Dec 08
16
Men More at Risk for Suicide than Women
For whatever reason, and even though more women suffer from depression and other mood disorders more than men, men seem to be the sex of the human race that is more susceptible to committing suicide. Sure, both sexes may have the same thoughts about actually taking their own lives when they get depressed, but for reasons still not totally understood, men seem to be the more likely to follow through with suicide and actually take their own lives, which means they are the higher risk group when it comes to suicide action.
Studies have been done to determine what areas of the brain might light up differently in men than in women when suicidal thoughts or thoughts of taking one’s own life enter into the picture, and while they have an idea that it may be a brain center that functions differently when it comes to follow through on everything, including suicidal thoughts, that men do not share with women that may be responsible for the risk discrepancy.
In this bleak economy, and with job losses and huge financial losses in the personal money sector on the rise, the fear is that more men will be likely to take their lives when this financial disaster gets worse, especially since men’s egos and self esteem are often tied closely to their jobs and the amount of money they are able to bring to the table.
Experts are trying to keep more of an eye on the male suicide and suicide attempt numbers over these next several months in an effort to help stop them and get these men early treatment and get their loved ones educated in how to recognize serious problems before they escalate so that we don’t have a male suicide epidemic on our hands as we did during the great depression when suicide – especially male – suicide rates were at all time highs.
