Suicide; parasuicide and self-harming in pre and perinatal psychotherapy:

the possible origins of suicide, parasuicide and self-harming in the pre and perinatal period of life

by Shirley Ward

Death by suicide is unnatural, something else is going on in every death in suicide that is not visible.(O’Donohue, 2004)

Introduction

It is August 2023. During the last three years planet Earth has been threatened by the Covid-19 virus pandemic. Questions are arising as to the effect of the virus on the mental health of tens of millions around the world who have lived in lockdown, isolation and possible domestic violence due to confined living space and lack of freedom (Carey, 2020). It is not expected to be known for many months if suicide spiked in 2020 due to the pandemic as every death has to be investigated as to the cause. Suicide rates are expected to rise after the pandemic. To date there have been 693,186,371 cases of Covid-19 and 6,907,147 deaths worldwide.

For over 40 years at the Amethyst Resource for Human Development in Ireland, founded in 1982 by the late Alison Hunter, and assisted by Carmel Byrne and myself, we have explored the origins of suicide and mental illness, as being in the primal stages of our sacred journey from conception to birth. Our research has been based on the pioneering work of Dr Frank Lake who was the first British psychiatrist to recognise that stressful pregnancies, traumatic births and disharmony and conflict as far back as at conception may hold the key to subsequent adult behaviours, relationships, mental health issues such as suicidal tendencies, personality disorders, diseases we develop and where we tragically block our human potential (Lake, 1973).

Suicide and society

In a recent European paper by Bak et al. (2019), the research team studied various transformations in contemporary society for the phenomenon of suicide. They believed it affected areas of social life, culture, lifestyles and mobility amongst others. Some refer to Europe as experiencing turbulence in every aspect of social life.

Their findings showed that wherever processes within cultural and religious subsystems of society were weakened, changing values led to the disintegration of systems and brought changes in moral attitudes of today’s society. Interest has shifted from religious and philosophical positions to the fields of medicine and general health. In Ireland many people had already lost their faith in the church due to clergy abuse over many decades.

People’s faith was what they had held on to, having given them strength, belief, confidence and trust in something bigger than themselves. This belief diminished in people’s lives and suicide increased. The Covid-19 world experience will also add to many changes worldwide. Medically it is known that resistance to change produces deep psychological disturbances leading to multiple stresses. We have to change to learn new ways of living and working with family and social interactions. If changes do not occur, suicide, parasuicide, self-harm and mental illness will increase owing to the fear, anxiety and intolerable pain in individuals globally.

Definitions of suicide, parasuicide and self-harming

These are issues that are very complicated to work with. Suicide is the act of ending one’s own life. Individuals who die by suicide, according to family and friends, have had long-lasting emotional problems. These may include anxiety, depression, unhappy relationships, unemployment, loneliness, feelings of guilt and very deep emotional tendencies to feel that no one cares about them.

The suicide of an individual may occur when the family least expects it and the individual decides to take their own life. Depressed people are at a high risk of suicide when they have a long history of an inability to communicate their needs. This is often a ‘secret’ place where there is no communication or knowledge between the family and the person contemplating suicide. No one is to blame, yet family guilt of not knowing why can cause so much pain and distress.

Parasuicide refers to suicide attempts or gestures and self-harm that do not result in death. It refers to self-harming behaviour identified by the client as suicidal; these non-fatal acts include those in which a person deliberately causes an injury to themselves or ingests prescribed drugs in excess (“Parasuicide,” n.d.). Sometimes a suicidal gesture may involve cutting wrists to draw blood but not deeply enough to damage veins or arteries; skin may be burned superficially with lighted cigarettes to release tensions.

Related issues

The presence of other mental disorder symptoms is often noticed in such cases, such as bipolar disorder, formerly called manic depression, a mental illness that involves the sufferer having at least one manic (overly excited or irritable mood) or nearly manic episode (Medicine.com, 2023). Mood swings of this condition can last for weeks, causing distress at work and significant relationship problems. Bipolar depression, significant sadness, irritability, hopelessness, and an increase or decrease in appetite, weight or sleep can result in sufferers wanting, planning or attempting to kill themselves or someone else.

A strong wish for attention, care and understanding from others is an underlying reason for para- suicidal behaviour (Reidbord, 2009). The author of these observations adds the words of the person in such pain as “I am here.” “Help me.” “Care about me.” “I am lonely.” “I am scared.” “I need someone to care”. These are the deeply hidden words from that secret place where they are too deep to be spoken but professionals need to be aware of their presence.

The retrieval of pre and perinatal memories

In our work as pre and perinatal psychotherapists, looking for that which is not visible is at the foundation of working with those who are suffering the excruciating pain that can be at the primal roots of suicidal tendencies. The established science of pre and perinatal psychology is at the foundation of pre and perinatal psychotherapy and is dedicated to the in-depth exploration of the psychological dimension based on the mental and emotional development of the unborn and newborn child. At Amethyst over the years we have facilitated the experiential work of at least 3,000 people reliving their conception- to-birth journey. In the early days the techniques we used were primal integration, regression therapy, and guided fantasies (Ward, 2014). As we progressed, we utilised more gentle therapeutic styles through visualisation, meditation, artwork, sand play, music, and shamanic journeying, particularly by quantum field experiences with the rocks and stones of the Irish landscape.

It also resulted in the preconception and conception meditations as devised by the late Alison Hunter in workshops and training weekends (Ward, 2020). In individual sessions we devised and utilised personal visualisations for our clients enabling them to experience the earliest place of intolerable trauma and helping to dissipate this at its origin. Throughout their pregnancy individuals, at whatever age they were undergoing therapy, found different places of transmarginal stress but many continued to find it in the area of conception.

Spiritual evolution

The depths of fear, terror and/or shock of original separation from the spirit and light world, coming into a physical body (sometimes with professional indifference by those supposed to care for us)

can be experienced throughout the pregnancy at various points of trauma. The terror and fear of the simple cell, the blastocyst, the embryo, the foetus and the preborn can exceed the limits of tolerance and it can scream inwardly for care and help. It is here, in the places of absolute terror, or transmarginal stress, experienced by the embryo or foetus, that Frank Lake believed the splitting off occurred and created the roots of severe mental health issues and personality disorders. In these places the post- traumatic stress syndrome could rise like a phoenix from the ashes in later years, surfacing when similar patterns occur, duplicating or replicating the transmarginal stress experienced in these primal places. It might possibly be an answer as to why not every war veteran suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder or suicidal feelings even though they all experienced similar war-induced trauma. The responses are possibly induced by primal conditioning as in suicidal tendencies.

The complicated issues of suicidal feelings, parasuicide and self-harm are thought to have their origins in these early primal beginnings. The great need to be cared for, knowing someone is there to care for us, is at the origin of our whole being. It is a primal human essential need. Our belief is that the way our parents prepare or do not prepare for our conception, the state of our parents at our conception, the way we are in gestation, and the type of birth we have all affect the way we live our lives and the way we die. The miracle is that we can find the circuit breaker and change the negative patterns. The following is a case study that shows a medical intervention injury.

Case study: Matthew, age seven years

A very concerned mother brought her seven-year-old son to Carmel as she had heard about pre and perinatal work and had her suspicions that the problems may have started further back than anyone had thought. Matthew kept threatening to kill himself and said that he didn’t want to die but he had “to get rid of the pain”. He was a passive lovely boy but each year experienced milestones that caused behaviour changes and mood changes that were unexplainable. In Session One with Carmel, his mother explained that when she was two and a half months pregnant with Matthew, she had an internal medical investigation. This was an invasive procedure in which the child’s head was injured in utero and the umbilical sac was damaged.

Continuing with his story, at two years of age he fell out of his mother’s arms onto his head. His terror was so great he was hospitalised and from this time the problems continued. At five he played video games, playing more and more dangerous games. He displayed immense anger, shouting and screaming with tantrums, but medical tests showed no pathology.

Suddenly, in this first session with Carmel he covered himself up with cushions in a womblike position, put his hands on his head on the fontanel (the gap between the bones of the skull) and went berserk, screaming “It hurts! It’s going to kill me. Let me out! Get your hands off me!” In an absolute rage he roared “I shall kill myself!” This was the place he had experienced past terror in the womb where the transmarginal stress caused intolerable mental stress. His mother explained that this was how he went on year after year since he fell on his head. It may in some ways have replicated a womb trauma.

In Session Two Matthew came in and remembered that he was going to kill himself in the last session. He said that he had to put sharp, cold, metal things on his head. He had the choice of sand play, art, cushions, drawing, finger painting and drama to work with. During this session he drew what he was feeling and seeing: metal instruments, very lifelike and explainable. He drew scissors, forceps, and instruments that would have been used for the internal examination at two and a half months in gestation and also for his suction forceps birth.

In Session Three Matthew sat on the cushions and blankets. He put his hands on his head and said that he had dreamt that it all got too painful, and he killed himself: “I put a knife into the top of my head, and I killed myself.” Again, he declared he “did not want to die but wanted to get rid of the pain”.

As the sessions continued, he gradually built his own womb with cushions and blankets, climbed in repeatedly, and eventually got out his own way. By putting his own hands on his head and pressing down he said, “I feel better”. He was angry with lots of people around him, for not helping him. It took 20 sessions to desensitise Mathew’s fear and anger. His mother and father said there was a vast difference in their son; he had turned a corner. The sessions stopped as Matthew no longer wanted to kill himself and was the passive, lovely boy without the millstone of traumas he had experienced.

Although depression was not mentioned in this case study, depression is often an accompanying issue. Depression can be frozen anger and needs to be melted through gentle techniques. I am always astounded when I read metaphors written by professionals describing depression as ‘feelings which describe a sense of being pressed into a dark space; a sense of not being able to move; or see any light at the end of the tunnel.’ I do not think it is so difficult, with a bit of imagination, to become aware of what these metaphors may be describing and to do some research on traumatisation during the pre and perinatal material that is being produced globally.

The difficulty of verification

For those who have not experienced this work, are deeply sceptical or have never heard of it before, it is vitally important before continuing to look at the primal roots of suicide, that the general understanding and knowledge of how that which may be invisible to us from the very early times may be made knowable to us.

The major question that is so often asked is how this cell consciousness, foetal memory or birth trauma can be real. The most convinced person is the one who has experienced the hidden places of life from a primal place so far back that it is difficult for them to comprehend. The regression experience has profoundly modified symptoms of major life difficulties. In the case of suicidal tendencies, having found them at the source, the emotions and desires to end it all have dissipated with many clients. Once the place where the emotions originated has been found, and the client realises that these feelings do not belong in the present day, there is great hope and often a positive behaviour change for the future. I also acknowledge that people who ascribe to past lives as researched and published by Jon R. G. and Troya Turner in Whole-Self Psychology, Philosophy and Education would also take the problems further back because respect for all of our beliefs and traditions is uppermost for peace and healing for the client (Turner & Troya, 1996/2017).

Verifying cellular memory

In the 1970s Frank Lake attempted to prove it was physiologically conceivable that the cellular and primitive body-brain function of the organism at six to 12 weeks could cope with the complex tasks of findings from deep experiential work. Taking all this back to conception, Frank Lake believed that it was possible that in the protein molecular structure of that single cell there is a capability to react to internal and external, good and bad, and pleasurable and noxious stimuli. He stated that it was obvious to anyone who had studied the single-cell amoeba that a single cell could do so much.

Molecules of emotion and recent advances in cell biology

Frank Lake died in 1982 and other researchers have provided scientific answers to the questions he was asking 60 years ago. Candace Pert (1997-2003) discovered the opiate receptor and many other receptors in the brain and body which led to an understanding of the chemicals that travel between the mind and body. She discovered that the brain makes its own morphine and that emotional states are created by the release of the chemicals called endorphins, shorthand for endogenous morphine. This pioneering research has shown how our internal chemicals, the neuropeptides and their receptors are the actual biological underpinnings of our awareness, manifesting themselves as our emotions, beliefs and expectations and profoundly influencing how we respond to, and experience our world. Dr Bruce Lipton (2005), a cellular biologist, believes parental programming is first initiated in the formation of germ cells (egg and sperm) through a process called genomic imprinting. He has replaced the notion of nature and nurture with the environment, an important aspect of pre and perinatal work, with the blastocyst, embryo or foetus body growing in the womb environment.

Teenage suicides

Teenage or youth suicide is when a young person below the age of majority deliberately ends their own life (Johns Hopkins Medicine, 2023). With the pressures of modern living and computer technology teenagers are under considerable stress. The difficulties in creating their own identity can lead to desocialisation in peer and school environments.

In a very enlightening and informative article, Stephanie Doupnik writes that teen suicide deaths have been rising in recent years and thoughtful treatment is necessary (Doupnik, 2019). Highlighted is the fact that suicide is the second leading cause of death after motor vehicle crashes. Also, children’s hospital visits for suicidal thoughts and suicidal attempts have doubled since 2008 (Yard et al., 2021). In treatment for suicide, it was found the adolescents liked the doctors, nurses and social workers they met in the hospitals and felt relieved and well cared for, knowing these professionals could support them. It sounds like wonderful work is being done and the recognition that teens need to have a supportive community around them as they recover from a mental health crisis is paramount.

It was also discovered that there were many complex triggers for the suicidal crises arising from complicated issues and it seemed no one event was ever the sole cause. In the pre and perinatal work this is true. There are so many stressful places in difficult pregnancies and births which lead to suicidal and parasuicidal thoughts. This work is still in its infancy and further education is needed, but the awareness and consciousness that there can be a focal point of origin for such distress is a beginning.

Case study: Henry, age 15 years

Henry’s mother brought her distressed son to Carmel for help. Henry had a history of parasuicide and his self-harming included slashing his wrists and scarring himself with knives. He would engage with no one, and a social worker suggested that he see Carmel. His mother explained she had considered abortion during her pregnancy.

In Session One Henry was silent and did not want to be there. Carmel explained she was not a psychiatrist and Henry was in charge of his own session, to which he was appreciative, and he responded to being respected. He felt unwanted and uncared for and was terrified of being hurt. Because no one wanted him he self-harmed, cutting his wrists with a knife, and was hospitalised multiple times.

In Session Two Henry had a choice of working with sand play, art, finger painting, therapeutic stories, blankets and cushion work, tunnels and tents, clay or Play Doh or acting. He was very responsive to the availability of different ways of working which had not been offered to him before. He was very creative and made an agreement with Carmel that he would not self-harm whilst seeing her.

As he continued the next 12 sessions his anger with his mother was apparent in his gestation. He shouted, “I wish I were dead”. He asked Carmel, “Do you care about me?” Carmel assured him and the therapeutic relationship of trust carried Henry through. He continued dissipating anger with his mother and the lack of care in utero and that there was no safe place for him; his suicidal resentment was based on wanting to make his mother sorry by killing himself. He repeated that he was only a dot, a nothing, when all this being unwanted was happening.

Henry eventually used cushions and blankets to make what he called his safe place, shouting, “At last I can’t be seen by anyone! I can die now! I’m only a dot! Come on mum kill me! I know I’m not right! I know she doesn’t want me. She doesn’t know I can hear her! I hurt my mum when I was only a dot! I am evil! I need to be destroyed!” A month passed and Henry returned for his sessions with his mother. He proceeded to get out the cushions and blankets, climbed under them and said “I will get peace away from you now! I hate you all! You hated me when I was very small, when I was only a dot! You wanted to be rid of me! You didn’t want me! You wanted to kill me!”

His mother told Carmel that Henry had been induced. From under the cushions and blankets it took Henry a long time to get out as he shouted, “Let me out! Let me out! You hate me! You don’t want me!” Henry gave a big push and came out from his ‘womb’ straight into his mother’s waiting hands.

In the next session, his mother was delighted with the change in Henry. He wanted to have his birth the way he chose. He made himself comfortable in the cushions and blankets, asked Carmel to play ‘birth’ music and from inside his cushioned womb Henry started to change the birth scripts that had become his life scripts. His new words were “Henry, I love you. You are the most beautiful boy. Mum loves me and really wants me! I have a right to live!” He then started moving gently and came out of his ‘womb’ in the way he wanted, gently and lovingly into the hands of his mum. Henry continued to see Carmel for another five sessions planning what he wanted to do with his life, with education and training. The lives of the family have changed. The old scripts have gone and he has learned to deal with the ups and downs of his life. As Henry says, “I want to live and love!”

Total or part dissociation from pre and perinatal trauma

These case studies show how a person can act out their pre and perinatal dynamics in gruesomely overt ways of suicidal tendencies. The dynamics are so hidden, repressed and overlaid with defences that the conscious mind has absolutely no access to or insight into them, being part of their unconscious dynamics (Adzema, 1996). The conscious mind can then completely convince itself that these dynamics are actual, real and doubtless parts of the situation and therefore require an actual, real and extreme response. This can be brought about by a total dissociation from one’s pre and perinatal experienced traumas. But the trauma is internalised and self-inflicted, and in this situation, the suicide may be completed and death occurs.

Where there does not exist total and complete dissociation of the pre and perinatal trauma and it is much closer to the surface, although still not in consciousness, it is more likely to be allowed to emerge into consciousness to be relived, healed and then removed forever as a motivation to end one’s life.

Part Two of this article is to be continued in the next issue of Inside Out

Shirley Ward is a Founder Member and Honorary Member of IAHIP. Now a published author, she has recently been awarded an Honorary Degree from the University of Bedfordshire. Her latest book Conscious Global Healing is hopefully to be published in 2024.

References: 

Adzema, M. D. (1996). The Scenery of Healing. APPPAH Journal, 10, 261-272.

Parasuicide. (n.d.). In APA Dictionary of Psychology. Retrieved from https://dictionary.apa.org/ parasuicide

Bak, T., Kardis, K., Nguyen Trong, D., Ciekanowski, Z., & Pala, G. (2019). Suicide and society: The sociological approach. Clinical Social Work and Health Intervention, 10(3), 63–69. https://doi. org/10.22359/cswhi_10_3_02

Carey, B. (2020, May 19). Is the pandemic sparking suicide? The New York Times. https://www.nytimes. com/2020/05/19/health/pandemic-coronavirus-suicide-health.html

Doupnik, S. (2019, October 30). Teen suicide is on the rise. So, I talked to teens who attempted suicide. Vox. https://www.vox.com/the-highlight/2019/10/30/20936636/suicide-mental-health-suicidal-thoughts-teens

Johns Hopkins Medicine. (2023). Teen Suicide. https://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/health/conditions- and-diseases/teen-suicide

Lake, F. (1973). Clinical theology: A theological and psychiatric basis to clinical pastoral care. Darton Longman & Todd.

Lipton, B. (2005). The Biology of Belief: Unleashing the Power of Consciousness, Matter & Miracles. Elite Books. Medicine.com. (2023). Bipolar Disorder. https://www.medicine.com/condition/bipolar-disorder O’Donohue, J. (2004). Divine Beauty Lecture [Lecture].

Pert, C. B. (1997/2003). Molecules of Emotion. Scribner.

Reidbord, S. (2009). Borderline personality disorder: parasuicide. Reidbord’s Reflections. http://blog. stevenreidbordmd.com/?p=123

Turner, J. R. G., & Troya. (1996). Echoes From Hell: Memories (Rev. 2017).

Ward, S. (2014). Fractals from the Womb: A Journey through Pre and Perinatal Psychotherapy (p. 30).

Twin Flame Productions.

Ward, S. (2020). Birth Earth Our Future (pp. 139–148). Twin Flame Productions.

Yard, E., Radhakrishnan, L., Ballesteros, M. F., et al. (2021). Emergency Department Visits for Suspected Suicide Attempts Among Persons Aged 12–25 Years Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic — United States, January 2019–May 2021. MMWR Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, 70, 888– 894. https://doi.org/10.15585/mmwr.mm7024e1