Experts say only about one-third of suicide victims leave notes. Perhaps the most puzzling, however, was the one left by 49-year-old John Thomas Doyle in November, 1964 which simply read:

“Absolutely no reason except I have a toothache.”

Photo of a 22-year old John Thomas Doyle

Witnesses then saw Doyle jump from the Golden Gate bridge to his death. In a post mortem it was discovered that he was in fact suffering from a maladjusted wisdom tooth in the back of his jaw. Instead of clarifying the issue as you think, this only sought to intrigue many as it was theorised that the note was simply a spurt of dark humour in his John’s last moments.

Further investigation into the incident uncovered that John suffered from sleep walking from a young age which lead to conclusion being made that he suffered from some sort of dissociation in the moments leading up to his death. The detachment from reality may have triggered him to comprehend that suicide was a solution to his toothache, I suppose he wasn’t wrong in that sense, but he couldn’t have been more wrong in the big picture.

This is mostly speculation however perhaps John Thomas Doyle’s toothache was so incredibly painful that suicide was a legitimate option for him, we will never know.

Research Sources:

http://articles.latimes.com/1987-05-22/news/vw-1097_1_golden-gate-bridge http://articles.latimes.com/1995-06-21/news/mn-15513_1_golden-gate-bridge http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dissociation_(psychology)

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