The End

Happily today we found Shahriar alive. He hadn’t eaten or drank anything for three days and it sounds like he’d been in quite a dark place but at least he’s not dead. The mental health team in Newcastle has decided to section him for possibly two months. Fill him with drugs, wipe his sensors clean then try to build him up again. It seems so crazy that a person has to get into such a shocking state before we’ll offer some form of support. There must be a better route to take long before we have to consider the mental institute.

To finish it all off I’ve been told that my relationship with Shahriar may well have been detrimental to his health. They feel as a snooping ‘journalist’ I would have been dragging up all the negativity in his life, possibly causing him to nose-dive emotionally and pushing him to consider taking his life. I find that a hard pill to swallow. I’ve certainly learnt some lessons on how to deal with a phone call of that nature, but as far as these relationships go it’s more about friendship and trust than the digging of dirt. When you spend that much time with someone you certainly do talk about the problems, but you talk about so much more. Just having someone to sit and chat to must be worth something. So I’ve been told for the benefit of his health I shouldn’t contact him for at least a few months. Maybe it would be better for these guys to have no friends at all then the only thing we could blame is the system, although we’d probably just end-up blaming them.