Some had set their alarms for 3am and dragged themselves out of bed on a drizzly Saturday morning to attend. Others didn’t bother returning home from parties or clubs in the city centre, instead heading directly to the Phoenix Park in Dublin for the annual Darkness into Light fundraiser for Pieta House, a suicide and self-harm crisis centre.
Last year the event attracted 15,000 people across the country. This time the figure more than doubled, with 40,000 gathering in 20 locations including Cork, Waterford, Limerick and Galway.
Supported by Electric Ireland, the event is a 5km walk or, if you have the energy that early in the morning, a 5km run starting in pitch darkness and ending in the thin light of dawn.
About 7,000 people attended the main Dublin event. They gathered at the Papal Cross car park from 3.30am, a snaking line of yellow T-shirts and torch light as far as the eye could see.
Most people didn’t get far into conversations explaining why they were there before their throats caught and they were overtaken with the emotion of the morning.
Togetherness
Ven Naughton had come with his wife, who is in a wheelchair, his two daughters and a son, remembering his son Greg, a soldier who took his own life two years ago. Fighting tears Michelle, Greg's sister, said the event was "wonderful" and provided a feeling of togetherness.
Geraldine Hall was walking with a small framed picture of her husband, David, a Dublin fireman, in her pocket. He took his own life 13 years ago.
She said the morning was full of symbolism, giving people hope and showing there was always help out there “if you just look for it”.
Several members of the Dublin football team were there, including Paul Flynn, who was walking for his friend Alan Leech (25), who took his own life last year.
Pieta House founder Joan Freeman addressed the crowd before they set off, saying it was the start of a journey with thousands of others across the country who were fighting against what she called "the scourge of suicide".
She said her organisation would not stop campaigning until suicide figures were falling every year and the Government took suicide prevention seriously. “I know most of you are here today because you know someone or loved someone who has died by suicide,” she said.
“Each year I feel this wave of sadness but I also feel this incredible tidal wave of hope.”
The latest figures from Pieta House show a 42 per cent increase in the number of people seeking the organisation’s help for suicidal thoughts and self-harming behaviour. The charity was contacted by 2,736 clients last year, up from 1,923 the previous year.
The drizzle stayed away for most of the walk and the atmosphere was upbeat, with people chatting and laughing as birdsong filtered out from the trees and the growing dawn light made the torches redundant.
The crowd included hundreds of teenage students who had been inspired by Donal Walsh, the Co Kerry teenager with inoperable cancer who recently made a public appeal to young people not to end their own lives.
A woman who did not want to be named because of the stigma she believes prevails around suicide was there in memory of her son, who took his own life three years ago.
Walking her dog with her husband, she said she found “comfort and solidarity” in gathering with others who had lost people in the same circumstances.
Emotional
"Going into the dawn together is very beautiful and emotional for all of us," she said, as a choir wearing robes and singing gospel songs urged participants on.
“It is horribly sad – there just seems to be so much despair out there at the moment – but services like Pieta House offer real hope to people.”
At the finish line, flickering electric candles spelt out the word hope.
People spoke of how deeply moved they were by the event and wrote on a banner in memory of those they had lost. “For you Lisa, I am here,” wrote one man before the rain came again and the crowds moved on.
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