

Swartz’s Girlfriend Shares Details Of His Last Days - Jagat
http://techcrunch.com/2013/02/04/swartzs-girlfriend-shares-intimate-details-of-his-last-days-explains-why-aaron-died/

======
hkmurakami
HN thread on Taren's post iteslf:
<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5164287>

~~~
anthonyb
Thanks. I'd much rather have a discussion there than on TechCrunch's tasteless
cash in.

------
nullc
> pessimistic arrogance

[...]

> Self-esteem, needless to say, was definitely not Aaron’s problem.

Probably the first comments I've seen about Aaron since his death that rang
true to me as someone who'd interacted with him. :P :(

But sometimes the arrogance and self-importance is just a shield that hides
something more fragile on the inside. After hearing about his suicide, I'd
just taken that to be the case.

------
kjackson2012
At least in his particular situation, committing suicide was not rational
because they hadn't even gone to trial yet, and there was still a very
reasonable chance that he could have escaped the charges.

If presented with several viable options, and a person chooses to end his life
instead of pursuing those perfectly viable options, doesn't that mean he had
some sort of mental issue? Whether it is depression or something else at that
point is just splitting hairs, in my opinion. If he could have had access to
some sort of mental health professional, maybe he could have gotten the
treatment he deserved so that he remained alive.

------
danso
I respect Taren's perspective on this and applaud her for continuing to raise
awareness for Aaron's cause, but I think it's difficult to believe that
depression didn't play a part in this. And before someone says, "Well, who
would know better than Taren"?...She herself said she was shocked by Aaron's
suicide. So there were undoubtedly things that were hidden even from her.

I think it's perfectly reasonable to argue that depression wasn't the sole
cause, for the reasons that Taren mentions and for the obvious fact that Aaron
seemed to be managing fine since the well-known incident more than five years
ago.

But it's also reasonable to argue that since Aaron had coped the past two
years since the indictment, that the threat of prosecution alone couldn't have
been the only trigger. What I get from Taren's essay is that Aaron was a
fighter and by this point, was well-versed in the intellectual aspects of the
law...why would fear and apprehension alone cause him to quit before the trial
even started?

I think we just have to accept that the factors in his decision were myriad
and complicated. Taren's post says that Aaron worked out every day until two
weeks before his death, when he got the flu. Given what we know about
exercise's impact on the brain and body, I think it's possible that the
sickness, and the lack of activity, had a negative impact on his ability to
cope. That, plus the events of the prosecution, plus any ongoing emotional
problems, and any other factors we don't know about...this all together may
have just been too much for him.

A few weeks ago, Taren gave an incredibly powerful eulogy for Aaron at the
memorial service in NYC:

[http://www.livestream.com/democracynow/video?clipId=pla_f83c...](http://www.livestream.com/democracynow/video?clipId=pla_f83c80fe-0fc0-474c-9936-efe8659466f6&utm_source=lslibrary&utm_medium=ui-
thumb)

[http://mretc.net/~cris/swartz-transcripts/taren-
transcript.t...](http://mretc.net/~cris/swartz-transcripts/taren-
transcript.txt)

One of the revelations she made then was how Aaron shut her and others out of
his life because he didn't want them to be entangled in the case:

    
    
    		For a long time we didn't talk about the case 
    		very much.  He wanted to protect me and he wanted to cordon 
    		it off from the rest of his life.  He was worried that I 
    		would be subpoenaed, or that his other friends would be 
    		subpoenaed, and so he kept it all to himself.  He kept all 
    		of the stress and the anger and the fear to himself.  
    
    		We started talking more and more about it over 
    		the last few months as it became clear that the government 
    		was not going to recognize that this was just one big 
    		mistake; that Steve Heymann, the prosecutor who was hell-
    		bent on destroying Aaron's life was not going to come to 
    		terms with the notion that Aaron was not a threat, that 
    		Aaron should not spend years behind bars, that Aaron 
    		should not be labeled a felon for the rest of his life.
    
    		In December there was a hearing that I went to 
    		with him -- the trial was delayed because another hearing 
    		at this hearing -- the decision was made to delay the 
    		trial until April.  And afterwards I -- we came out of the 
    		courtroom and I tried to give him a hug, and he pushed me 
    		away.  And he said, "Not in front of Steve Heymann.  I 
    		don't want to show Steve Heymann that."
    
    

Isolating oneself is an emotionally exhausting and painful state of being.
Moreso, I imagine, if you're doing it out of anxiety from an impending prison
sentence. And I think Taren is justified to attribute this kind of pain
directly to the nature of the prosecution. But Aaron's mental state is still a
factor in the tragedy, even if not the primary one.

~~~
dwj
If you read Aaron's blog, you'll see he posted about his illnesses back in
2007. From his account, it sounds like he suffered from burnout/CFS (chronic
fatigue syndrome). I would suspect that his 'flu' 2 weeks before his death
might have been a CFS/burnout episode. Severe depression can be a symptom, and
suicide is usually the end-result if you don't know what's happening.

I know this because I suffered from burnout and CFS myself, and had severe
depression, and I did quite a bit of research to figure out what was
happening.

The bottom line is that people like Aaron and myself who have a high capacity
for working incredibly hard also tend to suffer from burnout which can lead to
CFS and severe depression. The mistake Aaron made is that you CANNOT push
through it. The other mistake he made was hiding it from other people.

------
DungFu
Because every depressed person always acts outwardly depressed...

If this was the case, depression would be the easiest mental problem to solve
in the world.

