I sure hope that woman gets the help she obviously needs...
And those are the key words right there. I've seen people to alot of crazy stuff to themselves, and I've heard a few stories crazier than what I've seen myself. I've even seen suicides and suicide attempts a few times. But for a person to be able to set herself on fire...deliberately and with a plan to commit a hoax to frame others for doing it...
This woman is not well, not in the slightest. I'm completely beside myself trying to wrap my mind around this. Hypothetically speaking, if my life ever got to the point of being suicidal, I could down a bottle of pills, I could probably pull a trigger, I could definitely clam bake myself in a room with a burning charcoal grill.....but I could never, not in a million years, set myself on fire. Hands down the most excruciating natural way to die, and the third worst way ever conceived by anyone in the world behind Vlad Tepes style impalement and crucifixion. I can't imagine doing that to myself.
Dear ITM: As another poster already said, I also believe she didn't mean for it to go this far. She probably only intended it as a media stunt. If she didn't have the foresight to think past that, it makes sense she didn't plan for serious consequences as getting critical burns either.
There was another man who cost 4 million dollars of damage, starting a fire to get out of work that day. I think this case falls along those lines. In a neighborhood where one of my friends volunteers, two kids, one of them a promising athlete with a baseball scholarship lined up, flooded their high school with the fire hose as a "prank," but cost 4-6 million dollars in damage, shut down their school, and had to migrate their entire student body to a neighboring rival school which threatened the safety of both schools. Again, these people were just "not thinking" -- it was not due to mental illness because they weren't. Just not thinking maturely and did not think through all the consequences, and did not check with anyone who could have advised them. The other partner in these incidence went along with it, instead of stopping them. When adults are still thinking juvenile, they make mistakes just like teenagers half their age.
I am touched by your personal concern for her welfare. When I look at how more people are so sensitive to mental health issues, and expressing caring sympathetic thoughts publicly, I realize how much farther we have come as a society, where years before, nonprofit advocates had to initiate special educational outreach campaigns to stop the stigmatization of mental illness, and encourage more people to get help, instead of hiding and judging this when we don't judge other illnesses this way.
Some of these incidents happen, and spread in the news, to compel more awareness, sensitivity and action. The day we are so connected as a society, that issues are resolved directly BEFORE they escalate into more visible abuses and violent crimes, then we will see less and less of these type of incidents occur. Most can be prevented by earlier intervention.
Thank you for caring, and may you always be encouraged
to apply your capacities to effect positive change from wherever you are.
The world is a better place because of conscientious people like you!
Please take heart and take courage from this.
Whatever grief you feel, direct it toward people and groups
who can certainly benefit from your contributions. I think
you would make a great mentor, to help someone in need
of guidance so foolish ideas don't have to lead to disaster.
If these people had someone like you in their life to turn to,
they would have been counseled out of this so it didn't mess up their lives.
So maybe you are grieving because you know you could have stopped it.
I grieve like that too, and can appreciate the mixed thoughts and feelings.
If you are a mediator, and can empathize with both sides at the same time,
we probably have a lot in common. I look forward to reading more
comments from you, that will sound a lot like my own thoughts, I'm sure!
Take care,
Yours truly,
Emily
To deal with my own empathy, which can be crippling at times when I take on too much at once from
too many conflicting angles,
I have looked into different approaches and programs on the steps of grief, steps of forgiveness,
and process of spiritual healing to understand these processes.
If you have background in mediating, or counseling through
conflict resolution, if you start your own thread posting thoughts
or resources on that, I will be glad to contribute to your thread.
Anything that you have found to be a helpful resource
will likely help me or others struggling with the same,
and vice versa. I also started a website/blog for spiritual healing
resources, but haven't added the page on forgiveness yet.
That is so deep, so interactive and concurrent with the process of people around me,
I have trouble writing it up because it is happening as we speak.
All these incidents in the media, and the messages back and forth,
are part of a collective holistic healing process, so the internet has
really facilitated and sped up that process. I believe we can
achieve world peace with our advanced communications, hopefully within this lifetime!