JUVENILE SUICIDE

Children kill themselves by jumping off roofs, out of windows, hanging themselves, and cutting their wrists. They take their own lives, hoping to enter a different happier world where one and all love each other, where schoolteachers to do not give you C’s and D’s, where one never feels lonely and where one does not have to blush noticing others eyeing one’s boots with cracked toe caps, borrowed one’s mother. In our adult eyes their problems are trifling, yet our children are left alone with them and with their fear, humiliation, and what they see as a hopeless situation, with inexplicable and incurable self-pity.

Last winter a 12-year-old pickpocket hanged himself with a vacuum cleaner’s hose in a small town in Ivano-Frankivsk oblast. He had been caught red-handed and the school principal wanted to see his mother. The boy did not want to see her upset. This March two teenagers committed suicide in Khmelnytsky, one after the next with a two-day interval, reports The Day’s Mykhailo VASYLEVSKY .

While a suicide or attempt is registered in virtually every Ukrainian city almost daily, what makes the juvenile suicide statistic especially frightening is the fact of its existence. In 1998, the Derzhkomstat [State Statistics Committee] registered 78 cases of what was termed “suicides or self-inflicted bodily injuries of children aged up to 15.” 1997 shows the same statistic. Compared to the total number of suicides (about 15,000), the juvenile death toll seems insignificant. However, Liudmyla Volonets, head of the Childhood Study Center at the Institute for Social Research, told The Day, “Only cases when no other explanations can be thought up are registered as attempted suicides. Yet among the causes of death the Derzhkomstat also mentions ‘accidents resulting from use of firearms, causing death.’ Here one is hard put to distinguish between an accident and predetermined act. Another, one of the highest death indices, is described as an ‘injury without ascertaining its accidental or predetermined character.’ This formula is used when the investigating officer is not sure. A total of 213 such cases were registered in 1998.”

Among other things, an item formulated as “accidents involving traumas” leaves many questions unanswered. When a child throws himself under an onrushing car, bus, or streetcar, this is invariably recorded as a road accident. Another item is referred to as “other accidents”. No one will explain the difference. Last year saw 222 of them. Stanislav Voloshanivsky, chief expert with Khmelnytsky’s regional labor and employment department, made an attempt to answer this highly sensitive question. He believes that police records never tally with roundup statistics, because a statement made on the scene is always carefully worded, lest one get a dressing-down from superiors. It is hard to explain why the government is scared to bring up the problem of juvenile suicide. Perhaps because it is too painful and because this society, despairing from other hardships, should not be exposed to yet another, even greater shock. Or maybe the government does not know what to offer children as an alternative to what Longfellow described as the great world “on the other side of the red line, behind which is eternal darkness.”

COMMENTARY

Natalia MAKSYMOVA, doctor of psychology and head of the laboratory for socially maladjusted juveniles, Kostiuk Institute of Psychology, Academy of Pedagogical Sciences of Ukraine :

There are three groups of causes leading to juvenile suicide. The first and perhaps the most significant one stems from the character. The second is the age. We have in our parlance “teenage and youth suicides.” And the third one has to do with complicated stressful situations. Yet the latter are far and wide apart.

More often than not suicides are committed by children and teenagers with some accentuated character traits. This includes the asthenic type, children with weak nerves, asocial, and weak-willed. Next comes the cycloid accentuation, when a good mood is quickly replaced by depression. This type balances on a thin boundary between normal and abnormal. The third and most widespread type is the hysteric and demonstrative character, most often found in young girls. In such cases children may want to commit suicide to prove or achieve something like sympathy. Usually such children actually do not want to die. They often leave a final note, demand an ultimatum or write a warning. Yet their attempted suicides often prove lethally effective; they miscalculate the number of pills or the woman next door comes too late.

Serhiy ANDRIYASH, deputy director, Ukrainian State Youth Social Services Center:

Juvenile suicide is a major problem in Ukraine. Primarily, it is explained by the fact that our children grow up very fast (due to the abundant information available). Accordingly they harbor plans and dreams too adult for their age; they want to assert themselves and get more out of life, particularly more than their parents ever did. Naturally, they cannot comprehend or adapt themselves to adult problems for various reasons. Here a crucial role is played by teenage tendency to want it all. Regrettably, children sometimes see no alternative but to take their own life.

Troubled families appear an especially strong negative factor. Lack of parental attention along with inability to understand children and their problems make teenagers regard suicide as an ultimate solution to stockpiling psychological problems.      NUMBER OF JUVENILE SUICIDES     Age group            1996    1998   5—14                     88      78   15—19                   383     407   Total                   471     485   Urban residents         383     287   Rural residents          88     198  №9 March 21 2000 «The Day»
In using our publications, reference to The Day is mandatory. © "День"