Suicide - would/could you kill yourself?

This might be a really good time to remind people that the Internet has a VERY long memory. What you post here isn't private and even if you use a pseudonym you can be identified. You may have read about how that AOL released supposedly anonymous search data for legitimate research purposes and within a week the first person was identified.

Talking about even your thoughts about suicide-- as fleeting as they may have been -- could come back to haunt you, especially in the US and UK. You could be denied insurance, denied a job, and even forcibly committed.

While this thread could be cathartic or otherwise helpful to others, I'd strongly suggest asking Editor Bob for permission to create a second account specifically for this topic and others like it.

woof.

@Topsy: Glad that you are feeling better and just have the f-l-u.

The flu has made me look like death for the past three days, but MS isn't too bad and I have had that since '99!

I have never once thought of offing myself for either though.

Unless the MS progresses to the point that I can no longer take care of myself, then I may reconsider. I'd choose quality of life over quantity in that case!

I hope she's feeling better by now, seeing as she originally posted in 2006!

I´ve actually thought about this once!Then I thought to myself , why do the buggers that messed up your life a favour!
So I fully intend to live a happy and full life in the knowledge that those individuals are of no consequence and have no place in my world.
It may be a short one but, by god it will be a fast and funny one!

While I was away, a set of adverts caught my eye from the NZ National Depression Initiative.

Their use of former All Black play John Kirwan has been remarkably successful in outreach work in a country where an All Black is almost a deity and the height of what a man should be, for him to tell others so publicly about his depression and how he sought help, well it's a big step forward.
Just goes to show that public health information can and does make a difference, particularly when it is as innovative as this.
Mental Health Foundation of NZ on the campaigns.

Isn't this the kind of post you would usually pour scorn on BadDoggie? It sounds just a little paranoid to me. I mean what are the chances of an insurance company or a potential employer going to such lengths as deciphering a forum pseudonym and finding this exact thread in order to profile someone. Just picture the scenario where someone would do that.

Hi,
I spent last night reading through this thread, the prompt being having helped to tidy up the mess that was left when a young lad jumped in front of a train last weekend.
I am curious if there is a male/female difference in how one goes about killing onesself - personally, if I were going to, I would take tablets and hope to just go to sleep, but other ways are far more dramatic...
I´d be interested in any comments on this
thanks!

well, i just finished reading a book by jodi picoult called 'the pact'. yeah, it's about suicide. well written but not a very nice book at all - made me feel like shit, which is exactly what i'm NOT looking for when reading! ok so it is of course fiction but i'm assuming the author based some of the facts given on actual research. apparently girls are three times more likely than guys to try to commit suicide (within the teenage sector), but guys choose more decisive methods and are thus generally much more successful. girls might be more ready to take pills or to try to gass themselves, whereas guys are more read to use a gun through the mouth or to hang themselves. apparently. but never believe a paperback! of all the ppl i've known (and known of) to commit suicide, only one of them was a girl (talked her little brother into doing it with her). i come from a drought-riddled farming region, and the number of middle aged men i've heard about topping themselves is truely alarming. i think these men are probably those least willing, or least able, to approach professional help, or to even reach out to a friend. it's so sad. if only we could get rid of all the stigma surrounding depression and mental illnesses as a whole...

When I was voluntary recieving treatment here in Germany as an inpatient for sever depression; it wasn't unusual to share a ward with those that had been sectioned for 2 weeks on average where they would be assessed and either released or re-committed.


I'm not on the same pills but I've probably had them in the past as its taken a while and many changes to my medication to achieve my present cocktail of stability (Venlafaxinhydrochlorid, Carbamzepin, Lamotrigin, Doxipin, Pipamperondihyrochlorid and Paliperidon). I've been off work since Aug '05 and am now pensioned off until 2010 due to depression. I, typical bloke refused to except there was a problem even though my life was going to shit until I was so suicidal that I was preoccupied with it continuously until I sought help. I spent the best part of 6 months as an in-patient until I discharged myself in which time my wife left me (thanks hon). I know without the drugs to counteract the chem. inbalance and bi-polar problems I wouldn't be where I am today. The reason why I have posted? don't be afraid of asking for help in Germany, there is an amazing system set up in place to help that makes the UK NHS look like playschool! Don't be afraid to accept medication, but if you feel you can progress without then by all means try your own route. I tried my own route and the doctors were very patient with me and caught me when I "fell again", for me their route works best, so don't be afraid to say you were wrong and change the method of professional help. To have friends that can really help is a rare thing, disgard the ones who say "yo just need a good kick up the arse". And most importantly don't make life shattering decisions, you just aint in the right frame of mind the change you world in live in.

Thanks for sharing.

Really sorry to hear about that Slackmack, I hope your life is still somehow managing to get back to something resembling normality.

While I was in Berlin last weekend I met some folks from Hannover who told me their train was delayed 4 hours from someone committing suicide on the tracks. When they told me about this I immediately thought about that person and wondered what could have brought them to this point in their life. I believe suicide is the most selfish thing a person can do and an act of desparation. What does it matter if it's pills or a train or some other means, dead from suicide is dead. Hopefully, mental illness will be destigmatized and more prevention efforts and mental health awareness are put into place to curtail and possibly prevent the number of suicides that are happening.

Looking at the poll I was surprised how many people voted for "Maybe, if I thought there is no point living anymore." I think there is always a point living, just that many people don’t see that in certain situations or moments – and it only takes moments for someone to kill themselves.

I wish I could have been there - for the people I know who have killed themselves - at that moment when they felt there was no point living anymore.

I was trying to get in contact with my friend from school, leaving messages on her answering machine when she commited suicide.
I knew she was feeling sad about a couple of things on her life, but I would have never expected her to kill herself. If only I knew. I would have never left her side.

I think I could if I get to a point in my life where quality is low. Just go to a lake and sink under or something (except that leaves a problem with who clears up).

It is very easy to say though.

Just before Tony Wilson died, he said that he used to blithely say he'd be happy to die in his 50's - but how that view changed when he was diagnosed with his terminal illness at just that age.

I wonder how many people who commit suicide actually put much thought into it, or if it's often a spur-of-the-moment thing.


I think it would be impossible to know unless you were in that situation. Even if you were diagnosed with a disease that caused progressive debilitation, you might think "when I can no longer feed myself, life won't be worth living", but you can't possibly know that for sure until you get to that stage.

Losing Mummy
This is an article about a mother diagnosed in the very early stages of an incurable debilitating disease who decided to take her own life despite her children's protestations. So because it was what she wanted and they wanted her to be happy, they supported her, travelled with her to Switzerland to have it done there, went sightseeing as a family, attended a concert in the days before, witnessed her taking the poison, snorting and choking, turning purple, dying. She was then cremated without her family present and her ashes flown back to the UK.

The whole thing seems very messy and you can't help but feel that there's exploitation going on, particularly since the company in question is profiting from this and there have been reports that it is prepared to 'assist' people who are not actually terminally ill (according to a TV documentary broadcast on German TV not that long ago, doctors who are approached by the company in order to prescribe the poison often refuse to do so because they feel that the individual's medical status doesn't warrant it but this doesn't stop the company from searching until it finds a doctor who can be convinced otherwise).

I understand how people don't want to die a slow and painful death in a hospital, but assisting someone to die seems to be such an act of violence. I don't believe in the peaceful death this company is trying to advertise. Taking poison isn't something that makes dying any easier. Of course it happens much faster, but still I believe most of these people make their decision based on false promises by a company whose main interest is making a profit.

I believe that everybody should be free to choose, I hate the idea of somebody "cashing-in" by being paid to help, and I don´t think it is fair to involve complete strangers by almost making them kill you - for instance jumping in front of a train - how would you feel if you were the driver???

Some people choose to end it all at the Dignitas establishment in Zurich. They say it is painless but since they can’t question the customers afterwards then it is difficult to substantiate their claims. People living in the same block are also a bit disturbed by it all – people being taken out in boxes and all that.
Company web site: http://www.dignitas.ch/

BBC article about the place
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/2676837.stm

Interesting article, BattalionBoy. I wonder how many people actually regret their decision once they have taken the drug.

'Dignitas' is the company the German TV documentary was about. According to the documentary, the company needs to find a doctor who will prescribe each fatal dose of poison. Apparently, if the first doctor they approach refuses, they approach a second one, and if he refuses, a third one, and so on until they find one who will. A doctor from Austria was interviewed, who said that he felt that he was misled into prescribing it and refused to cooperate with them again. A former employee said she had stopped working for them as she felt that they operated unethically and contrary to the principles they actually advocated.

However, it looks as if they've found a way round the problem of getting hold of the poison by adopting another method: plastic bag and gas.
Guardian article: Dignitas attacked for new assisted-suicide method

I found this interesting article on suicide prevention in "The New York Times".

It must be a strange working environment.

I wonder how much Dignitas charge for this service.


None Marie-Claire. Good beer and sex in heaven you know. At least, I like to think so.

That's an interesting article.


I've sometimes wondered if there's an inherent psychological danger in doing bungee jumping, especially for people who are already vulnerable. If you're able to overcome the natural self-preservative instinct not to jump simply because you know there's a rope attached, who's to say that the experience won't make you feel less inhibited from jumping without one?

Here is a link to site that tells about the life and death of Raleigh Collins "Raleigh". I met him while BASE jumping in Italy.
He took his life leaping from a cliff in Joshua Tree with a running exit and tracking (a body position used to create maximum horizontal clearance from the object during freefall) to impact.
I think that there is an inherent psychological danger in not doing risky things, like killing one's self because life is so boring. I don't know of any other BASE jumpers who have committed suicide by jumping.
Take care,
space

Sounds like a hell of a guy space.

Very sad. I just quickly read through the page, but seiing how many times he actually escaped death seems to make it even more tragic.

There was a thing on the news the other night about how some woman stood on a level crossing untill the train went thump. Thing was the selfish cow had just got out of her car which contained her 12 year old son who was pleading with her to get off the line.

Something similar happend back home where a guy i know was walking down a busy main road with his son when he turned to him and said "tell mum i love her" before throwing himself under a bus.

cunts the pair of them!

Far worse than that are the ones who kill their own children as well as themselves, coz they don't want to go on their own, or don't want the kids to be left behind.