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By:
PAULINE KAIRU | |||||||||
| Posted:
Sep,19-2016 18:49:41
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On the evening of February 13, 2014, David Njuguna woke up to find himself at Presbyterian Church of East Africa (PCEA) Kikuyu Hospital. He was disappointed to be alive.
For a whole month he had been planning to kill himself, and had actually tried to, earlier that day.
"It is something I had been thinking about for a while. Every morning I woke up knowing that I wouldn't come back home alive. I felt life wasn't worth living," says the 51--year--old.
Njuguna's problems began after he got a scholarship to undertake a six-month community--based development course in Canada in 2005.
Two months after his arrival in Canada, he learnt that he had lost his job as a social development teacher at the PCEA in Kikuyu.
He became extremely worried, wondering how he would take care of his wife and three children without a stable income.
"I was not the same after losing my job," he says, adding that something inside him just snapped.
Once a born--again Christian and church elder, he turned to alcohol "to escape reality" .
It began with a casual drink, but he eventually slipped into depression and was diagnosed with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), a condition characterised by sadness, emptiness or irritability that interferes with one's ability to engage in everyday activities.
Soon he was in and out of mental rehabilitation facilities. That is how his six--month stay in Canada stretched to eight years.
"I didn't want to come back from Canada alive, I wanted to come back in a coffin," he says. "The depression had progressed, making me suicidal."
In April 2013, shortly after Njuguna returned from Canada, he was struggling to make ends meet. An animal--salt manufacturing venture he had started failed.
So he would spend the day wandering around Kikuyu, his hometown, where he would eventually end up in a liquor den.
"It was the fear of failure that triggered my suicidal thoughts. It was better to die than see myself fail," he says.
REJECTED
Notably, he had shown signs that all was not well.
"I am told I would yell that I was fed up with life and that I would kill myself. But I think all people saw was a blabbering drunk," he laughs.
"It is believed that a person who threatens to commit suicide is just seeking attention, but most people who commit suicide have spoken about, or given indications, of their intentions, but they are never taken seriously," he adds.
"The church, which you would have thought would hold my hand, saw me as a drunk, a backslider. I was no longer the respected man of God. Preachers don't accept a person who drinks," he says.
"What do you do when your community doesn't want to associate with you?" he asks, then quickly adds, "We have to fight the social and religious stigma that surround people with depression."
"People like me are labelled wenda wazimu (lunatics) and nobody wants to associate with them or takes them seriously," he remarks.
He eventually hit rock bottom and, on February 13, 2014, at around 11am, went to his usual den, bought more than his usual tipple, walked to his usual spot on the railway line in Kikuyu and mixed it with rodenticides with the intention of killing himself.
"I wanted to be in a stupor when I did it so it wouldn’t be very agonising," he offers.
He had bought an indeterminate quantity of different rodenticides.
"I emptied them into the last sip of my drink and gulped it," he says.
"I don't recall what happened after that. All I know from other people's accounts is that my wife found me unconscious in the house, covered with vomit," he says.
"If she hadn't arrived in time, I would have died."
But all that is now in the past. After a week in hospital, he was discharged.
He has picked up the pieces and is taking medication for ADHD in combination with other therapies that have helped him recover and avoid a relapse.
However, he still has to deal with public derision.
"When you survive suicide, instead of being helped, you are told, 'Grow up...everybody is going through the same problems," he says, adding that the community has shunned him.
"People who are supposed to be close to me give me funny looks, the look that says, 'You're childish'. Some even look away when they see me. Now I don't think about the way others treat me," says Njuguna.
MY PURPOSE
He adds that his family has also been stigmatised.
"Thankfully, my family has overcome the experience.They have realised that I am a different person," he adds.
Njuguna, now a small--scale farmer, says he understands himself better.
He would like to start a support group, a "non--judgmental place for suicide survivors and where people with suicidal thoughts can come", but adds, "Suicide is such a taboo subject in Kenya that it is hard to start an association for survivors because they want to live secret lives and avoid the stigma".
"I've made it my personal mission to help others know they aren't alone in this. I have found my purpose," he says.
"Depression and suicide know no class, if only we could connect with the people. Depression is treatable, we don't have to bury any more people because we are not caring enough."
Njuguna feels the church let him down in his hour of need.
"The Christian army is the only army that kills its wounded. I was wounded, but they neglected me."
Njuguna, who was admitted to a mental facility twice in Canada and at least four times in Kenya, says: "I am here to convey the message that depression is treatable and suicide preventable."
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