Suicide - have you ever pursued it?

[warrior]

Another topic here provoked me on making this thread. Early in my teens I used to have a lot of suicidal thoughts, and while I have never really attempted such a thing - I did a lot of self-harm to myself that I shouldn't have done. So here's my questions to GA members:

 

Have you ever seriously attempted suicide? What were you thinking when you took such a strong step? How old were you then? Have you caused harm to yourself like cutting, slashing the skin etc? If you have stopped yourself from doing it - what stopped you? Someone or your own conscience?

[Douw]

I have attempted it but never got past bringing it too my skin then stopped. My conscience dues not have that much to do with it as hope dos as corny as this sounds if i didn't start venting here i wood have dun it... Thanks for lending me your ears to hear my ranting or rather your eyes to read it

 

I was thinking that it's better not to live then to live in isolation never to love never to know love just nothing... but thing got better and i stopped bringing the knife to my skin or looking over the edge for way to long...

[Arpeggio]

I have attempted suicide a few times, slitting my wrists, trying to shoot myself, overdosing, and each time I've been caught except for once when got help myself. Most of it was drug induced, mixed with being an over pressured teenager. It's been a long time since I have had any thoughts about it, and when I have, there are always good friends there to help me, even online.

[Skyline]

No thankfully I can say I havent ever pursued it. I've entertained the thought a few times in my life, but its never really been a serious option to me. Always like, well I could do that, without any real weight behind the idea. I find theres way to much of what I dont like in suicide (besides the obvious dying consequence) for me to ever really bring myself to a level which would allow me to even attempt to commit it.

 

I've never been one to self-mutilate/cause self-harm either (at least on purpose, some of my earlier drinking days might say otherwise.) I never found the sense in it to be completely honest. Please dont mistake me when I say this however, I dont feel that people who do cut or w/e are stupid. Its definitely not a good idea, but there are things going on in their head which are clearly not correct (whatever those conditions may be.) I've never been able to think up a rational reason to hurt myself, and as a person of reason and logic rather than emotions and feelings, I simply cant do it.

 

I do know a couple people whom have seriously contemplated suicide, and knew a couple people who caused self inflicted injury. All of them were deeply emotionally connected people, and I do not think this is coincidence.

 

As a side note, there have been alot of suicide related posts and threads as of late S: I wonder whats causing the uprise.

[Douw]

I can only say that when i was seriously considering it things in my live weren't going so grate (understatement) but non the less when i look back now do feel hesitant to explain what i was feeling at the time but what i will say its not worth it there is all ways a light at the end of the tunnel now to find the switch to flick it on that is hard but doable!

[Gregoire]

Have you ever seriously attempted suicide?

 

Never, it's never been appealing to me. While my own life has never held any extra importance to me, it's always been my desire to use it in the best possible way. I've endangered my own life for others, and others have claimed that I've tried to commit an indirect suicide, but I'm always happy when I come out of it. It means that I can do more, that I continue to live my life to lift up others. This conviction doesn't come from me just being an awesome person, it comes from losing people to suicide, too many people, and knowing that I could have made a difference had I intervened. Too often people forget the impact that their lives have on others. I have the good fortune of being constantly reminded. I'm also constantly reminded of how beautiful the world is. It may also be attributed to my aversion to pain.

[Skylights]

I have thought about it many times. Many, many times. But I've never pursued. I've hurt myself, yes, but I'm too much of a coward to actually do the deed.

 

I'm at a better place (kind of) and have only occaisonally been in that mind-frame again. But I am a different person now and I would never end my life, no matter how much pain there was. Because that pain is something. It is a feeling. And In its own right it is beautiful. I don't believe there is an after life (there might be, who knows? Though I highly doubt it) and because of this I wouldn't end my life. That doesn't mean the temptation isn't there, it's just that life is so much more beautiful now.

 

As a side note, I'm a bit of a freak and a part of me enjoys sinking into despair, self-loathing, depression and helplessness. A good cry every once in a while is nice too. But that's just because I'm a bit of a masochist

[MikeL]

I have thought about it many times. Many, many times. But I've never pursued. I've hurt myself, yes, but I'm too much of a coward to actually do the deed.

You raise an interesting question. Not to get us off on a tangent, but who is the real coward? The one who takes (or attempts to take) his own life or the one who can't "do the deed"? Is suicide the coward's way out?

[Skylights]

You raise an interesting question. Not to get us off on a tangent, but who is the real coward? The one who takes (or attempts to take) his own life or the one who can't "do the deed"? Is suicide the coward's way out?

 

To me any and every life is valuable.

 

But I don't think there is a textbook answer to this. It all depends on the individuals situation and a persons way of looking at it. Not everyone takes their life to escape something.

[Tiger]

I've thought about it, but I've never actually tried it. For some reason, death isn't appealing to me.

[Nephylim]

I love life too much to want to leave it voluntarily

 

 

[Phantom]

Saddly I have attempted a few times. Most of the time it was stress and depression that lead to it, another time it was because of my low self esteme. I know it sounds really pathetic but it's what did it for me.

The first time I tried was with a bottle of SoCo and two bottles of sleeping pills, I got caught by my best friend at the time and he helped me get some help.

The second time I attempted was when I was drivng home and I pulled off on the side of a bridge and stood there ready to jump into the water about 300 feet below. Only thing that stopped me was a call I got to go into work.

The third and final time was the most serious. Nothing seemed to be going right for me, I was really depressed and lonely, and it felt like no one was helping me. I left to go to work and stopped at the pharmacy and picked up a refill of Xanax and went to the liquor store and got a bottle of Jack daniels and took the pills. On the train I drank the bottle of Jack and started on my way to work. When I got offthe train I started throwing up and I passed out. I woke up in the hospital and was asked what was going on. I told them and said not to treat me and let me die. Well my parents overrode my wishes and I was treated. I had to drink charcoal and got my stomach pumped. Afterwards I spent two weeks in a crisis unit where I was given intense therapy and met others like me. I have to say it helped and taught me things that I never knew before.

 

This was two years ago and from then on i've helped others with similar thoughts and that's made me feel better about myself. Now I'm glad I failed because I'm doin much better. I'm working at a job I love, with staff that are good to me and residents who've i've known since I was younger and look up to me. I know what I want in life and th goals I've set for myself have helped me. I still have low self esteme issues, anxiety issues and depression issues but I know when to get help if needed and I now have peoe I feel that I can talk to.

 

But the biggest person I can credit for helping me is trebs. He's helped me with things and still helps me to this day when I ask him. There's a few others on GA who've done the same and I know that if it wasn't for them I'd be another statistic. I also think that my issues have made me a stronger person because I use my experience to help others.

 

Eric

[Cia]

I never considered suicide, though I had the means and the opportunity pretty much anytime I wanted. I was a what I called a "punisher". I would cut or hurt myself, stop eating, do drugs or drink, be with people who were abusive, just different things like that. I was angry at my life, some of the people in it, and myself a lot of the time. If I was focused on hurting me, I was doing it and I could control it, it helped to distract me from the things that hurt me that I couldn't control. My life wasn't as bad as some, I know plenty of people have had it a lot worse but it was bad enough. It was my dirty secret for the most part, I never told anyone. I still haven't divulged all the awful details to any one person though I have shared bits and pieces of my journey to others.

 

I would have to say that learning to value myself helped a lot. I met someone, finished school early and left home at 17. That was the biggest factor for me, to get away from the negative influences in my life that provided me with the means and the excuses to hurt myself. It's always a struggle, I still have the tendencies but with a family now and kids I don't want them to see me do those sorts of things. They are mimics and I would never want to teach them that. We work on positive ways to channel anger and frustration, to help them learn and to reinforce it for me.

[JamesSavik]

Mercy killings are another matter.

 

After a preview of my anthology entry drew no interest, It was best just to put it out of every-bodies misery.

[PrivateTim]

I would venture that most people have thought about it, me included, and sometimes more seriously than others, but I always come back to I could never do that to my parents. That is why I can get that others, especially gay kids who felt their parents don't care about them have no problem completing the act. I have thankfully never had anyone close to me commit suicide, or at least no one who was a close friend at the time they took their own life. That would have been tough for me to handle knowing they couldn't come to me.

[CarlHoliday]

About six or seven years ago my life took a dramatic downturn, so dramatic that searching for an exit became a real possibility.

 

I looked at a number of certain ways as I was not interested in half doing it and ending up maimed or, worse, lying in a vegetative state waiting for someone to get the guts to pull the plug, which, in itself, is a way to do yourself in.

 

I looked at death by trains because there is a mainline about two miles away, but it rejected because there are people who get traumatized when their train runs over someone.

 

I seriously considered jumping as that almost always works if you do it correctly. If you don't get it right, as a few have done jumping off Golden Gate, you're in a big hurt. So, you need to find something high enough to either reach terminal velocity or be over something that's going to do a lot of damage. Freeway overpasses are popular in our area because if done at night a lot of vehicles are going to run over you before someone gets off the cell phone long enough to pay attention what's ahead of them. There was one guy who the police figured was hit and run over by three vehicles, including a semi, that didn't stop. There wasn't much for the fourth vehicle to do except call 9-1-1 and put his flashers and hope no one rear-ended him. The police weren't even certain the guy was a suicide until they found his abandoned car on the overpass above. Just driving down the avenue and that feeling hit. Parked the car, ran around to the railing, and dove over. It's as simple as that.

 

I saw someone jump off a building once. There was this hotel in Seattle that had a restaurant and cocktail lounge on top of twenty or so stories. They also had an outdoor patio on the roof. A guy came in ordered a drink, took a couple swallows, and jumped. On the way down he clipped a support wire for the electric buses and hit the curb head first.

 

No matter where you jump, the key to a successful jump is to hit head first. Anything other way and you run the chance of bones and tissue absorbing the shock enough that you don't die, but wish you had.

 

But, I figured the best way to do it, for me at least because basically I'm a coward when it comes to pain, is hypothermia. As I saw it back in my insane days, there were two choices. I could take a ferry across Puget Sound and about halfway jump into the water, which is about forty degrees and death will occur in about twenty minutes. Or, I could dress very lightly, take a fifth of whisky or some such alcoholic beverage and have a private party somewhere out in the snow.

 

I never considered drowning, which seems to be from what I've read a very literary way to do one's self in, because, although it is very, very effective, physically it is very excrutiating. They say it takes the brain about a minute to die via drowning. That's too long for all those "I'm doing something stupid!" thoughts to run through your mind.

 

Now that I'm being medicated, those thoughts stay pretty much in the background, but the original cause of the problem still exists, so I have to be on my guard against actual attempts, which occurred at least three times that I remember. Memory from that time is a bit fuzzy around the edges, but I do remember once being on a bridge looking down at a lot of traffic going about 60 MPH. It was a good fifty feet down, not enough to kill me if I hit wrong (not head first), but if you jump on the far side of the bridge, the oncoming traffic doesn't see you jump and they have less reaction time to stop. Yeah, they end up traumatized, but you're dead and won't see it on the evening news.

 

What stopped me from jumping? I don't really know other than the time factor from point of jump to point of impact. The oh shit factor when you realize that you're doing something very, very stupid, but you're going to die anyway so why are you worrying. Like I said I don't like physical pain. Mental pain is bad enough. I had the ferry thing planned and had a date set, but life got in the way and I met this terrific therapist who started me on the chemical intervention route.

[Tipdin]

At the age of 20, I attempted suicide, nearly successfully. I spent in week or so in a comma after taking an overdose of drugs.

 

My partner came home way earlier than he was supposed to and found me. When I came out of the comma, I was extremely disappointed. That was about 30 years ago; I've never been glad I survived.

 

I did all the right stuff afterward, therapy, drugs, learning coping techniques, etc.; however, all of those things together have just taken the edge off the blade; they haven't made enough difference for me to say it's been worth it. I wish my partner hadn't come home early.

 

For over three decades I've had to find - or create reasons to get up every day. It has been a life-long struggle. Now, in my fifties, I have lived long enough to lose my looks and physical abilities, I get to deal with Asbestosis, a type of incurable lung cancer. I buried all my friends that died of AIDS, survived a heart attach, and now, lucky me, I will follow in my old man's footsteps - Alzheimer's.

 

The good news is, with Alzheimer's, I probably won't realize that I'm choking to death on the fluids building up in my lungs.

 

Can you say... angry?

 

In my case, suicide is once again a viable option. If there is to be a next time, I will first have a retro-disco party and say goodbye to everyone; individually, in private. Then I will dance my ass off and have a blast. I might even have a drink and a cigarette - two things I have never done. But what the hell, it's a party!

[Y_B]

To see it objectively, people commit suicide when pain outweighs the ability and resources to cope.

 

We all hurt, we all cry, but for some it becomes too much; so much that suicide becomes the only escape.

 

Don't say it's a coward's way out, because who are you to think you know the pain people feel and how they can deal?

 

The only thing that is worthy of concern is how to provide help to those who need it; to provide resources for coping.

 

Now, to answer the original question, no I have not.

 

Will I entertain the idea again in the future? most likely. Will I go through with it? most likely not. Because my ability to cope with stress and hurt is unrelenting.

 

 

[JamieD]

I've never considered taking my life, thankfully I've never had a reason for it, but I think I understand why some people would because I actually know a kid my age who tried to do it. I got the chance to talk to him and he opened up to me and my friends about it, he was pretty much feeling alone in the world and couldn't find a way out. I guess when there's nobody to hold you there it doesn't matter how much courage you have; it doesn't seem worth it. He's doing great now btw, he managed to connect with a lot of people after his attempt and I see him very often. He looks happy

[jon-jon]

To see it objectively, people commit suicide when pain outweighs the ability and resources to cope.

 

We all hurt, we all cry, but for some it becomes too much; so much that suicide becomes the only escape.

 

Don't say it's a coward's way out, because who are you to think you know the pain people feel and how they can deal?

 

The only thing that is worthy of concern is how to provide help to those who need it; to provide resources for coping.

 

Now, to answer the original question, no I have not.

 

Will I entertain the idea again in the future? most likely. Will I go through with it? most likely not. Because my ability to cope with stress and hurt is unrelenting.

 

 

 

Damn! This is a depressing thread. While reading the comments, I was trying to formulate my position, thinking back about things I had done or not done. Yang Bang, you kinda hit it on the head. I seriously doubt that someone at the point of suicide is thinking about courage, how its going to look, what someone will think, that sort of thing. I think they must go beyond a point of reality where their pain is the only thing they are thinking about. Unfortunately, this has been something I have had to think about several times within the last several years because there have been three or four teenage suicides in my town. No matter how well you think you know the family or the kid, you never know the why of it. It really hurts to think about a young life snuffed out because of such unknown internal pain.

 

As to the original question, I have thought about it, the 'how' of it. I think everyone does. For me I think when I was young it was more about the drama of it. The effect it would have on the ones left behind. There was never any reason for actually doing it. Now that I am older, I find I am thinking about it more in terms of dealing with health issues. To what point, if I had the choice, would my health have to deteriorate for me to consider suicide? Would I do it? Ah, that is the question. I guess I will just have to wait to see what happens vis a vis my health versus that reality thing. So far, knock on wood, it is not an issue.

[Skylights]

I'm sure everyone has amazing stories to share. I'll be the ass and admit they're too long for me to bother reading ><

[Kev de Cauchery]

Left some beautiful scars on my wrists once.

 

Hmm, they're almost gone now. Kinda missed them.

 

So yes, I have attempted but not really. I did not seriously tried and no I did not do any harm to myself.

 

Funny thing is, I've been nursing the idea again these days. But then now I know I'll probably do nothing about the idea. Just overall stress and...

[soup]

No. Entertained the idea, quite a bit. never went through with it.

 

My best friend, though, is another matter altogether. She's attempted it a few times and also hurts herself heaps. drugs, cutting, bad relationships. It got better for a while when she realised what it would do to her family, but i dont think the pain ever went away. Then after a particularly bad time she reverted back to her old self.

She talks to me, tells me pretty much everything and so i kind of understand why she thinks the way she does. But i think the depression and lonliness are really what start killing people slowly from the inside, making them think that suicide is the way out.

[Eros]

When I was younger I heavily considered it, yeah. But, things change in time.

[Tipdin]

I seriously doubt that someone at the point of suicide is thinking about courage, how its going to look, what someone will think, that sort of thing. I think they must go beyond a point of reality where their pain is the only thing they are thinking about.

 

The assumptions people make are interesting, and often those assumptions are incorrect, at least in my case.

 

Prior to my suicide attempt, I thought a great deal about others; how they may react, what they'd be required to do about me and my things, how they would or would not cope with my death, etc.

 

I carefully, consciously deliberated for several weeks about my options. I tried forecasting various scenarios for my future. After working with a therapist for a couple of years, I re-assessed everything agin. My suicide attempt was well considered. I researched the effects of what my body would be going through after taking an overdose of the pills I had. I tried to minimize the after-affects by making myself comfortable in the bathtub, an area that could easily be cleaned up.

 

In my opinion, when someone is serious about suicide, not just trying to get attention, the act of making the attempt is quite courageous. Perhaps misguided, but courageous nonetheless.

 

All too often, suicide attempts are a spur of the moment knee-jerk reaction to current suffering. Or super-charged tantrums of a sort. Mine was not. Unfortunately for me, my partner returned home far earlier than planned. Had he followed his well-established normal pattern, I would not be typing this note. In the 30 some years since, he STILL cannot remember why on earth he came back home...

 

With the help of more therapy, and lots of people willing to make an effort to help me make my life better, the edge of the suffering has been dulled. Chronic depression that cannot be mediated by medication is a terrible disease. Most diseases most people can understand and empathize with the victim. Depression is a mostly invisible disease that most people do not understand well.

 

We all have bad days, many of us have bad months, and sadly, some of us have traumas that are long lasting. For those of us that suffer with severe, chronic CLINICAL depression, life can be a living hell. Some people can be helped with medication, others cannot be. The depression causes all sorts of problems, from "little" things like constantly trying to fight back the desire to cry, to the big things like chronic fatigue, and a host of other physical ailments that can dramatically impede absolutely everything we try to do.

 

I started thinking about suicide before I was 10 years old. The last 4 decades haven't been much different. Most days, I wish my attempt had been successful; damn near was. However, so far, I've managed to deal with the depression and its accompanying side affects relatively well. I'm lucky that I've had loving people around me to help me monitor the depression.

 

I think there are two types of suicide when we get into these sorts of conversations. One type of suicide is a sideways cry for help by people that may lack more advanced coping skills than they currently have. The other type is a serious health related issue. But again, most people don't understand depression well enough to see the dividing line between the two types of suicide attempts.