Avicii’s Father opens up about Suicide Prevention

Avicii‘s Father, Klas Bergling, has recently opened up to CNN about his late sons mental health and how he did not think that his son planned to commit suicide last year. Klas says that he had long talks with his late son last year about Avicii’s mental health. Klas says that Avicii (born Tim Bergling), struggled throughout his career with depression, stage fright and addiction. These were issues that they discussed in their ‘long talks’ about Avicii’s mental health.

In an interview with CNN, Avicii’s father spoke about his late sons passing and how it affected him. He said ‘”Up and down… some people may expect that this goes over after a year or so, but it’s not the way it works.”  The Tim Bergling Foundation was set up soon after Avicii’s passing at the age of 28 in Muscat. Klas says “We will focus on mental health and prevent suicide, that is the purpose of the foundation. My wish is that it will be a change here, where young people can get help very early, when the problems are small”.

Klas describes how he had many difficult conversations with his son over the years, including Tim’s thoughts on meditation, life and love. “When he was younger we had many hard talks [about] getting him out of bed.” He talks about how introverted his son was and how Avicii had to do a lot of things he did not want to. He said “Our theory is not that he planned this suicide — more that it was like a traffic accident. Many things happened and came into the same station, so to say, and brought him out of his control.”

Avicii’s posthumous album TIM was released in July and included collaborations with vocalists Chris Martin, Aloe Blacc and Bonn. It included the tracks ‘SOS‘, ‘Heaven‘, ‘Heart Upon My Sleeve‘ and ‘Peace of Mind‘

Bergling has put huge pressure on politicians in Sweden to address the issues of mental health earlier. “School should be the best place for the children, so let’s make it the best place for the children,” Klas says. “The problem is what are they doing in the society to handle problems like this?… The most important thing (is) trying to catch the problem earlier. It’s really a political question that has to be solved, not talked about for 10 more years.”

Watch the full interview with Klas Bergling below.