When someone dies, especially at an untimely age, we want to know why. Whether we knew the deceased, or they were a complete stranger, or in Matthew Perry’s case a “friend,” that question is on everyone’s lips.
According to HuffPost, some people become fixated on the cause of death, spending endless hours on the internet searching for clues.
“I think when we hear about someone passing away at a young age, it rocks our sense of normalcy,” said Los Angeles-based therapist Rachel Thomasian. “We operate with the general belief that people live until they are older and, barring a major catastrophe, will die well after they retire. Believing this is our brain’s way of keeping psychologically safe from worrying about all the bad things that could actually happen.”
Finding out the cause of death gives us some sense of meaning as to why this could happen, says the expert.
“People have a natural fear of their own death, so when they hear of an untimely death, it might give them a sense of control to know how they died so they can prevent it,” Thomasian added. “So when we hear about someone who dies at a young age, it reminds us not only of our own mortality but that we too are not immune from dying much sooner than our 100th birthday.”
In this age of information overload, people pride themselves on their ability to seek out answers. Not knowing how someone died is a part of a puzzle that needs to be competed in their minds, say experts.
“This neurological need to understand how and why someone died relates to that concept social psychologists call ‘cognitive closure,’ which refers to the motivation to find answers to ambitious situations,” says Becky Stuempfig, a therapist based in Southern California. “All of us have different levels of need for cognitive closure, and this need often increases during stressful events such as a death.”
In general, it is not a bad thing to ferret out information that will calm our fears. This is especially true when children die, and we have a desperate need to understand the cause of death to avoid a similar loss and to give some reason and understanding to this traumatic event.
But this impulse can become problematic in certain situations, said Stuempfig, if your desire to learn the cause of someone’s death becomes obsessive and interferes with your daily life, or disrespects the family of the deceased.
“On the extreme alternative end, those who fixate on all the alternative ways one could die young are usually dealing with some form of anxiety,” said Thomasian. In this case, if your desire for this information is rooted in a deeper personal problem, you may want to work with a therapist.
It’s important to acknowledge why you are consumed with a person’s death, say the therapists. For example, if a person dies from suspected suicide, it may be helpful to have open discussions with loved ones about how they take care of their mental health.
And try not to judge others if the cause of death is self-inflected or a drug overdose.
“Remember that many times the cause of death is not revealed openly because of the family members’ fears about how others will respond and judge them.” noted Stuempfig. “In the case of substance abuse overdose or death by suicide, family members are often reluctant to share the cause of death out of fear of judgment or blame.”
Stuempfig suggests focusing on how you can help those impacted by death, by dropping off a meal or helping with funeral arrangements instead of frantically looking for information to confirm “that won’t happen to me.” Spend more energy on the choices we have on confronting life instead of worrying about confronting death.