As I prepare to go I’ve been thinking about the problem of stigma and association.
Most see suicide as an emotional, impulsive, short sighted act of desperation that harms all affected. Its negative in every regard. And in most cases they’re right.
However, there are a core number of people like myself who have felt this way for a long time; we’ve put things back constantly to please and appease others, we’ve spoken to therapists, counsellors et al, we’ve considered the situation from every angle.
And we still want to do it.
We don’t expect or want Heaven/Hell/Purgatory; we don’t want Karma or Reincarnation, and we certainly don’t wish a ‘Restart’ to go through it all again.
We don’t ‘wish we were never born’ in self pity, nor rage against the world.
We want to simply cease. Existence, thought and being. Sopranos Ending.
I think it would be better if we were recognised as a separate sub-category: rational, insightful and entitled to our decisions. We do it FOR, not BECAUSE OF, a reason.
I think Mental Health needs updated on this issue.
9 comments
I agree with the wanting to “cease to exist” wholeheartedly..
Most days I just don’t want to be here, but I’m not actively wanting to or orgestrate my demise.
I just want to escape the pain, the pointlessness of my miserable existence but I must ,like a lot of us, still have some hope that one day things might “get better”, or I would’ve been busy hanging myself right now.
Don’t get me wrong, there are days I am looking for a way to go, somewhere to jump from (I have given up on overdosing coz every time I tried I failed miserably, after 24 odd hours of unconsciousness I would come to and be violently sick for the next 12 hours or so, so obviously that’s not the way for me to leave this planet)
But jumping, hanging, it’s so final.
There really is no turning back from that .
And is that really what I want? Or do I just stop hurting, not exist like this but want something better?
Yes is the answer, and to speak my mum’s wise words: “Where there is hope, there is life”.
Unfortunately sometimes, but obviously I don’t have hope.
And so must you ,OP, or you wouldn’t have written the words u wrote with which I, and no doubt a lot of people on this forum, weather they’re aware of it and want to admit it to theirselves or not..
I do hope sincerely ,from the bottom of my aching heart, that things will get better for us, they can’t get any worse ,right? ?
(Yes they can, unfortunately, do as a day we want to cease to exist vs actively planning and executing our suicide, is for us, a good one..)
Here’s a hug and a bit of the hope I have to all of you, I hope it helps you to get through the day.
Oh, I Thank You for that.
I appreciate what you say, but I think I’m different as I’m not ill, poor, friendless or whatever. Just someone who wants to suddenly cease.
I’ve accepted many of my problems are self caused- I just have no interest in attempting to rectify them.
But have a Blessed day 🙂
BML84,
I was wondering if you were gone. Since you’re not, I will take the opportunity to wish you well. I agree with you wholeheartedly. Although not the norm, I see nothing wrong with not wanting to exist. Death comes to us all, and some prefer not to wait for it. So my hope for you is this: a peaceful, stress free exit from your life. Blessed be.
Thank You- its a Holiday Weekend so Monday night seems right.
I appreciate your warmth and compassion- have a Blessed Life.
Well if you don’t have a family or anything to live for, you are basically nobody, you don’t feel happy or good… then I understand, like it is your life and you can feel the need to cease existing – as you put it.
That is my case.
I completely agree about Mental Health needing an update, but don’t count on that. There seems to be an enormous resistance in general, but in the mental health services in particular, to any notion that suicide can be rational. If you don’t want to exist anymore, the party-line goes, then you must be mentally ill just because you think that. The fact is that there are many reasons why one may not want to live anymore, and while many or most may be the result of a psychological disorder, not all of them are. In my case, it is based on ideas that I have thought about for several years now, both philosophical and things that are personal preferences. For example, for all of my life, I have never wanted to be old, just like I have never wanted children. I succeeded at the second, and I would like to succeed at the first as well.
That is an excellent, well thought out reply.
We are a minority and as you point out, much is invested in maintaining the current structure and ideology.
Thank you, I appreciate your response.
Is obligation an accurate word to describe how it is to live for someone else’s sake?