Choose Life – It’s too hard to die

I am a suicide survivor. Three times I have tried and failed. They weren’t the kind of failures where I wanted to fail. They were real.

The 1st time it happened, I was 18 (I’m 26 now). After years of abuse from my father, I came to the end of the road. I was running away from my father and he was pursuing me in the car, but I managed to get away. Feeling like I was sure to get caught by him, I hid under a flyover for hours and hours wondering what to do. After what seemed like forever, I decided that whatever happened, I had to face him, so I made the decision that I had only one other option – death. I headed for the 100ft bridge near my town, climbed up the banking in the dark to the very top and tore through the barbed wire fences onto the train line. Once up there I knew I had to go through with it whatever and made my way to the middle and the highest part. My head was spinning as I checked the height. My mobile rang. I looked at the screen. I don’t know this number I thought. I answered it feeling sure it was nothing important. The police. Oh f*** what now? I told them I was OK. I look above my head, a helicopter? How the f*** did that get there! I cursed myself at my obvious suicide location. of course my dad knew how I was, and knew where the first choice place was. I was f*****d unless I jumped right now. I turn around, torches down the line, cops everywhere, dogs, you name it. I climbed onto the side, grabbing hold of the square mesh fence which was about 3 feet high. I inched my way along to the lower fence and went over the other side. Now I’m hanging over a 100ft drop and what do I see. My f****ng dad and a bunch of cops at the bottom! Oh my lord. So this baby faced copper, not much older than me comes about 4 feet from me and tries to persuade me to come back. I am smoking a cigarette and he talks and talks and talks. I get through about 8 fags and he asks for one. He says if you’re going to jump, at least give me a cig first. Stupid me, of course, with my kind heart, gives this copper a ciggy. He takes it with one hand, and handcuffs me to him with the other! So to cut a long story short, after all that, I end up in the back of the police van tied to this copper, on my way to see the glorious police shrink and a one way ticket to the psych ward. Oh yeah, one down two to go.

The second was much more dramatic than that. Many months later, after tons of sh*t had passed me by and yet again found myself alone, and at the end of my rope. I had visited a friend who had sent me to another friend who had promised me a handgun. So I go to this dude’s house and he shows me a load of guns, all kinds. I pick one out. A 38 revolver snub. Sweet piece of kit so I’m told, and meaningful against a human being. He takes me out to the woods and we shoot this thing for a couple of hours, looking at the damage to logs and so on. He gives me the gun wrapped up and says come back tomorrow for ammo. I do and he loads up the gun and gives me a box of the ammo to take. I get home at about 11am. I sit down at the kitchen table staring at this thing and thinking this will be the thing that ends my life. The more I think, the more chicken I get until minutes turn into hours. After 9 hours pass and I have barely moved from the spot, I finally cock this thing, aim, hesitate, hesitate, hesitate…………BANG…….Am I dead? No f***ing way. I am lying on my kitchen floor, ears ringing, deaf, stunned but completely unharmed except for a slight burn. Two down one to go.

The third really was the most dramatic, and the turning point. I had been admitted to the psych ward again, this time lock up, for various acts of craziness ranging from leaping around on the roof of the local hospital, to escaping from the open ward, to trying to jump from windows. I had been on suicide watch for 2 weeks and they had just let me off. I had been waiting for this. I ordered a takeaway meal, curry, samosas and a can of coke. The last supper. After eating this supper, I took the empty coke can and shoved it up my hoodie. No way you could see it considering I had loose jeans and several layers on. I went into the bathroom to take a bath. I had at least half an hour before the next check. Wasting no time at all, I turned on the water to drown out the noise of me tearing up the can. I got the sharpest piece of can I could find, found a place where I could see a visible blood vessel and took a slice at it. First time, nothing much happened, a bit of blood, pain the cut was deep but mainly just into fat and skin. I was totally determined not to fail this time. Took the metal edge, sticking it directly into the existing cut. This time, I hit. i have never seen anything like it. Blood fountained everywhere, up the walls, the floor and my clothes turned red in seconds. I had a thought. I’m actually going to die now. I felt calm, happy. I slumped on the floor and waited for the life to drain from my veins. If I had died I wouldn’t be writing this, so it’s obvious I was found in time. One member of staff first, who freaked and hit the alarm. Another came, and another, before long there were 6 of them trying to stop the flow. Shortly after, the paramedics came and took me to surgery. Yet again, I have lived to fight another day.
So what now? Do I continue on the path of self destruction? No way! You would not believe how difficult it is to actually die. Humans are tough. I am here for a reason. My life has changed. I am getting married, I have years of life to look forward to and all my past torture has got less gradually. The pain has never really gone away for good, but enough to make me believe that live is worth living and you never can tell what will happen, so why throw your life away. You have one chance at life. I tried to destroy it and was rewarded with 3 chances at new life. I will never ever go back there. No matter what pain you suffer, and what torment you go through, nothing is worth giving up your life for. You can get through it, I would not lie and say it’s easy. It’s f***ing impossible sometimes, but you CAN do it. Choose LIFE, DYING is harder than living.