What Happens to Suicides After Death? Introduction
Many people who were close to someone who took his or her own life are desperate to know what happens to suicides after death. Although 
religions have taught that all suicides more or less meet the same grim fate, the truth is–almost anything can happen. This series of Suicide Posts explores the afterlife reality of people who died from a variety of suicide methods, from accidental overdoses to deliberate self-attack. Deliberate suicides also include people who are already in terminal phases of an illness and want to shorten the process.
I have worked with a number of people after their successful suicides. Those who took their own lives by dramatic means, such as as shooting themselves, hanging themselves, or throwing themselves in front of a train, are nearly always in shock afterward and seek help. Unfailingly, their enormous emotional energy makes their appearances fantastically brilliant and clear. The seriously ill who have gone through an assisted suicide are usually well prepared for death and need little or no help whatsoever. People who have died by an accidental drug overdose are the most difficult to help in my experience.
In all cases, no punishment awaits people who take their own lives. It is true than when people who are already dead by suicide are able to communicate with the living who are considering suicide, they urge them not to take their own lives. From the cases that I know of, the dead clearly understand why a person wants to die prematurely and know that with a little help that person can recover from suicide longings and depression. It must be said that the individual’s state of mind will influence his or her experiences directly after death, and that holds true for anyone who crosses over, by suicide or not. People who die from an illness and are in deep depression or burdened with conflict or guilt are likely to find themselves in uncomfortable conditions after death, even in self-induced hellish delusions. All of these not-so-positive afterlife experiences eventually get cleared up, often with the help of the living.
In subsequent posts, I will give you real-afterlife situations of suicides I have worked with.
Marcie
2013-01-17 @ 6:27 PM
I see your point, Julia. Thanks for responding.
Also, really loved your interview with Miriam Knight, which introduced me to your work. So very interesting.
When I go for my walks, I project forward into the kind of world I want to live in, and one of my imaginings has been the disappearance of this chasm between the living and the dead. How much grief and sorrow would disappear if we could simply communicate with loved ones who are in another dimension! I’ve also heard about induced after-death communications and listened to an interview with Dr. Allan Botkin, whom I think developed (or, perhaps, stumbled upon) this therapy in his work with veterans. It is amazing to contemplate. I think my projections are becoming reality!
I’m considering doing the Monroe Institute’s Gateway program this Spring. It always sounded a little scary for someone who likes to “remain in control.” At the same time, it involves an exploration of who we really are…. and, sooner or later, I need to accept that kind of growth.
Julia
2013-01-21 @ 1:42 AM
Keep in touch Marcie and tell me about what happens at the institute. I have always wanted to go there.
TOMI K Ryan
2013-03-26 @ 4:52 AM
Dear Julia. My dear daughter, Jodi, died on Oct. 2nd 2011 at age 46 of pancreatic cancer. She was in hospice here at my home for most of the last 9 months of her life. The last six or so hours of her life she stared up into a corner of the ceiling in her room and moaned the most loud and heart wrenching moans. We could not get her attention. I was frantic to help her. The hospice people said she did not seem to be in pain as they can tell by a person’s facial expression. Some of us had been doing prayers throughout the day and evening and were very attentive to all her needs as best as we could be. Finally, about 3:10 a.m. I took my husband’s hand and we prayed for her to be released into the loving arms and care of God. Within a very short time of the start of our prayer, she stopped moaning, looked right in my eyes, took her last breath and died. I have read many books and have meditated and prayed and am working through this but that moaning haunts me. I hope she wasn’t scared or suffering. It was so loud that you could hear it throughout our home. Any thoughts on this that could help me? Thank you., I also lost my brother of a heart attack two days before the 1st anniversary of Jodi’s death. He was the last of my family of origin. There were six of us and I am the last one. Two of my younger brothers died of suicide from mental illness. It’s been a rough year and a half. I am doing pretty well though. I have a great spiritul path and am a prayer practitioner with Centers for Spiritual Living. Thank you. Tomi Kathryn Ryan
Julia
2013-03-27 @ 8:49 AM
Tomi, you have quite a history with death so far. My strongest instincts about Jodi’s last hours tell me that she was working out her fears about what awaits us after we die. Was she taught there was a hell at any point in her life? Many people work strong conflicts and fears out directly after death, when they often begin reviewing the lives they lived. I think your daughter did all this before passing. The point of these nightmarish experiences is catharsis. Your prayers broke the nightmare and redirected her to leave. Her return at the last minute is not atypical. People frequently come out of comas right at the end too. Some even come out of Alzheimer’s completely lucid just before death. We are just beginning to understand this miraculous process of dying.
In The Last Frontier I write about those haunting memories returning, which are symptoms of PTSD. If you communicated with her right now you would see that she has transformed into a younger, incredibly robust and joyful person with impossibly expanded awareness. If you communicated with her, you would realize that those intrusive memories have nothing to do with the person she is now and that her last hours no longer affect her. So when those memories intrude, switch immediately to a vision of the Jodi who lives now outside the flesh. The real Jodi. It will stop the anguish immediately.
If you should feel a particularly strong wave of grief at any point, chances are high it is because she is right by you, trying to get your attention. Learn to communicate with her! If you are at a loss about how to launch contact, I have a huge section in my book that will take you far.
Once you have achieved contact, you can have what I call a living relationship with your daughter until you too pass over. You can also go on and contact the rest of your family, especially those younger brothers. Believe me, nothing moves you along the spiritual path more than afterlife communication because through them we interact with the essence of our loved ones, their authentic selves, for the first time. We come face -to-face with immortality. And it is awe-inspiring to the millionth degree.
Keep in touch and let me know about your progress And thank you for writing me.
Love always,
Julia
TOMI K Ryan
2013-04-01 @ 10:56 PM
Thank you so much for answering Julia. What you say makes sense as Jodi really did not want to leave and I think she had regrets and did NOT want to leave her boys. She never had been taught anything about hell as that is totally against how I raised her which was going to Religious Science and Unity churches off and on. However, who knows where we pick up these beliefs in hell. It’s in the general cultural race mind I think! I had a dream about Jodi last week where we were sitting facing each other knees to knees and she was explaining to me about how we are never separate, always connected and were one. She also was telling me that when any of us grow, we all grow together. Each helps the other, and so on. I wish I could remember more. I am almost through reading your book and have enjoyed the Nook version so much that I ordered it in hard copy too so I could more easily flip around in it. I just read the part about the soul to soul connections and I realized that that is what happened with me when my mother died. I was 25 and she was 50. I was alone in the house crying with a broken heart and thinking how I would never see her again when suddenly, I was her! I became her for a flicker of a second and I felt her within me so much that all I could think of was that I was her for a minute. Your description of the soul to soul connection was exactly what happened! I immediately stopped crying and felt much better and comforted. My mother adored me and I her so it fits that she would do anything to help me from where she was. I have read many books on near death, end of life and so on. It has helped me deal with sorrow over the years. I’m doing remarkably well and have found that I am a lot stronger than I ever thought I could be. Thanks again for your insight. Jodi was a very precious young woman. I am asking for contact in my meditations and am having amazing dreams about my brothers and Jodi in the past weeks. Take care and keep doing your wonderful work! Blessings, Tomi
Julia
2013-04-05 @ 8:14 AM
Fantastic, Tomi. What a gift you have!
marilyn
2013-07-20 @ 5:17 PM
Hi Julia,
I am a psychotherapist and i work with a lot of wonderful people who suffer from chronic depression. It was disconcerting for me to read in your article that someone who dies (non-suicide) while depressed will have a more difficult time initially. It is such a challenging and unpredictable illness to live with and it saddens me to think that the effects of depression also shape the person’s afterlife experience. Could you say more about that?
Also, what can we do to help that person after they have passed? This is a bigger question that i have anyway–how do we help our loved ones who have passed? What kind of help do the need for us? As a kid I was taught to pray for the repose of the soul of ________________.
Thank you.
Julia
2013-07-21 @ 6:51 AM
Marilyn, our state of mind affects everything we do, and shapes our experiences. Why would it be so different after death? A deeply depressed person may not do well right after passing but he or she has a much better chance of unlocking the cause of depression and dissolving it in the “afterlife” than here. And help is always available. You might already be helping. It would not be difficult to tune into your patients when they pass over to see how they are. There are no rules about what happens. You may find a person who suffered from chronic depression fully liberated after leaving the body. Furthermore, the psyche goes through rapid change at the end of life. As far as I am aware, chronic depression is liable to break before death. On the other hand, I have seen deep depression occur during end stage illness, which has more to do with our ignorance and fear of death than anything else.
About praying. Of course that helps, if it is targeted. Much better is making direct contact with the deceased.
Does any of this help? I would be happy to enter into a fuller dialog with you!
Julia
Archna
2013-07-24 @ 2:29 PM
I lost my younger brother last year. He took his own life. His first anniversary is approaching. Apparently, he was very close to me, which I know because he shared his feelings with his closest friends and his fiancee as well. Still, I never had any communication with him after he has crossed over. Why so? I miss him very badly and want to hug him, hold him , touch him. I have seen him sometimes in my dreams but he never communicated anything to me. Although he has spoken to my mom in her dreams. Why he is not visiting us? And how can we find out if he is doing okay in the afterlife. Please suggest.
Julia
2013-07-25 @ 7:20 AM
Don’t wait for him to contact you. You can contact him yourself. In my book, The Last Frontier, I wrote about 150 pages on this alone. There is a whole chapter just on the techniques of afterlife communication. Your need will make it happen! If people are unsuccessful at making contact, they can make an appointment with me and I will guide them into it. You can do it! He may feel bad about how much he has hurt you. That often happens with people who have taken their own lives. Keep in touch with me. I want to make sure you’ve communicated with him.