is suicide really all that bad?

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is suicide really all that bad?
blacken

blacken

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Is suicide really all that bad, of a choice. Oh, I hear the religious ones screeming at me now.
As shocked as I was at gunnar's last post, I can't condemn the man for trying. Someone in chat said its, "not stopping the abuse, its giving up." It's easy to say it, so very different Living it. Was living thru that HELL a better way. The daily torture of mind and body with no hope, (or prayer), of escape. I wasn't even aware of the concept of suicide (or that I could kill him) as a kid, too bad really.
Why dont I do it now ? Because I am not living in the abuse, and I dont want to hurt those that care about me. But I sure came close to it a year ago. So close. I still understand the pull of suicide...
 
I still understand the pull of suicide too blacken.


Once that choice is acted upon to its completion, there are no other choices. Just knowing that became a deterent for me, what if it was a mistake. Knowing I could end the pain, that I had a choice, helped me to hang on a little longer. Suicidal thoughts comforted me in a very sad way.

While driving the thought of just letting go of the steering wheel at 70 miles an hour and it could all be over. No more pain.

I ignored the possibility that I could live through it with permanent brain damage or be paralized from the neck down.

I entertained thoughts of suicide for several years, but I told no one. In my head I was always exploring methods for doing it.

By not commiting suicide on a particular night I eventually came to experience some days that weren't half bad. It was much like the song says"help Me Make It Through the Night,"and "The Darkest Hour Is Just Before Dawn." I found that second saying ever soo true on sleepless nights. The next day wasn't as oppressively tough to endure. After experiencing this many, many, many times, hanging on became a little easier.

As I've said in Lloydy's "How Long" survey post, a book by John Bradshaw titled "Healing the Shame That Binds You,"helped to turn my life around. It differentiates between guilt and shame. Guilt is about a mistake I made, or something I've done wrong. Shame is about - I am a mistake, my very being is a great error.

Part of suicidal thoughts were about finding relief for the never ending agony. Part of my suicidal thoughts were about murdurous rage. Suicide is self murder.
The murderous rage could not be at my "loving" mother, what kind of ungrateful son would I be. It had to go somewhere so I joined everyone else in my family who tried to destroy any self worth i should have had.

I swallowed a three months supply of maximum strength anti-depressants (Elevil) in my murderous rage after I walked out on a conjoint session with my wife and my therapists.

I drove to a nearby park, and waited for death.

When The medication began to get into my system I started to feel better and I couldn't remember why I was so rageful, so I turned myself in to my therapist. The little blue pills bounced all over the place on the ER floor. I was soon unconscious.

It is now 27 years later. I have come to experience life as prescious. I have come to claim a life for myself. Suicidal thoughts were about what they taught me about myself. I know now they were so very wrong.
 
RJD, thanks you so much for sharing your journey from despair to hope and belief in a better future. This is really helpful.

It is good that after your meds began to work you could still get to the ER. I suspect some want to do that, but decide too late.

Congratulations! It took courage to go through all that and it takes courage to tell it. But please do know that you have helped us a great deal by telling us that it is worth putting up a fight for life.

Bob
 
Blacken....i appreciate your post because once again in my life i am seriously considering suicide....i first tried when i was 15, but nobody knew...a bottle of aspirin will not do the trick.....guess my last serious attempt was in may 2001 when i took heart pills and slit my wrists with razor blades, guess i wanted help since i drove to a payphone and called the crisis line, i went to a payphone because i did not think they could trace the call... though i think i just wanted to talk to somebody while i fell asleep....unfortunately a bunch of police and an ambulance showed up....i was so mentally determined to accomplish what i've known i need to do for such a long time....it is hard to muster the courage to do it.....i was very close in december, i went to a gun shop to buy a gun....unfortunately i was flagged and had to wait three days....i let that fact slip during a therapy session, maybe sub-consciously i do not want to die, and ended up back in the hospital.....but here i am again, so needing to end the pain and self-loathing....how do you ever get over being abused????? especially when bad things started when i was so young (2-3) and lasted so long (until i was 15), i had so effectively blocked those bad things from my memory for so long, but now the dreams and flashbacks are unbearable, i just cannot endure much more.....the anti-depressants, i had such hope in, do not seem to be working and i'm tired of trying different pills.....pills will never feel the void inside of me, unless they put me into a permanent sleep with no more nighmares of being raped....

you say you did not do it because it would hurt your family.....i think i used to try to do it to make my family love me, if not in life, in death.....but at this point in my life i no longer care about my family, it has taken me alot to get to this point, but my wonderful mother did me a great service when in may 2001, after i had slit my wrists and was still hospitalized, decided to vacation in las vegas with my sister....at that point, i realized she was always going to be incapable of caring about me and i had to severe ties with them.....that point was driven home when several days later i told her of the abuse and her response was well, i'll call your uncle and ask him....that was the final straw, i cannot allow myself to care about such a person any longer.....so you see, family is no longer a barrier or even a consideration for me.....let her have her pitiful funeral for me where she can act like the suffering victim and garner all of the attention she so craves.....i do not give a damn......

yes, i have fears of becoming a living vegtable...but in so many ways i already am that....my therapist retorts when i talk about suicide," you do not know what is on the other side, you might suffer more and not be able to do anything about the pain. At least here you can try to make the pain go away".......sad thing is, it never does go away, it just gets worse....so that argument really holds no validity for me.....

people say suicide lets the perpetrators win.....this is not a contest.....i do not give a damn about who wins, i just need things to end.....

maybe soon i will be courageous and complete the act........michael
 
Michael please I beg you don't go down that road. Please find someone to talk to. i have done the things you've done, tried those things to. but they are not the answer, life is the answer, a chance to get past the hurt the pain the abuse. While i was laying in bed marc sat beside me while he waited for the results of the cat scan. I tried to tell him but couldnt i already knew what the answer would be and i couldn't even tell him. now i have to live with this forever, the damage i caused myself. please stay with us and keep talking
 
I joined this Forum back in August of 2001. There has been a lot of change since then.
I was extreamly angry back then. The wounds of renewed memory were fresh and stung greatly.
My mood here on this Forum is quite fickle. One post might be hopeful, the next dreadful. I think because I listen, and the words of others invoke or release inner feelings that have been waiting (perhaps for decades) to be released. I am far more open here, than anywhere else in my life.

RJD, Your responce is right on the mark for me. It rung true in my heart and I appriciate U taking the time to write it.

michaelb, I am not currently, actively seaking my own death. BUT! I am certainly NOT happy. I have moments of joy. I have days of "ok'ness". But I really dont know what Happiness is, on an emotional level.
I, in my work, have had to talk to kids about & out of suicide. And at times I have felt such the Hipocrate. I felt I was telling lies.
I so much want to not feel this dread that still holds on to the shirt tails of my soul. Holding me back from allowing myself to risk being intimate, to strive to reach my true potentials.

You said, "people say suicide lets the perpetrators win.....this is not a contest.....i do not give a damn about who wins, i just need things to end.....". I hate that F*cking comment too. :mad: And I do agree with your feelings on this. That one comment burns me up. Its so Damn sinical and judgemental. To me, that truely insensitive comment means; 'If you end your life, your a loser, your a weak piece of shit.'
It validates the power of the perp and condenms the victim! I hope people stop using it.
Am I required to dedicate my whole F*cked up life to fighting an ENDLESS battle that I don't see anyone ever winning? The idea of 'winning over SA' could be a thread all to its self.

But there are also a great number here in the forum, chat and elsewhere in the world that continue on. They keep fighting the fight.
I have heard that success is measured by the simple act of ATTEMPTING, day after day, ie, fighting the fight; continueing the struggle; feeling the pain and sharing; speaking your mind and heart; laughing and crying...
And for me, posting here, is part of my fight. And I don't always get my point across, or I convey the wrong idea than what I meant. Or I was in a bad (negative) mood when I wrote it.

I find it difficult to convey meanings by simply writing it. Speech is so much more effective. With its tones, volume and inflections, its so much more accurate.

In not even knowing gunnar personally, but just reading his posts, has invoked deep and mostly painful memories. It awoke a sleeping lion in me. I feel quite strange. It is going to take me some time (how long?)to process this all. And in the mean time, I may be an Ass at times. Please forgive the transgrations.

Please michaelb, keep fighting the fight. Its not a contest, but U have a right to seek happiness. I thought my therapist was an idiot when he said, "It will get less bad over time".
It did get 'Less bad', its still not good either.
But perhaps it will, some day....
Blacken...
 
somehow it posted the same thing tiwce

(I took it off, Lloydy )
 
Suicide is something that's affected me deeply. I've known too many people who've chosen this path at one time or another.

For me it was an unplanned and instant reaction to the shame of acting out, a product of the confusion I felt after the event.
It was probably half hearted as well, or maybe the despair set in when I couldn't find a length of hose to fit my Landcruiser's big exhaust pipe. But for whatever reason, I gave up the attempt very easily.
To go on and do it some other way would have been possible I know, but I think the realization that I was so fucking useless I couldn't even do that simple thing sent me into a level of despair where the effort to do something right became impossible - if that makes sense ?

I'm one of those that believe that the perp's win if we kill ourselves, I lost my childhood friend Mick like that. He was abused at the same school and took his life back at the school grounds many years later.
He lost everything, my only consolation is knowing that his perp ( different to mine ) threw himself off a bridge and killed himself a long time before Mick.

Dave
 
___________
CAUTION
___________

Here again, unknown to them while growing up, my daughters have been my teachers.

I learned on an intellectual level that all children need unconditional positive regard.

Even adults need that, but we hopefully have the skills to cope when we don't get that positive regard.

To have that skill as an adult, we have to have recieved unconditional positive regard as children.

I didn't recieve that as a child, but there is a saying in recovery circles to,"Fake it, till you make it." I was serious about wanting the best for my kids. Even though I knew down deep in my soul that I was shit, I could still see how precious they were. The shit, I came to believe I was, covered and hid the precious child I was born

My daughters have grown now. Their unconditional positive self-regard has brought them into full bloom in reaching their potential as adults. Oh, they have their self doubts, but they take risks that earn the respect of the people they gather into their lives and the people they work with. They dare to face life on it's own terms. I burst with pride just thinking about them.

The darker side of seeing them flower is how it glaringly illuminates... what I didn't get.

So now I've come to understand I have to re-write the legacy of what my family did to me, and parent the little boy in me at least like I parented my daughters. I parented them with patience, forgiveness, understanding and unconditional love....and joy.

If I had an adopted son who had had the experiences I've had, I would listen to his story of agony until he had healed enough that he no longer needed to tell me one more time. (The tears are puddling again for that young man whose heart was torn every which way but loose.)

If he then needs to start his story all over from scratch at some other time, I will lovingly listen and, no doubt, I will cry with him again. I would do this because, I especially, know that kind of pain.

It is a joy to care for him that way as it was a joy to be the loving father to my daughters.

When suicide again becomes an option for him, I will take him to someone who can help. When he is that rageful, I cannot take care of him on my own. I need to seek outside help.


There is another book by John Bradshaw titled, "Homecoming." In the book there are some very powerful exercises. I think they work better in a gruop. At the time I was in a men's support group with survivors of various kinds of childhood trauma. It was a self led group of men with no facilitator though the men understood well the need for safety. These were men seasoned in their recovery work.

I recorded my own voice reading the passages from the exercises in the book. Especially for me, it was powerful hearing my adult voice talking to little Bobby, taking him by the hand and going with him into the house he grew up in. I walked him up to my mother , father, and big brother and told them Bobby will not be coming back home because they did not know how to take care of him. I told them I would be taking care of him from now on.

With that, Bobby and I left together, hand in hand.

Bobby was in terror because of my history with him, but he sensed where my heart was and he was comforted with that. His eyes were filled with tears, he now had somebody to take better care of him.

I had some work to do to be able to live up to my commitment to him.


I ENCOURAGE ANYONE TO NOT DO THESE EXERCISES ALONE.


Surround yourself with people who can do that kind of work on their own personal issues. THEY CANNOT FIX ME. All they can do is listen and share their stories of pain or joy. That is also all I can do for them


The little boy in me already feels like his soul was murdered, as long as there is a murderous threat to his physical body he cannot feel the safety it requires to do the healing work on this terribly, terribly wounded soul of his.
 
One thing we must always remember is that there are alternatives to suicide.

None of them are easy, many will be short term, but none will be as final as suicide.

What we MUST do is talk.
I know that when we're in the depths of despair that sounds easy. Believe me I know it aint easy.
But we have to do it, we owe it to ourselves and those we love.

If we talk to someone we will find out that people do care about us, would you say to someone "go ahead, do it" No, of course you wouldn't, it's inbuilt into all of us to help someone in distress.
I say that even in the face of the evidence of all the abuse we've known between us. We've know some truly evil people but to say that takes evil into unknown levels.

Some people are isolated, have no family or loved ones. But there are people out there who care.
We care, the Samaritans are on the end of a 'phone, as are many other people who care. A stranger on the street will care, doctors care, a cab driver will take you to an emergency room rather than a high bridge.
All we have to do is tell someone, it's the first and strongest alternative.

Talking is the best weapon we have.

RJD, thanks for your reply there, it's stunning.

Dave
 
This has been a difficult thread to read--but in the midst of such longing for things to be different than there are and were, there is hope and determination.

It is really difficult for someone who is past 30 years or so. to accept that his childhood and adolescence were abnormal to say the least, AND that we can't redo it. RJD, Bob, I think it was you who wrote the moving story of taking little Bobby by the hand and into the house he grew up in, to tell his family you would be taking care of him now.

That is a profound picture for me. I visualized is as I read it and it was a "shouting moment" a one of my African Ameerican ladies used to tell me. Thanks.

Please guys, do not think I am saying something here that I am not. But, I will tell you of a time in therapy when I was so angered at my therapist that I could have taken his degrees and certificates off the wall and thrown them out the window.

I was talking to him about these very thoughs, lost childhood, feeling abanoned, unloved etc. I think this happened just in the past decade so this is after 25 to 30 years of therapy off and on. Mostly on.

He looked me in the eye and asked:" Bob, what are you getting out of all that?" I did not understand the questions. So he explained that I must be getting something that I feel I need out of feeling so sorry for myself and my life, and holding on to that with all my might. Damn him, was my immediate thought.

This was one of the most emotionally conflicted times in my life. I was filled with anger, hurt, shame, betrayed, challenged and finally embarassed and kind of hard on myself for not seeing the dynamic earlier.

I could not believe he could be so cruel to say such a thing--but gradually, as he talked and we talked, I saw a point. Until I could get over holding on to my "victimhood" I could not move on.

Sure wish there was a cheery ending. But the truth is, that I still feel sad, angry and cheated, at least at times. I grieve over a past I did not have and decisions I made without ever experiencing the norm for life as a young man. But, I am getting better, and I do ask myself that question a lot. I ask myself what I am getting out of it and of course the answer is the same, lots of sadness and some people giving me a little sympathy, which in fact I can admit, I want some times.

Peace to us all.

Bob
 
Bitter pills for me to swallow:
"You're just feeling sorry for yourself." the expression lacks soul to me, and I have often heard it used as a put-down.
"What is this getting you?" I've even seen that used as a put-down, but I also have heard it as a good question.

I'm with you all the way here Bob.

"You're just feeling sorry for yourself."---The good news and the bad news of "getting better" then attempting suicide was that My rage was finally getting to the surface. That was the healthy part of coming out of a catatonic depression.

The downside and unhealthy part of attempting suicide was that I dumped on the first support system I've ever had: my theripist, my wife, and myself. The three of us recieved all of the pent-up impotent-turned-potent rage of the terribly wounded boy/man in me. He wanted someone else to feel what I could only try to numb out. In retrospect, they represented my architypal mother, and the kind of care I was accustomed to.

Another vulnerable bystander was my 4 y.o. daughter, who was not yet aware of what was going on,though she was not unaffected by the drama.

I lived and breathed suicidal thoughts. They were how I got through the day.

What they got me was relief with the thought that I could opt out of the pain at any time. But what they also got me was to reinforce how I felt about myself as a sick fcker and deserved to be continuously tortured and threatened with death that way. I complained about it. but I also wallowed in it.

Then one day the question came to my attention,"What would life be like without all this self-loathing. ...Now there was a scary thought...

Self -loathing was part of my identity. I had learned to do it so consistantly that I knew no other way. Could I 'choose' not to do that anymore? Since when did I have this choice?

The key for me was when I began to tell my story over and over again and the secret that I should "never tell anyone, because they won't understand," was not a secret anymore, and it gradually released it's hold on me. (over several years.[ages 30-40)

I still pick up a hammer and instinctually beat myself with it, but now I catch myself and can stop sooner than I used to. (some of you might remember the post under "I hate wasps" when I did that quite litterally.)

Choices are now visible to me that were impossible for me to see even a few years ago.

Going to grad school 3 yrs ago was a step into my light that was terrifying to me. Beating up on myself was a way of life. Stopping that behavior and daring to think that I deserved to be able to get a masters like anyone else who's ever gotten a masters before in history was so presumptuous of me. Surely the school made a mistake when they decided to accept me.

I litterally had to say "stop that Bob" on a regular basis for the past two years. I'm on the other side of the experience now, and it is still a crisis for me even though I've graduated.

I had to understand what I learned as a child. Then I had to unlearn what I learned. Then I had to teach myself a new way to live life.

I am envious of those who learned the right way from the start. .
 
suicide was a big issue for me before new years, 2003. Until...

My cousin, was kicked out by his second wife, with no real contact with his children by his first wife, nor his daughter by his second wife. He thought his pain would never end. I don't think he was a survivor of SA, but he sure was in alot of pain. Wrote his ex and his wife, and his kids letters. Mailed em. Shot him self dead on new years eve.

He said in his letters that if he could not be with his wife and kids, he could not be here at all.

I went to the funeral. This is the spooky part.

He spoke to me, at the memorial service at the Firefighters Memorial (he was a volunteer Firefighter) Almost like in a dream, but I was wide awake. "Look at my mother, my father, my wife, my ex wife, my son, my daughters. (they were sobbing in so much pain as we all were) I could not deal with my pain, so I thought I could get rid of it all by ending my life. I was wrong. All I did was stop my own pain, and gave it all to those whom I love the most here on earth. Marc, don't ever think what I did was the easy or correct thing to do. It solved nothing, my family bears my pain, and I carry more pain in this place than I did on earth..." And he was gone.

I feel pain, suffering, sadness, anger, rage all those things we as SA survivors feel. But it took my cousin's suicide (and speaking with brothers like Dan in NE, Chey-WY, Lightfang, the Dean )to make me realize that the end is not the answer.

orodo
 
i would like to share this on your current topic if i may,

at 43 married with 4 young adult/teenagers and as a survivor
i know feel my own hurt pain and saddness that seems endless, so many times has driven me to the point where, yep to die would seem the best choice.

but then creator who whispers in one ear, woz then who will do the heart work? while i whisper in the other countering creator, who cares?

my wife and children care i know they do, yes they dont tell me as often as the little boy inside wants to hear it.

but i know that they do and i know that the courage i have been shown by them to me by loving me in spite of my great efforts at keeping them away from my heart and fealings.

so to honour them i will do the heart work, for me, my wife my children, my creator, my friends

i can not change that which is past and the pain and the saddness will not change the fact that my protectors as a child, teenager, and young man all failed in there job.

but i can stand with courage because i have found one who loves me in spite of me.

me

but just a little better yet 5 others,( wife daughter son son daughter) then before i knew it a few more again, so i now know the whole world may not love me, but just one is enough and my life is showing me that i am not standing alone anymore.

so dont have to listen to me, when i say you are woth standing for the fight of your life, just listen within, you will here you the real you cause like me you are the most single important loveing being the your creator has ever made, and you are worth the fight.

do i ever think of the what if's yes every day still, but a little boy tells me i'm worth standing up for.

listen to your chld within they know that your worth it to.

and though i may not know you yet, i think that you are too.

blessings
 
A person would have to be blind and deaf not to see enormous courage here. Orodo, your cousin was so right. WOZ you put the struggle so well. RJD Bob, you always have a healthy word to speak.

Physical pain has driven me to think that I wanted life to end, as much as has the SA pain. But I always know that what I really want is to stop the pain. So I drive my physicians a little nuts by telling them that the pain has got to lessen, if it can't stop.

Pain sucks. Hope is awesome. The hope and experience of the past in getting rid of some of the pain, sure helps me want to see a long future, as long as I can make it be.

Peace to you guys and thanks for sharing your agony--I feel compassion for all of you. But I also get strength through it all. It is invaluable to me.

Bob
 
What do I think? I do think that taking your own life is letting your abusier win. If you take your life couse of your sa you are still letting them control you. I do think that taking your own life is giving up on your self. You are worth so much to this world and your self.


Love, Nathan
 
Nathan: You are so so right. I know what you are talking about. My perps hotwired me to keep silent etc, etc. And I did. The permanancy of suicide guarantees silence forever; their ultimate victory over us. And the CANNOT and MUST not win. Last Spring was a very scary time for me. I had been in therapy for about 5-6 years and things were going to straight to hell. One evening I was going inline skating at the rink where I teach. I took a tremendous amount of medications (Effexor and Welbrutin) and lfet the rink and drove down to Lake Ontario. I piled my clothes on the shoreline and headed into the lake fuly intending to swim umtil fatigue and the cold helped me suceed. I was about 50 yards from shore when I heard a voice "PLease dont do this". I looked back at the shoreline and saw a young man walking his dog. I went back to shore intending to tell this young man why I was doing what I was doing. When I got ashore there was no one there. I was really spooked. Got dressed and sat in my car with the heater on for about 1 hour. When I got home the poiice were waiting for me. My friends at the rink had called my wife and daughter and they had frantically looked for me before enlisting the aid of the police. They were kind and gentle with me. I completely broke down and one officer, older guy, held me while I shook and told me to let it all out. This was the first time an authority figure had done this. My wife and daughter were frantic with relief.
What this is all leading to is that I had never felt so much love right then from my family. It was a love that, no matter what, I had worth. Quite a relevation. So for me personally, suicide is not an option for dealing with SA.

RJD you wrote:The little boy in me already feels like his soul was murdered. I felt that way for most of my adult life. Ime 62 now. What I believe now is that my sould was not murdered nor my childhood stolen. Just locked up by my perps. They gave me the key to the jail and I did a very good job of guarding the door. Now I an opening that door and allowing some of the light and joy of living in there. It is not easy nor do I expect it to be. But IT IS ONE HELL OF A LOT BETTER THAN ANYTHING ELSE I HAVE EVER DONE. I DONT WANT TO JUST SURVIVE I WANT TO LIVE AND SEE JOY AROUND ME AND WITHIN ME.
For those of you that do not have close family or friends we are all here for you, each and everyone of us.
Nuff Said
 
Amen mikechurch...

Thrive my fellow traveler...and peace be with you...

I have often admired the beautiful work you do and the wisdom you speak..
 
Yes, I too have felt the pull of suicide. It almost pulled me off a mountain once.

But I also know that suicide is not an option, it is the end of all options.

Had I thrown myself off that mountain when I was 17, I wouldn't be here talking about the "option" of suicide. I wouldn't be here with this fine group of men opening their hearts to one another,
offering & receiving support & life.

Thanks to you all. I'm glad you're all here.

Victor
 
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