Connecting Singles^® Forums100% Free Online Dating

I decided instead of debating in the other suicide thread which should be reserved for prayers and sympathy it might be a good idea to do it here. NOT TRYING to be rude to anyone... its just out of respect for the departed.

Anyways... here's my thoughts.. and some of you may be angry with me. Some, in fact most people say that suicide is one of the most selfish things to do. I honestly think it is just as selfish for the friends and family to make their loved one promise that they won't. That doesn't mean I think suicide is the way to go... on the contrary. ALLOW me to explain the past first though.

I just turned 30 today... I was suisidal for more than 20 years, starting at about age seven. My mother tried to kill herself at 10. My father attempted suicide as an adult. My Dad was in the mental hospital throughout my entire childhood. Mom was a severely abused child growing up, and while I won't go into the details that was why she tried to kill herself.

Anyways, yes at seven I was suicidal... holding butcher knives to myself, wanting to slash my wrists and trying to smother myself. I won't go into the details of why, just know that I was wrapped DEEP in sorrow. In a way I was in love with Death. And if you've never been there, Death can be a very inviting companion. Sorrow is like a drug, the more you surround yourself in it, the more you want it. You come to depend on it. And I can tell you that many a time I promised Mom, Dad, and friends I wouldn't commit suicide, and I kept my promise. BUT I was swimming in misery and did not know how to get out... wasn't sure WHAT happiness was because I'd never experienced it, so I wansn't sure that I had wanted it. And NO ONE-- Would offer to help me find it. They wanted me to stick around, to live so they themselves wouldn't miss me, but they wouldn't offer to help me to get better. Why not?? Living a life with no happiness or cheer or laughter or smiles is VERY DIFFICULT.. but everyone expexted me to live it, and I did.

Three years ago changed all of that. I decided that I would try for myself to get better, and started therapy and Psychiatry, and have worked the suicidal tendencies out (still working on other issues). I found my chosen religion (Wicca) and THAT really gave me the will to live.

Why am I sharing all of this?? Not to change your mind-- because everyone is entitled to think, and to feel, however they wish. But I just wanted to tell everyone the other side of the story. Suicide may not be the answer... but try telling that to someone who lives in complete sorrow. They are not going to see that. Try telling them to take things in baby steps. Offer to be there for them. They might not accept your help, but they WILL know that SOMEONE is there for them-- and THAT will give them the will to live.

Life sucks... BUT it doesn't suck all of the time. It took me almost 30 years to learn that-- to learn that in Life there are happy times. Just give someone the chance to realize that too. Help them see it.

I think suicide is highly over rated.

tried it once.............didnt like it

This is copied and pasted of mine from the earlier one:

Suicide is the most selfish thing you can do.
Its a permanate solution to a temporary problem.
Its the worst thing you can do to your family. To your mother, who raised you, kept you safe, and tucked you in. To all your friends it is showing them how much you really don't care about any of them.

i would argue...that one person being in pain is much better than the hundreds that knew them.

that the sorrow at their passing, collectively, outweighs everything that they may gain by cessation.

ahhh yes....but with some nice editing

Sympathy for the suicidal...absolutely.

The reasons you give go against everything I believe. It is a person who needs to be helped if they think they have an "entitlement" to misery.

I agree that it is very selfish of the people who love a suicide "VICTIM"
to have promised not to do it. I think I'll allow them a little tolerance though since THEY are the one's who have to stick around and grieve.

I'm not even sure it's true grieving either. After going through what I did when I was 17, to this day I don't think I go through the same grieving cycles as I think I might have.

It really sucks to get stuck on anger, every time one goes through it.
Damn him for doing that to me 21 years ago!

you're right joel...the stages AREN'T the same...

and it's like it never ends. when other losses heal up and fade...those just fester.

In a way the "losses" remind you of the "theft" and....should say "I" have to deal with rage every time.

It may sound odd, but it would be nice to just be sad, the next time having to deal.

I can see "mercy style" suicide.

When I was struck by cancer, I just couldn't get over how it totally affected my whole body. Cancer had attacked my thyroid, causing many other problems with it. At that time I didn't realize that your thyroid not only controled your weight, but your heart and certain muscle type things.

I went from 210lbs down to 130lbs in just a month, month and a half. I kept going to doctors and no-one could tell me what was wrong with me. I looked liked a human skeleton with skin on it. even my eyes sunk into my head. Then my muscles either would not move the way I wanted, or they would cramp up so bad that the pain was unreal. Ever got leg cramps? Well, imagine those, except that it was every muscle from your toes, feet and shins, clear up to your butt cheeks. I would get these after walking ten feet. Arms did the same thing. I would even get cramps in my neck that was just un-goddly. Pain pills did not work.

Well one day I just couldn't handle my family watching me waste away to nothing, and having some one help me to the bathroom and back. Then go thru all the pain from the intense cramps. So I talked my girlfriend at the time in leaving that night, sent the kids to grandma's. I called a buddy that I knew was a dealer in prescription drugs and asked what he had. I took about 20 xanexes, 10 oxy's, 30 sleeping pills, over a period of an hour. Loaded my gun, drank a pint of rum, and smoked a joint, laid down to go to sleep.

I remember having the strangest dream about talking to dead relatives, and one of them said "your not ready, go back home". I woke up, never puked, and felt a new energy about me. I started getting better. I went to another hostpital for blood test, and it was there that I found out about the cancer and it's effects. I refused the treatments for cancer, and the doctor said I could get my appetite back up and releive some of the pain if I smoke a little marijuana. I said, "I CAN DO THAT!!", And here I am today, 3 yrs later.

isn't it incredible what we go thru to find our personal truth????


i support you!
your point of view rings loud in my heart.... i die every second and have thrown myself into seriously life threatening circumstances with the full awareness of the risk and secretly wishing i would never have to live thru the experience.... that it would take me out with it.


it never did.... not time to leave this nightclub... dancin till my feet fall off!!! and i'll prolly have to crawl out of here!!

only the good die young!

Well i have lost a friend through suicide. Felt the pain anger the quilt. I now work people who have suicidal intendices. I have sat up 13 hrs on sucide watch not nice for me and not nice for the person Watching. And i don't know the answer to to this as i feel i am invading their privacy and putting on extra pressure. But what is the anwser at the end on usualy 48 hr period the black cloud usualy lifts a little. But mostly i think if some one wants to kill them selved if their realy serious they will do it not matter what safe quards are put in place. Also i allways felt anger at my friend at committing suicide but now knowing more about it i know she thought she was doing was for the best and she was a burden to us and we would be better off with out her. So hardly selfish act after all.

I lost my husband John to suicide 7 years ago, leaving behind 8 wonderful kids and me to pick ourselves up from the aftermath of it. He was found on our eldest daughter's 18th birthday, the children ages at that time range from 18 down to 6 years old.

I could write pages and pages for you of the wonderful husband and great dad he was but i wont cause i learnt along time ago. I cant justify the person he was, as the person I knew would not have put me and our children thru all this pain. He was somewhere in his head that I knew nothing about.

I had to leave that big "why did he do it" with him as it would put me in an early grave too. I now can tell you how proud my children have done Emma is 25 has a phd in interior design and is getting married on her daddy's birthday next year, Derek is 24 has a first class honours in computer science and works for citibank in london, Annemarie is 23 has a first class honour in law and is a qualified barrister, Siobhain is 22 and qualified as a nurse this year, Brendan is 21 and qualified as an architect this year too, Eoin is 17 and is studying to be an interior designer in college, Edwin is 15 still in secondary school and Conor is 14 still in secondary school.

I now help with a support group for families who are breaved by suicide, and i do go out to places where i have been invited to talk on my story of how myself and my children have coped with john's death. There was 9 people greiving the loss of John but in so many different ways. We have overcome so much but it was a tough road somedays and we have had great times together.

If anyone would like to read "my story" email me and i will send it on.

Wanted to add that I have seen the other side as well. I've lost a friend to suicide as well. AND my Mom since being sick and in EXTREME pain has wanted to die before and has been suicidal. So I'm not going blindly into my opinion.

Every time I hear about someone committing suicide it makes me much more angry with the pressures of society and the people who were insensitive enough to cause the suicide victim to feel the way they did.

There's a lot of selfishness in our society, but I'm not convinced that suicide victims carry the brunt of it. On the contrary, its more likely that the selfishness of others is what drove the victims to suicide in the first place.

Our society is extremely competitive. We compete for education, careers, and even our lovers. Everything is competition. Some people don't deal with competition well. Especially if they are very caring and sensitive person themselves. It's hard for them to understand why everyone around them seems to demand such ruthless and insensitive competition.

I think it's a joke to point the finger at suicide victims as being 'selfish' when we live in a society that is based on selfishness and competition. The mere act of shoving the 'selfishness' onto the suicide victim is just another selfish act on our part so that we don’t have to deal with any responsibility for it. That's the ultimate act of selfishness right there.

That's how I feel about it.

I don't feel suicide should be illegal. Lame and selfish most of the time, but not illegal. Assisted suicides for those who are terminally ill, if the dying person wants it, I would let them. I also don't believe in paying through the nose to rehab junkies. Seem pretty suicidal to me, so just let them OD if they won't stop on their own.

Drug rehab is a whole separate story. I could write a book on my feelings about that.

Not to sidetrack but I'd just like to say that drug addicts should not be treated as 'criminals'. Yes, they need to be 'incarcerated' in a rehab facility, but it should be a regular 'prison'. They should be treated as victims. And they should be forced to rehabilitate.

I don't understand why we have no problem sentencing criminals to prison, but we seem to have a problem sentencing drug attics to rehabilitation centers that don't treat them like as if they are criminals. I also agree that we shouldn't have to pay for that. Part of their 'sentencing' for having become addicted should be to work at the rehab center after they are rehabilitated until they have paid for their own rehabilitation costs.

Also, it should be recognized that it's impossible to become 'addicted' to marijuana. I mean, sure, people can become psychologically addicted to it, but I'm talking about hardcore additions here.

Finally, if our society would address some of these kinds of problems from a non-criminal point of view they probably would reduce a large number of suicides. At least the drug-related ones.

I think most everyone in their life has thought of suicide to some degree or another.

Is it right to say a person who trys or has succedded is selfish? No..I would say they are. They are suffering a great pain and like others have said, sometimes they think they are actually doing the world a favor.

Abra, I can only agree with your post if it is edited as below.
“Drug rehab is a whole separate story. I could write a book on my feelings about that.

… drug addicts should not be treated as 'criminals'. Yes, they need to be 'incarcerated' in a …regular 'prison'. They … should be forced to rehabilitate.

I don't understand why we have no problem sentencing criminals to prison... I also agree that we shouldn't have to pay for that. Part of their 'sentencing' for having become addicted should be to work at the rehab center (just replace rehab center with prison throughout) after they are rehabilitated until they have paid for their own rehabilitation costs.”

Lion – guess I was mostly thinking of those who killed themselves and left behind kids or others that would be left without a caretaker etc. Some really are so messed up the world would be better off without them. Too bad all the freaks, rapists and murderers don’t get suicidal often enough.

i agree with the rapists, murderers dont get suicidal enough, there the ones who should as they do totally wreck lives