Noor

Noor said: "It's been quite rewarding being able to help people through their own process of grief.

"I'd lost my friend to suicide a couple of years ago, having gone through my own process of grief, I know how important it is to have the right kind of support at the right time. So, being able to volunteer for Cruse Scotland also gives me a sense of purpose.

"It helps me to make meaning of my own grief but also helps me to give back the kind of support that I got when I needed it the most as well. So, it's kind of like giving back what you got when you needed it."

Mental Health

The death of her friend to suicide had a big impact on Noor’s mental health and she needed professional support to help with her grief.

Noor said: "I really struggled with my mental health at the start. Initially, I could not believe it had happened because I had seen my friend the night before she had taken her own life.

"So, I went through a process of almost being numb to it, almost being in shock, not believing it had happened, not really being able to see a way forward either.

"I could not comprehend how to keep living normally. You wake up having lost someone who meant so much to you. The next day, everything seems to continue as usual, but for you, everything has changed.

"So that was quite challenging to cope with that kind of conflict, but life goes on, but then your life doesn't seem to have to go on.

"So, I really struggled with my mental health at the time. And I reached out for support when I felt like I was ready, kind of when it sunk in, and I was able to accept that what had happened had happened. And then I was, I felt quite low, quite depressed.

"I thought I needed to speak to someone about this.

"At that point, I reached out for some counselling. That really made a difference to my mental health and to my ability to make sense of the grief.

"It helped me process the grief and, later, do something meaningful with my experience. I hope to help prevent more people from dying by suicide in the future."

Suicide Prevention Scotland Campaign

Noor has become a new ambassador for a campaign by charity Suicide Prevention Scotland, sharing her lived experience of suicide.

She feels that suicide specific grief is different and can be quite traumatic.

She said: "It is a specific type of grief.

"I think every type of grief is different, but suicide-specific grief can be quite traumatic sometimes because the person might have died in a traumatic way. The news can be shocking. You may not have been able to see that coming.

"A lot of people, well, for me, at least, I was left wondering, like, could I have done something else? What if I said this? What if I did that? Could I have stopped the death?

"So, I think that particular process of maybe blaming yourself or thinking, what if, or did I miss the signs, or if I'd asked, or would that have changed the outcome, which can be very specific to, like, suicide bereavement.

"And obviously, with suicide bereavement as well, people are at an increased risk of taking their own lives after they've lost someone to suicide. And we know that through research and statistics, exposure to suicide death increases your own risk.

"We know that people need a specific type of support to process that death because it can be quite a traumatic way to lose someone."

Noor believes it is important to talk about it if a person you know has died due to suicide.

Noor said: "I think to talk about it. Initially, when my friend had passed away, I was hesitant to talk about it because there is quite a bit of stigma, still, unfortunately, a bit of shame attached to it when people die by suicide because other folk might assume that that is a selfish thing to do.

"So, part of you might think, I don't want to share that with other people. I do not want people to think, to remember the person that I had lost in the way that they died, really.

"But I think the thing that made the biggest difference to me was being able to talk about it.

"So that would be my advice is to just talk about it and try and push through that stigma that exists still, unfortunately, and try and reach out for support."

If you need to talk to someone and are struggling with your grief, please call our Free Bereavement Helpline on 0808 802 6161.