Tina Brescanu's Blog
May 29, 2018
Myths about suicide
Talking about suicide is dangerous. It is contagious and will spread
False! Talking about suicide is a preventative action. Don’t wait for someone to say how they feel, they might never, but ask,”are you suicidal? Do you have suicidal thoughts?”
Suicide is not contagious. Ask your children if they have suicidal thoughts, dare to tell them about yours and don’t fear to wake the bear, talking will soothe the bear.
To lack a lust for life is common, even in children, perhaps especially in children today because of the added pressure of being somebody, being oneself is not enough.
Suicidal people are mentally ill
False! I never felt mentally ill when I wanted to die. It’s a myth. I always felt like I wanted to go home hence my saying, 1969 man landed on the moon, and I landed on earth.
Often, the reason we feel suicidal are dismissed as minor, silly or selfish by adults or experts so how can we expect young people to talk to someone?
I’ve been suicidal three times in my life. The first two times I saved my own life, the last time in my frenzied automatic writing of goodbyes to life, my yet to be born children wrote to me. They told me to hang on, to wait for them because we’re from the same place, you’ll recognise us and connect with us with such intensity you want to live forever, but you won’t, and that’s fine. Losing the lust for life is not a crime, it’s not a sin, and it’s not a failure. It’s a chance to start again; this is as you say on earth, third time lucky.
Until then I thought you could only save your own life, but I learnt you can indeed get help from unusual places.
I have experience from psychiatric care growing up in Sweden, and I would not recommend that kind of help. That’s where my sister and I differ, but then she became entrapped in that system. I escaped a diagnosis while she got several.
If someone talks a lot about suicide, they won’t try to kill themselves. It’s a false alarm
False, a lot of people who complete suicide have tried to talk about it, but maybe got “don’t say that we love you, you have so much, be grateful” instead of proper listening. Talking helps the person delay and hopefully change their mind or seek help. Talking about suicide is always a sign that the person needs help. Listen.
Suicidal thoughts are common, especially in the teenage years
Yes, true, but they are also more and more common in children. Of course, people of all ages suffer from suicidal thoughts and existentialist questions and it’s not always depression or mental illness. Perhaps it’s high sensitivity or alienation.
Boys don’t talk about suicide
True and false!
My brother didn’t, but my son did. Most young people don’t talk to adults because adults think they should be lucky to be alive or some other unhelpful sentiment about how one must feel about life. When my son was suicidal at the same age as myself when I was a child, I asked him, and he told me, and just like me when we accessed help together he was told he was highly sensitive, and as such he can lose his footing easier in life. My son was told to enclose himself in a bubble of love which was unhelpful at best.
If young people talk, it’s often to a peer, if they have someone who knows how to listen.
I didn’t talk to anyone. No, that’s not true. I talked to myself. I wrote to myself. The most important conversation we’ll all have in life is the one we have with ourselves. Experts say, talk to someone, get help, but unless the conversation with self takes place, no other person can ever continue the saving. Saying “don’t be so selfish” is not helpful. Making friends with self is more important than making friends with brothers and sisters and anyone else outside of self. Friends with self first is self-love, the foundation for all love. For life.
Suicide is sudden
True, with young people suicidal thoughts can come on suddenly, but it doesn’t have to be mental illness, it can be a societal illness which is different. Deeply depressed people often have no power of action, look out for a person who starts to feel better after a period of deep rest.
Once suicidal always suicidal
False, but at least in my case, I continue to live but on the edge of society, where I’ve always lived. I don’t feel depressed, ill or suicidal, but I feel intensely, and sometimes it’s too much. I need a lot of alone time to cope with life.
Birthdays and other celebrations are not risky times for me because I don’t celebrate anything in a mainstream way.
You can’t stop a suicidal person from completing a suicide
False. It’s possible. But the first hero here is the self. Always.
Going back to when I was in the deepest, darkest place I became my own hero, as did my sister and my brother. We are all sensitives. We all saved ourselves. But I knew people who couldn’t find the hero within, who instead completed suicide. This is why I advocate the conversation with self. You save your own life, and then you ask for help. You are the hero.
Afterwards, I never thought, why did I think like that? That’s trivialising the feelings that lead to suicide, instead, we should ask, how do we access the hero within in situations that overwhelm us, eats us up, tear us apart?
Loving someone who is suicidal is not enough. The suicidal person needs to be able to access self-love from within and become their own hero. Stop expecting suicidal people to live for someone else and help people to live for themselves first because that’s the only relationship that matters when you are so near the end.
False! Talking about suicide is a preventative action. Don’t wait for someone to say how they feel, they might never, but ask,”are you suicidal? Do you have suicidal thoughts?”
Suicide is not contagious. Ask your children if they have suicidal thoughts, dare to tell them about yours and don’t fear to wake the bear, talking will soothe the bear.
To lack a lust for life is common, even in children, perhaps especially in children today because of the added pressure of being somebody, being oneself is not enough.
Suicidal people are mentally ill
False! I never felt mentally ill when I wanted to die. It’s a myth. I always felt like I wanted to go home hence my saying, 1969 man landed on the moon, and I landed on earth.
Often, the reason we feel suicidal are dismissed as minor, silly or selfish by adults or experts so how can we expect young people to talk to someone?
I’ve been suicidal three times in my life. The first two times I saved my own life, the last time in my frenzied automatic writing of goodbyes to life, my yet to be born children wrote to me. They told me to hang on, to wait for them because we’re from the same place, you’ll recognise us and connect with us with such intensity you want to live forever, but you won’t, and that’s fine. Losing the lust for life is not a crime, it’s not a sin, and it’s not a failure. It’s a chance to start again; this is as you say on earth, third time lucky.
Until then I thought you could only save your own life, but I learnt you can indeed get help from unusual places.
I have experience from psychiatric care growing up in Sweden, and I would not recommend that kind of help. That’s where my sister and I differ, but then she became entrapped in that system. I escaped a diagnosis while she got several.
If someone talks a lot about suicide, they won’t try to kill themselves. It’s a false alarm
False, a lot of people who complete suicide have tried to talk about it, but maybe got “don’t say that we love you, you have so much, be grateful” instead of proper listening. Talking helps the person delay and hopefully change their mind or seek help. Talking about suicide is always a sign that the person needs help. Listen.
Suicidal thoughts are common, especially in the teenage years
Yes, true, but they are also more and more common in children. Of course, people of all ages suffer from suicidal thoughts and existentialist questions and it’s not always depression or mental illness. Perhaps it’s high sensitivity or alienation.
Boys don’t talk about suicide
True and false!
My brother didn’t, but my son did. Most young people don’t talk to adults because adults think they should be lucky to be alive or some other unhelpful sentiment about how one must feel about life. When my son was suicidal at the same age as myself when I was a child, I asked him, and he told me, and just like me when we accessed help together he was told he was highly sensitive, and as such he can lose his footing easier in life. My son was told to enclose himself in a bubble of love which was unhelpful at best.
If young people talk, it’s often to a peer, if they have someone who knows how to listen.
I didn’t talk to anyone. No, that’s not true. I talked to myself. I wrote to myself. The most important conversation we’ll all have in life is the one we have with ourselves. Experts say, talk to someone, get help, but unless the conversation with self takes place, no other person can ever continue the saving. Saying “don’t be so selfish” is not helpful. Making friends with self is more important than making friends with brothers and sisters and anyone else outside of self. Friends with self first is self-love, the foundation for all love. For life.
Suicide is sudden
True, with young people suicidal thoughts can come on suddenly, but it doesn’t have to be mental illness, it can be a societal illness which is different. Deeply depressed people often have no power of action, look out for a person who starts to feel better after a period of deep rest.
Once suicidal always suicidal
False, but at least in my case, I continue to live but on the edge of society, where I’ve always lived. I don’t feel depressed, ill or suicidal, but I feel intensely, and sometimes it’s too much. I need a lot of alone time to cope with life.
Birthdays and other celebrations are not risky times for me because I don’t celebrate anything in a mainstream way.
You can’t stop a suicidal person from completing a suicide
False. It’s possible. But the first hero here is the self. Always.
Going back to when I was in the deepest, darkest place I became my own hero, as did my sister and my brother. We are all sensitives. We all saved ourselves. But I knew people who couldn’t find the hero within, who instead completed suicide. This is why I advocate the conversation with self. You save your own life, and then you ask for help. You are the hero.
Afterwards, I never thought, why did I think like that? That’s trivialising the feelings that lead to suicide, instead, we should ask, how do we access the hero within in situations that overwhelm us, eats us up, tear us apart?
Loving someone who is suicidal is not enough. The suicidal person needs to be able to access self-love from within and become their own hero. Stop expecting suicidal people to live for someone else and help people to live for themselves first because that’s the only relationship that matters when you are so near the end.
July 24, 2017
My Tag Cloud
animal power bisexual erotica bisexuality body love bullying caring for a pet change child power choice coming out later in life creating a better world doctor dolphins education and learning erotic romance exclusion family bonds family teamwork fantasy friendship gender fluid guinea pig happiness heart humor identity imaginary friend imagination journey laughing for a living laughter life long learning lessons from life lgbt lgbtqi limitless learning limitless love love love in action love and life multi generational multiple partners new culture story nonconformism old soul orgasm pansexual patient pets polyamory punitive parenting school segregation sex sex positive solution focus soul nourishment standing up for one's rights suicide prevention swimming unconventional love unconventional romance unschooling untraditional values and beliefs visionary weirdly visionary wisdom of children
December 28, 2016
Writing in a Second Language
Writing in English when it's a second language is not for the faint-hearted. Choosing to write in English when I had only spoken English was a rebirth, a dismantling of self, yes, I ceased to be for a bit when I started out. I lost myself for awhile, nothing I wrote made sense but I kept going, I kept finding clues and in the reconstruction of self my stories grew and yes, they're odd, they're different, they're not grammatically perfect, but neither am I.
August 16, 2016
A recording of laughter
My daughter is on holiday in Sweden for a whole month, staying with my mum, and on the third day she rang me and asked me to send her a recording of my laugh, "I miss you and your laugh so much."
I missed her laugh too so we exchanged notes.
I missed her laugh too so we exchanged notes.
June 26, 2016
My mum
Once upon a no time there was the most beautiful girl I have seen and she was really funny, yes she was so funny and her name was Tina. She was really mad when her son was sent to war but then he came back and then she was happy again. She was so bad at art and when she entered an art competition she told someone else to paint it for her but she didn't win another woman won but she is still so amazing and I love her because she is my mum Tina. The End
January 11, 2016
Children's right to body autonomy
School uniform is part of territorial thinking. School uniform highlights distance to others, it supports division.Enforced dress code is a form of bullying, not protection against bullying.
School is the biggest bully. The school uniform is also gender discrimination (skirt for girls, tie and shirt for boys) and impeachment of human right. Clothes are a form of language, visual language.
Clothes have to fit body type, personality and style, not school policy. School uniform is a band aid for social injustice, differences in income still remains. We don’t solve poverty with an enforced dress code.
School uniforms slow development of creative talent, independent thinking and personality. Fashion is self expression, always. Having your own style is as important as being yourself, they go hand in hand. A school uniform robs young people of their identity. We explore through fashion, we construct and deconstruct ourselves, the visible parts of self through fashion as a form of self-expression.
All children and young people should be allowed to express themselves in whatever way make them feel comfortable being who they are. A school uniform isolates students from their real selves, they have to cope with being someone else both mentally and physically during school time, hiding behind masks and in an enforced uniform.
School uniforms also slows transition to adulthood as clothes are part of experimenting with identity, finding out who you are, who you want to be. Strict behaviour policies also create rebels. We teach children about the freedom of our country, but we force them to wear uniforms, often in drab colours and unflattering cuts, instead of choosing what they want.
If one doesn’t have what someone else have; envy is a healthy response but devaluing oneself because of clothes shows a shocking disregard of one’s true value. Young people learn more about themselves by choosing their own clothing than by being forced to wear a school uniform.
School is the biggest bully. The school uniform is also gender discrimination (skirt for girls, tie and shirt for boys) and impeachment of human right. Clothes are a form of language, visual language.
Clothes have to fit body type, personality and style, not school policy. School uniform is a band aid for social injustice, differences in income still remains. We don’t solve poverty with an enforced dress code.
School uniforms slow development of creative talent, independent thinking and personality. Fashion is self expression, always. Having your own style is as important as being yourself, they go hand in hand. A school uniform robs young people of their identity. We explore through fashion, we construct and deconstruct ourselves, the visible parts of self through fashion as a form of self-expression.
All children and young people should be allowed to express themselves in whatever way make them feel comfortable being who they are. A school uniform isolates students from their real selves, they have to cope with being someone else both mentally and physically during school time, hiding behind masks and in an enforced uniform.
School uniforms also slows transition to adulthood as clothes are part of experimenting with identity, finding out who you are, who you want to be. Strict behaviour policies also create rebels. We teach children about the freedom of our country, but we force them to wear uniforms, often in drab colours and unflattering cuts, instead of choosing what they want.
If one doesn’t have what someone else have; envy is a healthy response but devaluing oneself because of clothes shows a shocking disregard of one’s true value. Young people learn more about themselves by choosing their own clothing than by being forced to wear a school uniform.
January 3, 2016
Energy Rap
A few years back, my children wrote energy raps in school on how to save energy, I found them again today and thought they were funny
Energy, energy, don’t make it your enemy
Turn down the heat and stamp your feet
Lights out
Instead of filling out print outs, let’s converse and why not try it in verse
Tell a story and do make it gory
Meat is a treat and so is sweet
If you want to energise your body, eat more greens
When it’s cold, don’t turn up the heat, put on a jumper and stamp your feet
Lights out
This is an energy rap
It’s good for you and it’s good for me
Lights out
Save energy to make more energy
Lights out
To be a part of the solution, don’t create pollution
Lights out
You are the light in the dark night, so shine your brightest and you’ll be righteous
Lights out.
Energy, energy, don’t make it your enemy
Turn down the heat and stamp your feet
Lights out
Instead of filling out print outs, let’s converse and why not try it in verse
Tell a story and do make it gory
Meat is a treat and so is sweet
If you want to energise your body, eat more greens
When it’s cold, don’t turn up the heat, put on a jumper and stamp your feet
Lights out
This is an energy rap
It’s good for you and it’s good for me
Lights out
Save energy to make more energy
Lights out
To be a part of the solution, don’t create pollution
Lights out
You are the light in the dark night, so shine your brightest and you’ll be righteous
Lights out.
December 15, 2015
Review of The Power of Death
There is a saying that the coward dies several times but the brave only once, I disagree and say it’s the other way around, in fact, the brave die every day.
Your story starts with the birth of your idea about yourself. You have to learn to separate yourself from your idea about yourself. The religious personality is the strongest personality. When you believe you don’t really know, most information comes from someone else and if you believe something you won’t be motivated to know. Belief is faking knowing.
This is a powerful read. Gabriel dares to crush our belief systems, even the hero system (a source of human aggression) strip away everything we think we are and then also take away hope. Brave. Your personality is not real, it’s artificial, but it’s the only idea you have about yourself. Sports is the optimal hero system, watching sports is the lazy person's way of becoming a hero, you become a hero by association. What hero system do you adhere to?
I’ve been suicidal three times in my life and the last time I saved my own life I realised that for me to want to live I also had to make peace with wanting to die because if I didn’t want to die, did I really want to live?
I wasn’t as challenged as many readers probably will be reading this book as I was already thinking along the same lines, but this book took me deeper. Life is a journey through grief; I’m learning to grieve creatively, by dying each night and being reborn each day, just like Gabriel prescribes in the book. I recognise myself in passage after passage in this book and I feel fortunate to have read it and I’ve signed up to immortology to deepen my connection to death and, therefore life.
The Power of Death: A Radical Path to Personal Transformation and Spiritual Enlightenment
Your story starts with the birth of your idea about yourself. You have to learn to separate yourself from your idea about yourself. The religious personality is the strongest personality. When you believe you don’t really know, most information comes from someone else and if you believe something you won’t be motivated to know. Belief is faking knowing.
This is a powerful read. Gabriel dares to crush our belief systems, even the hero system (a source of human aggression) strip away everything we think we are and then also take away hope. Brave. Your personality is not real, it’s artificial, but it’s the only idea you have about yourself. Sports is the optimal hero system, watching sports is the lazy person's way of becoming a hero, you become a hero by association. What hero system do you adhere to?
I’ve been suicidal three times in my life and the last time I saved my own life I realised that for me to want to live I also had to make peace with wanting to die because if I didn’t want to die, did I really want to live?
I wasn’t as challenged as many readers probably will be reading this book as I was already thinking along the same lines, but this book took me deeper. Life is a journey through grief; I’m learning to grieve creatively, by dying each night and being reborn each day, just like Gabriel prescribes in the book. I recognise myself in passage after passage in this book and I feel fortunate to have read it and I’ve signed up to immortology to deepen my connection to death and, therefore life.
The Power of Death: A Radical Path to Personal Transformation and Spiritual Enlightenment
October 25, 2015
I love dialogue the most about both reading and writing
I love dialogue. I can finish reading in the middle of a paragraph. I don’t always finish reading every book I start, it’s not that it’s bad, it’s just a connection thing, it doesn’t fit, but, of course, it could in the future. I like action, but of another kind, not violence at all, I can skip and skim, and I do. I like odd stuff, weird stuff, magical stuff and love, love, love, also sex, great sex and out of this world sex, I love when people talk about sex, in any book, not just erotica. I love spiritual books, fiction and fantasy, especially fantasy, it’s visionary and I love reading real life stories told in a different way, indies are unbeatable. I love children’s, teens and young adult books, the more rebellious the better. I don’t always write a review, but I should, it’s good practice. I don’t like faces on a cover. I don’t like too much details; I want stuff left to the imagination. I love some foreign words, but not if what is said doesn’t become clear in the next sentence.
August 13, 2015
Keep Writing
Keep writing, dear writer, because you're a writer whether or not you have a novel in bookstores or only digitally on-line, whether only a handful or the whole world has read your writing, whether or not anything of yours is ever traditionally published, you're still a writer. So keep writing if writing is who you are.
