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HammeredOut
07-18-2011, 07:06 PM
"Woody Paige Writes About Being Saved From Suicide
By TONI MONKOVIC
Most sports fans know Woody Paige as the goofy, impassioned, mischievous panelist on ESPN’s “Around the Horn.”

He’s also a columnist for The Denver Post, and on Thursday he wrote about the Broncos’ Kenny McKinley and what can be done to prevent suicide. He spoke from firsthand experience.

Why would a smart, personable, resolute, “happy-go-lucky” Kenny McKinley — with a college education, a young son, a $385,000 contract and a bright future in football and life — commit suicide Sept. 20, 2010?

Why?

I think I understand why.

I know an older man who eight years ago this month was committed to committing suicide.

Me."

http://fifthdown.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/24/woody-paige-writes-about-being-saved-from-suicide/


This article saddened me, as he is one of my favorite sports writers and personalities.

Softskull
07-18-2011, 09:26 PM
I like Woody, even as crazy and absurd as he can get. I'm glad he didn't do it. Some French guy said the first question about life should be is it worth continuing. Again, I'm glad Woody's answer was yes.

MOtorboat
07-18-2011, 09:33 PM
Hopefully, this opens up the eyes of the people who call Woody names, but get their panties in a bunch when the same names are applied to them.

People exist outside of this board. Remember that when you feel the need to personally attack journalists, athletes and coaches.

HammeredOut
07-18-2011, 09:40 PM
This sorta hit home hard for me. I had a close relative who I was close to and he and I cleaned out Vegas for a few years, all sports betting on hockey, and NFL. One offseason, he was out working with a trucking company who he had some part time work with, and found out his girlfriend was cheating on him. That is when he committed suicide and took his life. After that incident, I was forever changed. I still take vegas to the house. He was responsible for introducing me to sportsbetting, and playing the complex systems I play today. I attribute a lot of my success to sportswriters, and forecasters like Woody Paige, and Im glad he never did it. Sportsbetters like myself are junkies for sports information and stats, and it wouldn't be possible if wasnt for writers like Woody.

Broncogator
07-18-2011, 09:41 PM
Hopefully, this opens up the eyes of the people who call Woody names, but get their panties in a bunch when the same names are applied to them.

People exist outside of this board. Remember that when you feel the need to personally attack journalists, athletes and coaches.

Hey Mo...you suck! :coffee:

Traveler
07-18-2011, 10:28 PM
First Andrew Mason, now Paige too? I just had a friend/neighbor hang himself in his garage two weeks ago.

Might get skewered for what I'm about say, but so be it. Committing suicide is probably one of the most selfish acts. Ever!

Excluding those that have served in the military during wartime who will deal with numerous mental issues once returning to civilian life, I'll never understand- and never hope to experience it personally- the suicidal thought process.

How does one get to the point of actually planning to kill themselves? Do they even think about those lives they'll be forever changing. Or is it only about them finding a way out of whatever is troubling them?

My neighbor had three children, a wife and grandson that he was taking care of. Now only she's left to try and keep the family together and trying to stay afloat.

The life insurance company won't payout since he took his own life. Very few options available to her now. I'll miss my friend, but I'll also find it hard to forgive him for being so selfish and weak. He took the punk's way out.

BeefStew25
07-18-2011, 10:30 PM
I got a suicide rider on my life insurance policy.

socalthunder
07-18-2011, 11:01 PM
I got a suicide rider on my life insurance policy.

Did NTL sell that to you?

BeefStew25
07-18-2011, 11:16 PM
Did NTL sell that to you?

No. He doesn't have a license in FL. He wishes he did though!

scott.475
07-18-2011, 11:19 PM
I'm so confused. Why is this brought up now? I checked the interwebs and did not see that Woody committed suicide. Why is this brought up today?

I did find the long list of antidepressants Woody was taking interesting...and yet he was still suicidal. Commercials for antidepressants even give warnings that use of antidepressants have been shown to increase the violent and suicidal feelings! Is that not a problem??? I think it is fair to say treating the symptoms, not the root causes, sure doesn't work, yet we continue looking for a solution in a prescription bottle.

scott.475
07-18-2011, 11:21 PM
This sorta hit home hard for me. I had a close relative who I was close to and he and I cleaned out Vegas for a few years, all sports betting on hockey, and NFL. One offseason, he was out working with a trucking company who he had some part time work with, and found out his girlfriend was cheating on him. That is when he committed suicide and took his life. After that incident, I was forever changed. I still take vegas to the house. He was responsible for introducing me to sportsbetting, and playing the complex systems I play today. I attribute a lot of my success to sportswriters, and forecasters like Woody Paige, and Im glad he never did it. Sportsbetters like myself are junkies for sports information and stats, and it wouldn't be possible if wasnt for writers like Woody.

So your glad Woody didn't commit suicide because it would have hurt your sports betting? That's funny, in a sick kinda way, but still...funny :lol:

socalthunder
07-18-2011, 11:23 PM
No. He doesn't have a license in FL. He wishes he did though!

I saw a guy at the baseball game the other night vs. Giants. he looked like he could be your dad or another close relative. Seriously, I almost approached him.

BeefStew25
07-18-2011, 11:36 PM
I saw a guy at the baseball game the other night vs. Giants. he looked like he could be your dad or another close relative. Seriously, I almost approached him.

My daddy was half mongoose half George Michael.

nevcraw
07-18-2011, 11:56 PM
My daddy was half mongoose half George Michael.

wham or sports machine?

topscribe
07-19-2011, 12:13 AM
Touching story about Woody.

He's still a hack, but a touching story . . .

-----

Buff
07-19-2011, 01:38 AM
Oh good, let's bump the suicide threads.

sneakers
07-19-2011, 04:12 AM
Zoloft is the best, without it I would jump off a building!

Juriga72
07-19-2011, 06:45 AM
My wife's father killed himself when she was 16 or 17. I had met her 10 years after this event, and on the day we got married... Her... her mother and her brother ( also in our wedding) all broke down to the point of almost being unable to proceed.

The same damn thing happened at the birth of both of our sons. IF iI could meet this azzwipe, I would love to just punch him for hs selfish act that hurts even me over 15 years later.

BigSarge87
07-19-2011, 10:01 AM
First Andrew Mason, now Paige too? I just had a friend/neighbor hang himself in his garage two weeks ago.

Might get skewered for what I'm about say, but so be it. Committing suicide is probably one of the most selfish acts. Ever!

Excluding those that have served in the military during wartime who will deal with numerous mental issues once returning to civilian life, I'll never understand- and never hope to experience it personally- the suicidal thought process.

How does one get to the point of actually planning to kill themselves? Do they even think about those lives they'll be forever changing. Or is it only about them finding a way out of whatever is troubling them?

My neighbor had three children, a wife and grandson that he was taking care of. Now only she's left to try and keep the family together and trying to stay afloat.

The life insurance company won't payout since he took his own life. Very few options available to her now. I'll miss my friend, but I'll also find it hard to forgive him for being so selfish and weak. He took the punk's way out.

I completely understand where your coming from. I've always had this viewpoint of suicide myself. I used to make so light of it that I taught a suicide prevention course a couple years ago where I used games of hangman as the class learning activity and we laughed about it the whole time. I just thought suicide was the cowards way out.

However, after going through some pretty serious depression last year, I can understand (a little) the mentality behind it. It was the weirdest shit I've ever experienced.

I had no reason to be down, I had just got promoted and changed jobs from being in the artillery for 10 years to being a budget analyst at the state headquarters. I had no freaking clue what I was doing and no real cross-training to help me out. It was truely a 'thrown to the wolves' type of situation. Things needed to get done and I had every full bird colonel in the state breathing down my neck. I remember after a couple of weeks here sitting at my desk and getting these insane panic attacks constantly that wouldn't go away. They were accompanied by a feeling like life was this huge crushing weight that you couldn't get out from under from but couldn't 'man up' and just bear it either (Similar to if beef was sitting on your head, jk). I know it's silly that something like that would trigger it but it did.

It was a mental sickness caused by stress, simple as that. I started thinking of ways to make it end and many times swallowing the business end of my hunting rifle seemed like the only solution.

Luckily I have an amazing wife who helped me through it and it eventually got easier and easier until it went away completely.

I still think suicide is completely selfish and a cowards way out, but I understand a little better what someone with REAL problems might be going through.

Bottom line, if anyone of you find yourself in this situation, please know that it will pass. It will go away the same as eating a bowl of bad chili followed by nachos and jalapenos will eventually go away (but still might leave some scarring).

Get some help, it's not a weakness, it's a sickness. Your only weak if you give up.

BroncoNut
07-19-2011, 10:51 AM
kinda surprises me that the mountain states have the higher suicide rates. it seems like it would be a happy and peaceful existence.

Nomad
07-19-2011, 11:00 AM
kinda surprises me that the mountain states have the higher suicide rates. it seems like it would be a happy and peaceful existence.

AK has alot of people with SAD, depression, anger issues and a high suicide rates especially more than normal amongst the military community here. That's why before you come here, they have to go through your med records and before a panel for questioning to make sure there is no mental issues. I guess it develops over time here for some.....lack of vitamin D.

Like this morning, it's gloomy, cool and rainy!

BroncoNut
07-19-2011, 11:03 AM
BigSarge, that sucks, glad you pulled through it. I've been on antidepressants since my mid 20's. I was diagnosed about that time, but believe I suffered from depression from early on. Depression runs rampant in my immediate family. having a mom go through it and all while you're growing up may also impress it on a teenager. I may go through bouts but I think the meds keep me from going off the deep end and taking my life (cue Rex to post "nut take your meds, flush them down the toilet, wait). Meds suck because you have a tough time getting your rocks off. I went off of them for a week and a half or so not too long ago (ran out and forgot to reorder) and it was like I was a teenager again. beating the shit out of that thing and shooting through layers of double ply toilet tissue. I was more aggressive in general too. I kinda liked that actually. but my blood levels are back to where they need to be now and ... well, fun time's over

anxiety and depression go hand in hand. Anxiety is the worst for me. It's torture. People (co-workers, roomies) can bring me alot of anxiety. I'm sociable, but really don't like dealing with most people or listening to them on things I could really care less about. I'm pretty darn impatient with people that beat around the bush

Sneakers, what makes you think you'd jump off a building without Zoloft?

BroncoNut
07-19-2011, 11:11 AM
AK has alot of people with SAD, depression, anger issues and a high suicide rates especially more than normal amongst the military community here. That's why before you come here, they have to go through your med records and before a panel for questioning to make sure there is no mental issues. I guess it develops over time here for some.....lack of vitamin D.

Like this morning, it's gloomy, cool and rainy!

ew. I don't know how I'd fair in Arkansas. I'd probably have to have one of those lamps on me

The Glue Factory
07-19-2011, 11:49 AM
It was a mental sickness caused by stress, simple as that. I started thinking of ways to make it end and many times swallowing the business end of my hunting rifle seemed like the only solution.

Luckily I have an amazing wife who helped me through it and it eventually got easier and easier until it went away completely.

I still think suicide is completely selfish and a cowards way out, but I understand a little better what someone with REAL problems might be going through.

Get some help, it's not a weakness, it's a sickness. Your only weak if you give up.


Apologies for the wall of words...


Until my brush with suicide I never understood suicide. Then again anyone who is sufficiently well adjusted won't understand suicide. After my brush I don't make light of it (not that I did before, but I take it much more seriously now.)

Like BigSarge, I was in a very stressful job - Resident Counselor at a group home for teenage boys addicted to drugs. It was 54 hrs of work on a 4 day work week, living on premises. First job outa college so I couldn't afford an apartment to go to and little support from the organization let alone outside.

Within 6 months I was suicidal and didn't realize it. By the grace of God Almighty (who ochestrated events so save me from my self-destructiveness) I am here today. Why was I suicidal? I was empty. Completely empty. So empty that putting a gallon of gas in the tank would have still left it empty. And the solutions I did see were so far away that they might as well not have existed at all. I didn't want to off myself yet, but the first step was there. No way out.

I didn't realize it but I was two steps down the road to self-murder. The second step was a whispering of a solution. Take yourself out of the equation. Not a constant thought. Not even a cohesive thought. Just something that rumbles in the back of your mind, just under the surface; peaking it's head out every once in a while.

Fortunately, God did not let it go beyond that, but it was enough for me to understand just how desperate my situation was once I had recovered my mind.


Yes, suicide is selfish. There is no thought of what impact your action will have on others. It is also mental illness. People are not themselves, either. Their problems are so huge and no other solution seems sufficient to end those problems.

The solution to suicide? Make sure you do the "routine maintenance" on the relationships you care about. Be intimate (in a totally plutonic, non-physical way) with those you consider too valuable to lose. It was a visit from my parents over a single weekend that saved me from suicide. They didn't even know until years later that I was even marginally suicidal even though they knew that weekend that I needed immense amounts of love poured into my life.

Not only did my parents give me life, they also saved it. And now they have 3 more grand-children that they wouldn't have had, had I not benefitted from their visit.


Please, please, PLEASE; do not make light of suicide. Even if you don't understand it. It's serious and you likely don't know that someone you're friends with or related to is suicidal.

The Glue Factory
07-19-2011, 11:53 AM
ew. I don't know how I'd fair in Arkansas. I'd probably have to have one of those lamps on me

AK = Alaska :listen:

HammeredOut
07-19-2011, 02:44 PM
Apologies for the wall of words...


Until my brush with suicide and never understood suicide. Then again anyone who is sufficiently well adjusted won't understand suicide. After my brush I don't make light of it (not that I did before, but I take it much more seriously now.)

Like BigSarge, I was in a very stressful job - Resident Counselor at a group home for teenage boys addicted to drugs. It was 54 hrs of work on a 4 day work week, living on premises. First job outa college so I couldn't afford an apartment to go to and little support from the organization let alone outside.

Within 6 months I was suicidal and didn't realize it. By the grace of God Almighty (who ochestrated events so save me from my self-destructiveness) I am here today. Why was I suicidal? I was empty. Completely empty. So empty that putting a gallon of gas in the tank would have still left it empty. And the solutions I did see were so far away that they might as well not have existed at all. I didn't want to off myself yet, but the first step was there. No way out.

I didn't realize it but I was two steps down the road to self-murder. The second step was a whispering of a solution. Take yourself out of the equation. Not a constant thought. Not even a cohesive thought. Just something that rumbles in the back of your mind, just under the surface; peaking it's head out every once in a while.

Fortunately, God did not let it go beyond that, but it was enough for me to understand just how desperate my situation was once I had recovered my mind.


Yes, suicide is selfish. There is no thought of what impact your action will have on others. It is also mental illness. People are not themselves, either. Their problems are so huge and no other solution seems sufficient to end those problems.

The solution to suicide? Make sure you do the "routine maintenance" on the relationships you care about. Be intimate (in a totally plutonic, non-physical way) with those you consider too valuable to lose. It was a visit from my parents over a single weekend that saved me from suicide. They didn't even know until years later that I was even marginally suicidal even though they knew that weekend that I needed immense amounts of love poured into my life.

Not only did my parents give me life, they also saved it. And now they have 3 more grand-children that they wouldn't have had, had I not benefitted from their visit.


Please, please, PLEASE; do not make light of suicide. Even if you don't understand it. It's serious and you likely don't know that someone you're friends with or related to is suicidal.

This is a subject that has hit everybody in some way. I will tell my story.

I didn't always live in Aspen, infact I was born north of the boarder. I realize that sucide to some is a selfish act, but to understand it is another.

My parents are Native American, one is from Canada, and the other is from the States. Well growing up as a young kid, my mom dissappeared from my life and ran away from our family when I was about 4 or 5. My brother was sent off to a group home and I never got to see him, he just went from group home to group home. I was a stone throw away from doing the same thing as my brother going group home to group home. My dad was an alcoholic, and travelled for what seemed like months at a time, so I never saw him. One day my aunty stopped over to see my dad, but came to realize at the young age of 6, that I was taking care of myself at my dads house for a week or so. I even remember making my lunch, and jumping on the bus to school. So my aunty packed me up, and likely saved me from being in a group home like my older brother.

After a few years of living with my aunt and uncle, my dad started to come around to visit me, and one day he decided to take me back and take care of me when I was about 8 or 9. Everything was back to the way it was, when I lived with him the first time, he would leave me for weeks at a time, but this time I got to know the neighbours who turned out to be a priest from the local church. They took me in, whenever my dad wasn't around, which was a lot.

When I was about 12 years old, I can remember being home alone all the time, and this was not uncommon for me, and one day I walked into my dads bedroom, loaded up his gun, put it in my mouth and pulled the trigger. Somehow the gun misfired, and the bullet never went off. I can remember thinking how much I hate being alone, and how mad at the world I was. All because I was left alone, with nobody around all the time.

I did manage to make it threw highschool, with this incident still deeply bothering me. I just tried to forget it all together like it never happened, and really a state of denile. During highschool, my dad sold his house, packed up and moved to florida. I didn't go with him, since he moved into a little one bedroom place. At this point I was sorta grown up at the age of 18. So I managed without him or my mom, who we found 5 years after she dissappeared. My mom I found out was an alcohlic, and drug addict during the time she took off, and continues to be. Well I made it into college, and during this time, I had a gf of 3 years. So there I was in college at the age of 21 with no parents around, nobody really to talk too, other then my GF. Well she breaks up with me and kicks me out of the only place I ever really known as home, and the first time in my life somebody was ever there for me. So there I am, out on the street, about 4 months from graduating, and I am homeless. So I decided that since I have no where to go, nobody to talk to, then what did it matter if I go and kill myself. So I decided that jumping off the top of a tall building would do this time. Not long after, there I was, sitting with my legs swinging outside off a 14 story building sitting inside the window, with my life flashing infront of my eyes, or just trying to think why I should stay. Some stranger saved me that day, and talked me out of it. He gave me a place to stay for a few months until I got to finish school, and get back on my feet. Which I did.

It took me a long time to realize that the problems I had was never to due with drugs or alcohol, but simply the fact, I didn't have anybody to listen to me or talk to me. Well I find out later in life that my mom was severely abused as a child, and my dad was abducted by the Church as a child, and forced into a Residential School, where there was in some cases 51% death rate. So it really wasn't until later on in life that I realized that it wasn't my parents fault, and they really did care about me. They just couldn't communicate with me, because my dad taken away from his family at the age of 5, his language, culture, and heritage was stripped away from him with all family skills. I was just a victum of the cycle. I never took any pills for treatment. I do use medicinal reefer which calms me down.

Thats when one of my cousins who was almost in the same boat as me, decided that we take ourselves to Las Vegas and just dissappear. Thats when we got into sportsbetting, at the time, I could call every hockey game, while he was the football guy. So there we where sitting in Vegas in Sports Gambling, and doing really well. We hooked up with a local sports gambler who bankrolled us 20 grand one week, and sent him back 40grand the next day. That was the start of our Vegas Sportsbetting. I became a real junkie for sports information and statistics after that. Then one offseason, we flew back home, and he took his life over his GF who dumped him. Which is why I thought the Woody Paige article was close to home for me. I appreciate sportswriters, and forecasters like Woody, and guys like him have become closer to heart then before, as we shared some of the same struggles.

Now I am a happy man with a beautiful wife and 3 kids.