Richard Jeni: R.I.P

[Ash]

Man...
Richard Jeni was hilarious!

He was one of my favorite stand-up comics.

Most people don't realize how funny he was.
Some people have never heard of him.

Why the hell did he kill himself?

Read more about him

While you're here...Check out this hilarious video of him in action.

"3 minutes to total destruction!"
[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z-O4mJKEEqQ
(not safe for work!)

[Shadow]

Yeah, I always thought he was hilarious. I really enjoyed that short lived tv series he had, Platypus Man.

[Torgo]

He was one of the best comics around. Talk about a waste. 

[ulthar]

Why the hell did he kill himself?

That's a big question that largely goes unanswered in nearly every case.  Sometimes we THINK we know, but generally not.  Even if there is a note, at best that can be only what the person wanted us to know.

Suicide is, to me, one of the saddest things in human existence.  I recall once as a teen upset about something or other and talking to my Dad about it.  Somehow, the subject of suicide came up, and my Dad gave me the best bit of advice on this subject I ever heard: "If you kill yourself, just think of all this depression you'll miss out on."  No matter how bad things get, alive is alive, eh?

The closest I ever came was the day I was sitting on my bed staring at my 9mm and I could not think of a good reason NOT to do it.  That scared me - to this day, i thank God for the moment of lucidity in which I realized just how close I was.  Things were pretty crappy at that time (a couple of deaths in the family, a job where everyone hated me, some physical injuries), but now as I look back, I'm glad I did not let "it" beat me.

We'll never truly know what was in the mind of someone to lead to suicide.  In Jeni's case, at least according to Wikipedia, there may have been some mental health issues (depression and paranoia) contributing - so he may not have been thinking fully clrearly.

In any case, it's a sad loss.  Thanks for posting the clip.  He was a funny guy.

[CheezeFlixz]

Why the hell did he kill himself?

According to his family, they later stated with certainty that the death was in fact a suicide, and that Jeni had recently been diagnosed with "severe clinical depression coupled with fits of psychotic paranoia.

Those to are a cocktail for something bad to happen.

I thought he was a riot, I remember back when I heard he died I was like WTF, why?

[Yaddo 42]

Not sure I should post this, and I may delete it later.

I've mentioned before that I've had my own depressive episodes, including one that lasted several years. There were moments when I considered suicide, I felt my life had no meaning, I was powerless to do anything to change things for the better, and most of the people I knew wouldn't care if I was gone. My life wasn't as bad as others who have attempted suicide, but I knew the depths of my misery too well for too long. Time itself would slow down, just making every miserable second even longer.

When I would contemplate suicide I would look at my shotgun sitting across the room, after having planned how I would do it. I told myself I would not "attempt" it, I would either follow through or not do it. If I laid a hand on the gun with that thought in mind, I told myself, I would not put the gun down or back out. There were times I stared at that gun for a long time, made even longer by my state of mind. What usually made me not follow through was thinking of my mother and sister. How they would feel losing me; and since they are both devout Catholics, what they would believe and feel was my fate in the afterlife for taking my life. Being an atheist, I don't believe in the afterlife, the soul, damnation, and so on - but I knew they would carry their pain for the rest of their lives. I would usually walk away telling myself "Besides, I can always do it later." My release from suffering would be the beginning of their's. We saw what suicide did to a family, when a boy we knew in school killed himself after having enough of the unjustified hell his father put him through.

I have had loaded guns pointed at me by others, the first time when I was six. At that point, the business end of a gun seemed better than living on for decades feeling the way I felt. I know now my thinking was seriously derailed at that point, but seeing all that time ahead of you feeling as low and pathetic as I felt seemed the worse option. I'm not saying this is what was in Jeni's head but the answers to the question "Why?" aren't as alien to me as they are to others.

After years of work and therapy (and a short time with antidepressants) I am much better, I still have a long way to go for my life to closer to what I want it to be, but I'm getting there. I had a personal setback this week, at one time it would have been the end of my world as far as I was concerned (or close to it). Now, it hurts, but I know it can be overcome. There are still dark moments, and I can feel when they are rising but I know how to handle them much better than before. That said, while I don't contemplate suicide these days, the thought of ending my own life doesn't scare me as much as it should. It's not thinking I plan to give into, but I am honest enough with myself about those feelings.

[ulthar]

Well said, Yaddo.  I for one am glad you did not do it and have found another way to work through things.

[CheezeFlixz]

Yaddo I give you Karma for your candor.

I'll admit I'm not the most understanding, compassionate guy in the world, I'd say I rank in the bottom 10% in that department. (My wife says right below Adolph Hitler and just above Joesph Stalin.)
I've had suicides in my family (on both sides) and known people who choose that method, I'll admit I don't understand it in the least. I'm not a religious person in any stretch of the imagination however there is a saying that God will never give you more than you can handle and I believe that even if you interchange the name 'God' with 'life'.
I won't regal you with my trails and tribulations of life, but I too have had plenty of events that I thought at the time were nearly more than I could take, but time passes and the events fade and hind site shows them to really not have been as bad as I thought that the time. You just pick yourself up by the bootstraps and muddle on.
Anyway before I get long winded I'll close, and just say that glad you have overcame the events that took you down.

[Andrew]

I for one am glad you did not do it and have found another way to work through things.

I cannot add much more than to say "me too." 

Time does eventually make old wounds and pains fade some and, heck, tomorrow is a new day in an amazing world full of interesting people.  I'm glad to have some time to meet them and look around.

[indianasmith]

Karma to Yaddo for staying with us!!!

I have spoken at the funeral of a suicide, twice.  It's the hardest work any minister ever does.  Seeing the impact on the families, I have come to believe that suicide is perhaps one of the most selfish things a person can do.  However you choose to end it, most likely a family member is going to find you.  Even if they don't, they'll still have to view your body to ID you, and live with that image for the rest of your life.  Thank you for not putting your folks through that.
  I hope someday that you will find something to believe in that will make your burdens easier to bear.  I cannot imagine the intellectual loneliness that atheism must require . . .

[Yaddo 42]

Thank you all for your support and comments. I had no intention of hijacking this thread, but knew I, like ulthar, had some insight into what a person contemplating suicide is dealing with.

I've had my own paranoid moments, especially during depressive episodes. Not conspiracy theory stuff, since I know I am too unimportant to be conspired against personally. But couple paranoia with severe depression and it's obviously a recipe for deeper trouble. You lash out, either at others or yourself.

I've had suicides in my family (on both sides) and known people who choose that method, I'll admit I don't understand it in the least. I'm not a religious person in any stretch of the imagination however there is a saying that God will never give you more than you can handle and I believe that even if you interchange the name 'God' with 'life'.
I won't regal you with my trails and tribulations of life, but I too have had plenty of events that I thought at the time were nearly more than I could take, but time passes and the events fade and hind site shows them to really not have been as bad as I thought that the time. You just pick yourself up by the bootstraps and muddle on.

I can see your side, even if I don't agree with that saying. For me in the darkest days, it was the sense of powerlessness to do anything positive in my life at that point that made it so awful. So suicide felt like some form of taking control, of escaping from everything I couldn't deal with or change. The passage of time was not on my side then, there were no new positive developments, and the old wounds felt fresh. Like I said time slowed down for me, I also had massive insomnia during this time. I can remember one day trying so hard to get some much needed sleep, and after getting rid of every outside noise I could, I could still hear the ticking second hand of one small quiet clock in another room. And the time I experienced in between those ticks seemed to last forever. My thoughts would race, but not in useful or productive ways. So I had too much time on my hands and it felt even longer no matter what. The 30 seconds I would have to count off before shutting down the air compressors at work felt like several minutes.

Time does eventually make old wounds and pains fade some and, heck, tomorrow is a new day in an amazing world full of interesting people.  I'm glad to have some time to meet them and look around.

Then there's the self-loathing for feeling like a failure and disappointing the people I cared about, whether they actually felt that way or not. I pulled back from so many people or lost contact with them the way we all do in life. I wasn't meeting anyone new, and felt no one would want to know me anyway. I'm naturally a shy person to begin with, so meeting people has always been a problem. I felt like the worst person in any gathering, who could only improve things by withdrawing.

I have spoken at the funeral of a suicide, twice.  It's the hardest work any minister ever does.  Seeing the impact on the families, I have come to believe that suicide is perhaps one of the most selfish things a person can do.  However you choose to end it, most likely a family member is going to find you.  Even if they don't, they'll still have to view your body to ID you, and live with that image for the rest of your life.  Thank you for not putting your folks through that.
  I hope someday that you will find something to believe in that will make your burdens easier to bear.  I cannot imagine the intellectual loneliness that atheism must require . . .

Believe me, some of my thoughts when my mind was racing like that was of ways to not be found for as long as possible. Like noticing when the other people in my apartment building weren't around, so I would be less likely to be discovered if I screwed it up or didn't die right away. It was never going to be a cry for help, it was going to be a way out.

I was a doubting/lapsed Catholic and agnostic longer than I've been an atheist. When my doubts surfaced, I prayed for the strength to overcome them, just as I prayed for the help I felt I needed with things in my life. They never came, and I felt worse for it: guilty, unworthy, and ashamed for doubting. It can be an awful crisis to see that the answer you seek isn't coming and may not exist at all. 

I actually consider turning my back on faith to be one of the positive steps I took, since I owned up to my true feelings and beliefs about this existence and acknowledged that even with help from others (which I have) that I am the only one who I can depend on to  make the changes I need to make. It's not a comforting thought, but it is reality for me, my old beliefs and my explorations into other faiths are not. Wishing for it to be otherwise won't change things for me. If I have any strength of will, that is it.

Sorry to ramble yet again, I really don't want to be an attention whore. I hope I've provided some perspective on what (at least) seome people with depression feel. I can only speak for my experience, but from talking to others and reading around about the issue, my experiences aren't unique.

Think I'll go to the captions forums and be silly for a while.