Right, Left and Centre: The Politics of Some Canadians by Dave Jaffe. Chapter 34, Part Two of 'The Man Who Killed Himself'

    Chapter 34, Part Two of 'The Man Who Killed Himself'


     Peter Basilio's family had its problems. His brother Mike was always hassling with supervisors on the job. Peter suffered from bi-polar syndrome. And Peter's sister got a job as a cook with a high government official. She ran into problems also, though in the end she kept her job. Still, the Basilio siblings knew that Peter was the one family member with the most problems.
     This kind and sensitive individual had to stay on his medications or 'meds'. If he stopped taking them, trouble developed. In the mid-1980's, he listened to a new friend and stopped taking his pills. Soon he fell into a great depression, left his rooming house home, and ended up homeless. Later he went back on his medication.
    He then took a bus to Toronto and ended up in a house that took care of the homeless.  The enormity of the life ahead of him with all its problems overwhelmed him. Now full of despair, he took his own life at the age of 42. Peter was a progressive caring person who couldn't deal with his problems. "I miss him," said someone who knew him before he died. " Peter was a really nice guy."
     Peter's life and death must be seen in its social context. As the coloumnist Barbara Yaffe pointed out in the pages of 'The Vancouver Sun' some time ago, British Columbia has a very high incidence of mental illnesses. Then again, if Peter's father hadn't died in a car crash when Peter was in his teens and had stayed with Peter's mother, Peter might have lived a normal depression-free life. He might have even been alive to-day.