handle. By this, I mean we fail to provide some emotional support to neighbours for example who have lost a member of their family; instead of offering a cup of tea and a open arm for support, we shy away in fear of offending them. We often say "there are no words to describe this"- that's not out of shock of a person's death, that's literally because we are so awkward about it that we literally don't have anything to say.

How do we change this? I don't feel teaching this to kids is mentally helpful in our schools. Instead this requires, as you've alluded to, more celeb support on this matter- martin lewis, the sky sports presenter who lost his wife, prince william etc.

I think some age appropriate information on death to children wouldn't do harm like any difficult life topic with children, the first mention of death to me was when my dad had died (I was 9 at the time) and I don't think it should necessarily be that way or at least perhaps some training for teachers in how to approach it as none of mine in my time at school really knew how to so I stopped telling them and talked my way round it.
Celebrity campaigns are definetly a step in the right direction.