To the One We Lost on the Ledge of Gaisano Mall : An Open Journal

NOTE BEFORE YOU READ: META COULDN'T HANDLE THIS. MAYBE YOU CAN.

So, what you're about to read was originally posted on Facebook, until Meta’s bots took it down for allegedly “promoting suicide.” It wasn’t. It was about saving lives. About mental health, empathy, and the quiet desperation too many of us carry. Before it got removed, it had over 250,000 views and 1,000+ shares. People (mostly, young ones) were talking. Thinking. Feeling.

Apparently, that’s scarier than fake news ads and cat memes. So I’m reposting it here: where real stories still get to breathe. Read it. Sit with it. Share it if you must. This isn’t about death. It’s about why we need to start noticing each other before the fall.

WHEN DOES A FALL BEGIN? WHERE DOES IT TRULY START? IS IT THE MOMENT THE FOOT SLIPS, OR IS IT LONG BEFORE THAT, WHEN THE MIND DARES TO LOOK DOWN?

I’ve been thinking about this more often lately. It started the other night, while I was working on my book. My partner, casually scrolling through his Facebook feed beside me, suddenly interrupted the silence. “Naa na pud ni ambak sa Gmall, lab,” he said. (Translation: Someone jumped off Gmall again, love.)

I looked up, and there it was: the image. It was sobering. Raw. Heartbreaking. But after a few minutes, it was gone from my mind. Or so I thought.

Thoughts like that don't just disappear. They sink, they settle somewhere deep, lurking in the dark corners of your mind, waiting for the right moment to surface.

Dusk arrived. I was about to close my eyes and escape into sleep but I found myself reaching for my phone, mindlessly scrolling. I told myself it was curiosity, just a passing interest in finding out more about the news. But it felt something else. It was closer to obligation. It was an unspoken need to know, to understand, to witness.

There it was again: post after post, each one darker than the last. Same body, same pool of blood, same cold gray tiles framing the end of someone's story. The man, sprawled out on the floor like a tragic canvas, the blood pooling around his head. His story, his life, ending in such a final, irreversible way.

I was still, but inside, my mind was spinning. I couldn't shake the image. I couldn't shake the thought that this wasn't the first, and probably wouldn't be the last.

I stood up, lit a cigarette, and took a long drag. The nicotine helped quiet my thoughts, if only for a moment. I started writing, pouring out the dark thoughts that had taken root in my mind. Thoughts that, if not released onto paper, would fester and morph into something darker. Something more sinister. Writing, for me, is the only way to stop them from consuming you.

Thinking about the man's image, the gray tiles seem to have amplified the severity of it all. It was like the mall was designed to absorb the pain, the tragedy, until it was indistinguishable from the building itself. It felt like a final statement. A punctuation mark at the end of a life that no one was ready for, yet everyone failed to see.

If I remembered correctly, this was the third person to jump from the fourth floor of GMall in recent years. The third. It was becoming a pattern, a horrifying one.

The mall, once a symbol of progress, of commerce, was now something else. A place where people who are struggling, broken, desperate chose to end it all.

And so, I found myself asking: what is it that draws them there, that whispers to them that this is the only way out?

My first instinct was the same as anyone's. Why not just put up glass barriers? Eight feet high, perhaps. Block the ledge! Make it damn harder! Prevent that moment of desperation from becoming an irreversible tragic act.

But then, the voice of reason (well, maybe not reason, but experience) kicked in. The part of me that has spent too many nights taking online psychotherapy and psychology courses instead of actually sleeping.

I knew better. Su!cide-proofing a mall is like baby-proofing a knife drawer in a house on fire. You might delay the inevitable, but you can't stop the flames. People don't jump because a ledge is available. They jump because their minds have already pushed them to the edge long before their feet ever found the tile.

Living in this country, we are all carrying the burden of being "okay." Mental health is still a half-whispered secret. Something that gets you a glance of pity, or worse, a well-meaning dismissal.

"Kulang lang ka sa ampo/pansin," they'll say. "Pa-massage rana uy. Mawala lang na."

It's a shame. A real one. We have inherited an ideology that equates being sad with being weak. We're taught from a young age that "being okay" is not just a goal. It's an obligation. Happiness is expected of us, and if we're not okay, then it's our fault.

Did that man know that SPMC had finally opened a mental health wing? That psychologists are now available in the city? That the City cares about mental health?

Or did he, like so many others, believe that help was either too expensive or too shameful? That if the fall didn't kill him, the hospital bill would finish the job?

It's tragic. The weight of individual responsibility crushing you. The belief that if you fail, if you fall, it's entirely your fault. That your life is yours to carry, and if you can't carry it, then you're broken beyond repair.

I think about it constantly. It's there in the everyday conversations, the offhand remarks.

Failing in school? “Mao na! Tamad man gud mag-study!” Broke? “Angay ra ni nimo kay kulang ka ug kugi.” Depressed? “Pastilan. Kulang ra ka sa ampo. Kulang ka sa pansin. Pagka-weak shit!” Single at 35? “Choosy man gud ka gud. Tagam.”

We've built an invisible gallows in our minds, and we hand everyone the rope.

AND THEN THERE'S OUR MERITOCRACY MINDSET:

I used to believe in meritocracy. The idea that if you work hard enough, if you're smart enough, the world will reward you. That your effort would be matched by results. That failure was just a stepping stone on the path to success.

But the older I get, the more I see the cracks. The smartest kid in class is now selling insurance. The guy who cheated his way through exams is driving a Land Cruiser.

The universe is not a cashier balancing our receipts. It's a wild mess, where some are born into privilege and others are just born into nothing.

But the myth of meritocracy sticks because it gives us the illusion of control. If I fail, it’s because I didn’t try hard enough. If I suffer, it’s because I deserve it.

This is the ideology we’ve swallowed whole. And it’s poisonous. Because when life kicks you down (oh, and it will), it won’t feel like bad luck. It will feel like a judgment on your worth.

AND THEN, THERE'S THE ANATOMY OF SELF-HATRED:

The cruelest thing about depression is how it turns you into both the victim and the executioner. It's a self-destructive loop.

The man on the tiles didn't unalive himself because he failed at something. He died because he believed he was the failure.

When love leaves, when friends drift away, when work humiliates, when family members ignore, the healthy response is grief. You cry, you mourn, you heal.

But for some, like this poor man, grief doesn't stop there. It spirals into something darker. It becomes proof. Proof that you're unworthy. Proof that you're defective, damaged goods, something less than human. That the world would be better off without you.

And that voice (the one that says "You deserve this") it's not a new one. It's old. It's the echo of every time a parent's disappointment made us feel like we had failed at life. Every time love was conditional, given only when we earned it.

These voices shape us. They teach us how to interpret pain. And when that pain comes later in life, we don't see it as part of human experience. We see it as evidence of our failure. And when you believe you're a failure, you believe you deserve to be erased.

WHAT WOULD'VE SAVED HIM?

What in the world would've saved the man and the other ones who jumped off the ledge? What could've stopped these tragic endings?

I would dare say, it's LOVE.

Not the kind of love wrapped in gifts or grand gestures. Not the kind you post about on anniversaries.

But the quiet, everyday kind of love. The kind that says, "You can fail, you can f*ck everything up and I will still be here."

But love like that is rare. And sometimes, by the time you realize someone needs it, they're already halfway to the ground.

I think about my own falls, the metaphorical kind. The nights I stared at the ceiling, wondering if the world would be quieter and better off without me.

What stopped me? Sheer luck. Maybe. Friends who answered the phone, who cared enough to check in. A partner who saw me, really saw me, even when I couldn't see myself. And my children, my grandkids—they made me feel like I had a purpose, like I was worth saving.

But it shouldn't be luck. It shouldn't take a lucky break to survive. It should be woven in the fabric of our society, our city, our country. It should be the rule, not the exception.

A path forward, if we truly cared about preventing suicides, wouldn't just be raising glass barriers. We'd raise the budget for mental health. We'd make therapy accessible and affordable. We'd normalize it. We'd have psychologists in every barangay, and not just for emergencies, but for everyday struggles. We'd teach parents that love is not a reward, but a baseline. That it's okay to fail. That being human is messy and complicated and that's okay.

We'd normalize therapy the same we we normalize going to the gym. Not a confession of weakness but an obligation to care for yourself. The real act of self-love. Because shame kills. It makes us hide our pain until it becomes something too big to carry alone. It's what makes you feel like the only way out is through a four-story drop.

What if we all stopped looking down in fear, and started looking at each other instead? Because whether we like to admit it or not, a fall begins long before the jump. I stubbed out my cigarette and stared into the dusk. The village was waking up. People bustling, moving, unaware. Or maybe pretending not to see. Somewhere, someone is standing on their own ledge. Whether the ledge is made of concrete or something far less invisible, I hope someone notices before they fall.. And I thought, what if we all stopped looking down in fear, and started looking at each other instead?

Because whether we like to admit it or not, a fall begins long before the jump.

Maybe when we start to understand and accept this, there would be no need for eight-foot glass barriers on the ledges of our malls.

—Kooks D., Open Journal 2.19.2025

#mentalhealth #mentalhealthawareness #mentalhealthsupport #therapy #journaling