Friend/Somewhat Boyfriend Is Very Suicidal, Don't Know What To Do Anymore ?

Hi,

I've been dating this guy for about a year and a half on and off. Lets call him Jeff. Jeff is 20 years old and a very private person. He doesn't open up easily and is quite a negative thinker but always looks happy (he has a good poker face, you can never tell how he really feels.)

The first time I noticed something was wrong with him was a year ago, when one of his friends committed suicide. He was going through a hard time (which was expected) and he isolated himself quite a bit. He barely talked to me and always gave me one word answers. Ever since then, he's honestly been doing the same thing, but just got worse. When we split up for the second time, he met a girl and tried to be with her, but he ended up breaking his heart or something and he tried to kill himself (being a private person - he never really tells me what exactly happened.) He would text me constantly for about a month saying he cant go on and he's going to kill himself. He would never go home and would either just sleep in his car or at a friends place, also drinking every night (which he still does.) One night I was really scared for his safety because me and his friend could not find out where he was or if he was really going to kill himself that night, so I called the cops (this happened November 2014.) Long story short - the cops found him, put him in a hospital and held him there for a day. He said he saw a psychiatrist at the hospital, which decided he wasn't an immediate threat so they let him go after a day. The psychiatrist also talked to his mom and they agreed that he should go somewhere to take a vacation away from everything. He ended up going to New Zealand for 3 months to live with his sister. He came back in February, saying that it helped a bit, and that if he didn't leave he would have probably been dead. He opened up a bit about his depression - saying that he is now on anti-depressants which makes him feel a little bit better, and that he has always been depressed and suicidal, it just got really bad after this girl broke his heart.

Fast forward to a couple of weeks ago. We haven't been talking as much and I haven't seen him for like a month. Today he tells me he feels like we're drifting apart. I opened up to him and told him that I try to talk to him - but all I get is one word answers. I even try different approaches... I try to talk about him but he doesn't ever seem like he wants to, so I try to talk about other things and he still barely talks. I try to hang out with him - he tells me he's busy. I realize the only way he talks to me is when he thinks I'm ignoring him because that just makes him scared that we're ending things.

And this is the part that scared me and this is why I'm here - he tells me it's really hard to see anyone, he just feels super distant from everyone. He hates talking to everyone because nothing helps him and nothing changes anything. He says he's in a way way way worse place than he was before he left for New Zealand and he won't tell me why. He says that he's super self destructive (abusing alcohol, punching walls), and that he's scared of what he might do. This scares me because it's really hard to tell his feelings from looking at him or even talking to him because he hides it so well and he's in a way worse place when he was planning to kill himself months ago (but he probably didn't tell me until now because he's scared of me calling the cops again.) I've realized how little all of the help has done - he has people who text him on a daily checking up on him, his mom watches him like a hawk now, he's taking anti-depressants, I've already called the cops, I've tried to talk to him, I constantly tell him how much I'm here for him and how much I care about him... I don't know what else to do. I've tried talking to him about therapy but I think part of the reason he doesn't want to go is because of the stigma around therapy, and he's scared talking about it and bringing up things are just going to make him feel worse and might mess him up even more.

I honestly really don't know what else to do anymore and I'm just googling how to help a suicidal friend out, but I'm just finding things like "call the cops, listen to them". Is there anything else I can do? Is there anything else I can try? I know after this conversation I'm going to give his friend a heads up about how Jeff is feeling so we can both keep an eye on him. I feel like Jeff is the type of person that nothing is really going to have an effect on him but fixing the problems that he's dealing with - but what can I do if he doesn't want to go to therapy? I would just be grateful for any advice or suggestions.

Thank you so much for taking the time to read this.