Attempted Suicide, Committed Suicide: The Signs We Miss Until It Is Too Late

By Richard Agodzo

There are stories we only understand when we slow down long enough to see what was always there.

This is one of them.

The Post That Looked Like Life Was Perfect

I received a post on Instagram from someone I will call Bediako, not his real name.

We weren’t friends, but we had over 700 mutual friends, the kind of digital closeness that makes someone feel familiar, even if you’ve never had a conversation.

His post was beautiful. A clean, confident picture. A bright smile. A calm, composed posture. And a burgundy suit that spoke of elegance and control.

It was the kind of picture people post when life is going well.

But I pay attention to captions.

So I read it.

Once.
Twice.
Three times.

Something didn’t sit right.

Fourth.
Fifth.

By the sixth time, I saw it.

The message wasn’t ordinary.

It was written in reverse.

When I took my time to understand it, the truth hit me heavily:

This was not just a caption.

It was a goodbye.

 

When a Caption Becomes a Cry for Help

I didn’t scroll past.

I went deeper.

I opened his profile and started reading everything, his captions, his reposts, his timeline.

And what I discovered was unsettling.

For eleven months, Bediako had been speaking, just not in a way many of us would immediately understand.

There were:

• Posts about feeling tired
• Reposts about loneliness
• Quotes about disappearing
• Subtle reflections on pain
• Words that sounded poetic but carried weight

Individually, they looked normal.

Together, they told a story.

A story of someone slowly sinking.

A story of someone asking for help, quietly.

 

“If Pillows Could Talk”

That same day, Bediako had seen a post I made during International Men's Day.

The theme was:

“If Pillows Could Talk.”

It spoke about men and silence.

About how many men carry pain without expression.

About how society teaches men to endure rather than speak.

Because strength is often misunderstood as silence.

But pillows know.

They hear the quiet breakdowns.

They hold the sleepless nights.

They witness what the world never sees.

Maybe, just maybe, that post made Bediako feel seen.

Before It Is Called “Attempted” or “Committed”

We often hear the phrases:

• Attempted suicide
• Committed suicide

As if they are sudden events.

But they are rarely sudden.

Before those words are used, there is usually a long trail of signals.

And in today’s world, many of those signals live in the digital space.

The challenge is not that the signs are absent.

The challenge is that they are often misread, ignored, or normalised.

 

The Signs That Sit at Our Blindside

Bediako’s story is not isolated. It reflects patterns that many people overlook every day.

Some of the signs include:

1. Unusual or Cryptic Messages: Captions that feel coded, reversed, or unusually deep for the moment.
2. Repeated Themes of Exhaustion or Escape: Posts about being tired, wanting rest, or disappearing not just once, but consistently.
3. Emotional Contradictions: A smiling photo paired with a heavy or dark caption
4. Gradual Withdrawal: Less engagement, fewer conversations, more isolation, even if posts continue.
5. Reposts That Tell a Story: People often share what they cannot say directly.
6. Sudden Calmness After Distress: Sometimes, when someone has made a difficult internal decision, they appear unusually at peace.

These are not always obvious.

But when patterns form, they matter.

 

Completing the Story

I couldn’t ignore it.

I reached out.

A simple message:

“Hey, I saw your post. Are you okay?”

At first, there was no response.

Minutes felt like hours.

Then a reply came.

Short.

Careful.

Guarded.

But it was a response.

We talked.

Not perfectly.
Not deeply at first.
But enough.

Enough to interrupt the silence.

Enough to remind him that someone was paying attention.

Enough to create a pause.

And sometimes, a pause can change everything.

I also reached out to a few mutuals, people closer to him.

Quietly. Respectfully.

Because sometimes, support needs to come from more than one voice.

Bediako did not become a headline.

His story did not end with “committed.”

And that matters.

 

The Reality We Must Face

In a world where we scroll endlessly:

We see, but we don’t always observe.
We react, but we don’t always respond.
We connect, but we don’t always care deeply enough to check in.

And so, the signs remain:

visible, but unnoticed.

 

A Different Way Forward

What if we became more intentional?

What if we paused a little longer on captions that feel different?

What if we checked in when something feels off, even if we are not sure?

What if we stopped assuming that every smile means someone is okay?

Because sometimes, the difference between attempted and prevented
is not an expert.

It is attention.

 

Final Reflection

Bediako’s story is a reminder:

Before a life becomes a statistic,
before a story is told in the past tense,
Before the world says “we didn’t know”, there were signs.

They were in the captions.
In the reposts.
In the silence between posts.

Not hidden.

Just at our blindside.