What stops you from committing suicide, anyway?

[Steampunk]

Statistically speaking, I believe most people who attempt suicide do not follow through with it if someone intervenes. The idea is, suicide is typically an impulsive decisions. People who intervene usually try to get suicidal individuals to think about what they're doing. So, I'd say realizing the permanent nature of suicide and fully appreciating that there's no going back, no changing your mind is what stops people from doing it. I don't know for certain though.

As for what suicide is, I can't say. It is the exact opposite of what people are biologically programmed to do (survive). I think it's an impulse carried out by someone who honestly doesn't know how to fix things in their life but desperately needs some kind of relief or solution. Some people say that those they knew that committed suicide seemed relieved beforehand. It could be that they think they've found an answer to their problems.

[Espinosa]

Most situations, you will be wrong. But let's say it's true... no one cares about you in your family. Chances are, someone out there will. Are you really going to punch them straight in the heart? Are you really willing to put them through that just to use a permanent solution to a temporary problem?

You (not you per se) punch people in the heart without having to kill yourself though.

That said, I consider suicide the contrary - a temporary non-solution to a permanent non-problem, because: a) existence lingers on - once around, always around, b) you don't stop existing by virtue of killing yourself but the possibility of your development is halted, c) the problem remains unsolved, d) the realisation that the problem is illusory has been missed.

[JSND Alter Dragon Boner]

Honestly?

I am a pussy no more, no less

I actually considered it like.... 5 - 6 ish years ago(really long story). The sad thing is the idea of killing yourself is indeed scary, so I am limited to using stupid threats and shit like that.

After that I recovered while still having a habit of cutting my own finger with a Knife or Scissors

And the rest is history >_>

Edited June 27, 2013 by I have a Dragon Boner

[Myke]

I just want to see what people come up with next. Honestly, some days, that's all there is to it.

"man life is so complicated and exhausting and I just want to die- oh hey look they built a robot with enough fine motor control to throw and catch an egg"

also I want to see how a Song of Ice and Fire ends

Edited June 27, 2013 by Myke

[Green Poet]

Though life has no objective meaning, that doesn't mean you can't give it your own subjective meaning: that is, make your own goals to accomplish and be proud of. That's what makes life worth living.

I suspect it's animal instinct. Even if I don't know why I want to continue living, it just feels right.

I'm of the same opinion. One can usually come up with their own personal purpose in life (i.e. directed by religion, zealous investment in occupation), and is motivated by that. And, in accordance with our natural instinct, we are inclined to self-preserve and disinclined to self-harm.

Then there's the point that others have suggested, that the individual contemplating suicide may feel some sort of obligation to those that have attachment to him/her, causing some hesitation for fear of appearing selfish and leaving a detrimental legacy. This one in particular is what has personally steered me clear of seriously considering suicide for any significant time.

[Nobody]

IMO there nothing scarier than eternal emptiness, the loss of my conscience. This prevents me from ever trying it. Also, doesn't matter hiw bad life is, something good will always happen, even if it's a nice day with some friends or enjoying a new video-game. When you think life has no real meaning, it gets easy to ignore all the bad things and only focus on the good ones.

[FrostyFireMage]

Because being dead sounds like it would suck. A lot.

...Seriously, though, when I was depressed, I remembered all the times I was happy before, and reassured myself that somewhere, sometime in the future, I will feel that kind of happiness again.

[Excellen Browning]

I've planned my own death at several occasions. I have been suicidal for several years. Looking back at those moments, its really fascinating to me how coldly rational, and at the same time emotional I was in those moments.

To my knowledge, teenage boys ask themselves the questions "is there a meaning to life?" "where do I want to go in life" "what will the future bring?". I base this on my own experiences, as well as those of my friends. And it seems the answer to this question is very important to us, even though I've never found an answer satisfying enough to consider adopting.

Interestingly, suicide rates among teenage boys and young men are much higher than those of girls and women. Its also always men who talk about these things. I remember being afraid of the future when I was a teenager, or at least much more than now. Maybe that's an important reason, because I have the feeling this seems to be important reason to kill themselves for some.

I'm 22 now and several kids that I grew up with or otherwise have killed themselves. Of some of them, I have the suspicion they lost some sort of feeling of hope as I am not aware of a history of abuse(and I usually am). An important reason for others seems to be that they don't want to be who they are(or think they are). To me, this seems to be the largest group of suicidees and yes, this is generally a "cry for attention".

Finally, I think the use of the argument "we are not biologically programmed to do X" very weak. Per example this is used against homosexuality, as it supposedly goes against our reproductive instincts. But at the same time, several other species have members of their group specially dedicated to raising children, and not reproducing. Homosexuals may originally have had the same function in groups of primitive humans. The same type of reasoning could apply to the act of killing oneself.

[peener weener]

I figure I'm alive right now and life is literally all I have, so why not keep doing that and see how it goes since we all die eventually anyway.

Basically, if the question is "why?" the only possible answer is "because."

Edited July 1, 2013 by Stahlypin

[eclipse]

There is something seriously wrong with me, physically. I don't know what it is, and I think those close to me deserve some sort of answer before I even contemplate offing myself.

[BluBlaDe]

Suicide can be good since the resource are quite limited on Earth, it means more food for everyone. And anyway if that person wanted to die, who are we to force that person to live? At least the person should die in a good way, not the extremely stupid gun shot in the head or too much medicine.

What I mean in a good way to die is to play video games without breaks until you die, eat all the fast food you can forever or go steal a bank or something ( but don't kill people, that's pretty shitty, you ain't god) The people that commits suicide I'm sure would change their mind halfway through if they didn't use instant kill no turning back methods. Deep down ever1 wants to live. And you know what why not take tons of steroid if you are a man? Now see you may die but if you survive you'll basically be at the very top of the social ladder and be able to get any women/jobs you wants. You should go crazy as hell if you really are prepared to throw away your life ( but don't kill people it's stupid)

For any suicidal person I'd say this : YOU NOW DON'T GIVE A FUCK ABOUT DYING. This means you are invincible. Don't go killing yourself, you morons, the fun just started. Go into a foreign country with all the cash you have left and try to start a new life here( btw my columbians friends works 12 hours a day for a shitty pay and they don't kill themselves left and right), try to pick a country where you don't know the local language. You'll probably die of hunger or deshydration but at least it isn't a pussy dead. It's a moronic but brave and manly death.

You could also go swim with alligators and fight bears or even lions in Africa. If you pussy out at the thought of doing that stuff than you aren't really suicidal, you're just a pussy. What seriously can you be afraid of if you don't care about your life? Go steal a bank or two but don't kill people, it's not ever1 that wants to die. Remember to not join the mafia, these guys will kill your loved ones ! You could also be a border guard in Mexico. I think you have 10 % of dying everyday. Now that makes each day super exciting, doesn't it!

The teenagers male commit suicide more because they know deep down that they were born losers, they know they will never be able to attract the women they wants and they somehow wants to end their life because of that. Pretty stupid and naive if you asked me. People that base their whole lives around another person ( their love interest) and off themselves because they don't love them back is really really idiotic.

People that kill themselves aren't pussy or cowards, they simply are weaklings. They somehow know best what their reality is and they cannot handle it. They cannot handle knowing that nobody like them for real or gives a fuck about them and somehow they feel bad enough about it to kill themselves. HERE'S A HINT : IT'S THE SAME FOR EVER1!!! Welcome to the real world where people like your for your social standing or some other bullshit reasons.

These people seriously need to get a little angry at the people that made them feel suicidal in the first place. Namely society, the medias and all that bullshit. People are unhappy because they constantly compare themselves with others. They feel happy only when they think they are ''normal'' or they think they should be happy.

That's fucking bullshit. The only person that can make you happy is yourself. For me it's motherfucking video games, fast food, porno and the web. If you want you can also have friends at work too.

[Shin]

I would go through what's wrong with the post above, but I'm afraid there's much too wrong with it to do that. Blu, I think you need to go away and read up on the issue, you seem to have misunderstood virtually every aspect of suicide and psychological health. Suicide is a response to intense negative feelings, which can be brought on by many things. It's incredibly unfair for you to consider everyone who commits or contemplates suicides as weaklings.

Me? I love living too much, I've got loads of amazing things I want to do and dying's not on my list.

[deleted35362]

Teen males tend to think of suicide because they're more susceptible to being abused and socially rejected.

Weak/effeminate and weak males tend to have trouble. Big manly males will do just fine.

Effeminate females will do just fine, obviously. Tomboyish females? Yeah, like they're gonna get any trouble.

I used to be interested in real girls myself and yeah...not getting girls is usually not nearly enough to push suicidal thoughts alone.

[Inactive Account]

OP, are you looking for actual advice on how to keep yourself away from the edge, or are you looking for the bullshit speculation that a lot of people in this thread seem to be so happy to provide?

I didn't understand what made suicidal people tick until I'd been there myself. I suspect that's largely true of people who have never seriously considered it-- of course you don't understand if you've never been there, killing yourself is an irrational thing to do, a healthy brain isn't going to want to do that. But calling someone a dumbass for being mentally ill isn't going to help anyone, any more than calling someone a dumbass for having cancer is going to help anyone.

I went through some bad times not too long ago. Thankfully, I think the worst is over. But there were times when I felt like it wasn't worth it to continue, like I didn't deserve to be alive. There were times when I was afraid to walk alone across my university campus to get home because I was afraid of what I might do while crossing the bridge on my usual route. Times when I considered handing my meds off to my roommate for safekeeping, because what if I suddenly decided to take them all and go for a very long nap?

Each time it happened I had to spend a while basically talking myself out of it. Thinking up reasons why I ought to stay alive. Well, I don't want to live, but if I die now I'll have wasted all that money spent on tuition right before I graduate. Well, I don't deserve to live, but if I die, it'll be really hard on my family. That kind of thing. I talked to my friends-- I felt like I didn't deserve their worry, so I never told them just how bad it was-- but it helped a bit anyway. Just quick conversations: hey, the depression's really eating me right now, can you just send me something to distract me? And they'd send me pictures of cats or something until I was at least thinking about something else even if I still felt like shit. What helped even more than any of that, though, was when I found a way to help someone else-- it could be as little as helping a friend on a math problem, but it restored some of the belief that maybe I deserved to live.

So I guess my advice would be: Start with whatever you can find to keep you from the edge, no matter how small. Talk to people, even if you can't bring yourself to really call for help. And do what you can to remind yourself that you can do positive things.

If you're already asking for help, you're stronger than you know. If you're asking for help, it means that despite how you may feel, you want to live, and you're fighting to do it.

[Rehab]

When I'm down I don't know how I was ever up, and when I'm up I don't know how I was ever down. Sometimes something gets me so elated that nothing can bother me, and sometimes something bad enough happens (or more commonly, I don't progress on anything for a long enough time) that everything, including what I might've pushed aside before, becomes a problem.

Suicidal (or, maybe more accurately, severely depressive) feelings mess with my head. Sometimes they go on for so long it doesn't feel like "messing," so much as "it be how it is." Either way, in my experience they've usually been based, or at least phrased by my conscience, on/as self-hatred- "You're so retarded and screwy, nobody else would've even thought to make that mistake, all of your problems are so much the results of your fuckup nature that you don't deserve to feel self-pity, you have nothing and do nothing for anyone, you've messed up so much it begs the question of whether you can do anything right, you're an asshole who everybody is bewildered/annoyed/disgusted/hurt by," etc.

I'm almost definitely forgetting other things about how I tend to get back out, and I usually clam up so much I don't even mention it to anybody who isn't my therapist, but one thing that particularly helps sometimes (YMMV, of course) is to remind myself that I'm not inclined to be so hard on anybody else. If I met somebody who had the same problems I did, I'd want to be able to comfort and encourage them. My self-hatred is kind of engrained, and less than rational, tending to make connections that don't always logically follow, and it can view one-off incidents through a deterministic lens that I'd never want to force on anybody else.

[Tao]

Nothing except fear. I've sought help already since I was around 18. That still doesn't stop the thoughts, but I guess the only thing that prevents from acting on them now is the fear of death (and pain).

I don't really like those sort-of-old posts about calling people who contemplate or committed suicide as 'pussies' because that's not exactly it. Even if everyone posted logical reasons why not to, I don't think they really understand what's going in the person's minds. Everyone's minds has different threshold for how much they can take from the world and from their own situations. When things feel like it's too much, well, sometimes the only thing they can think of IS suicide. I'm not saying that's a wise answer or anything, but... it's not really being a 'pussy' for taking that path. So what if they feel like everything is hopeless, helpless, they're useless, etc etc?

Although I definitely do not condone people who use suicidal threats for attention or something stupid like that. Suicidal ideation is a serious issue and should not be used for something so stupid.

And now I'm out of here.

[deleted35362]

OP, are you looking for actual advice on how to keep yourself away from the edge, or are you looking for the bullshit speculation that a lot of people in this thread seem to be so happy to provide?

I'm too afraid of death to commit suicide, but I do have these thoughts a lot. I was feeling increasingly suicidal when I started this topic, but I'm mostly interested in other people's thoughts about it.

[Myke]

elephants can paint

seriously that is the most amazing thing to me how can you not want to live in a world with painting elephants

[Steve Ballmer]

that was a most pristine shitpost. please tell me, where do you get you're inspiration?

[eCut]

that was a most pristine shitpost. please tell me, where do you get you're inspiration?

Please tell me, why do you think it's okay to insult someone in serious discussions? Whether you agree with it or not, keep your snide remarks to yourself. Don't do it again.

If you want to have silly off-topic conversations, then do so via pm.

Edited July 4, 2013 by eCut

[eclipse]

I'm too afraid of death to commit suicide, but I do have these thoughts a lot. I was feeling increasingly suicidal when I started this topic, but I'm mostly interested in other people's thoughts about it.

I hope the answers have pushed you towards the "LIVE!" side. Even if I do find out what's wrong with me, I still have a lot of unanswered questions, and things to do. There's too much for me to live for, even if my contributions in the grand scheme of things are trivial. These things matter to ME.

[Raven]

My school and social life was absolute shit between the ages of 12 and 16. I would go to school, do stuff there, come home and play video games or go to the gym. The reason was essentially bullying. It was heavy the first couple of years, but then it was slowly laid off as people got bored, and came to a complete end when people had the opportunity to leave school at 16. I kept myself occupied throughout those four years through mainly playing video games. I was stupidly good at SSB Melee, Sonic Adventure 2, Burnout 3 and Revenge, amongst other games, for this reason. It worked well to keep the suicidal thoughts at bay, and kept me entertained when everything else was shitty.

I'd think about what would happen should I kill myself, and I thought about my family. When I was 11, I had a cousin die of a cot death at 4 months of age. My Grandmother was wrecked by this for a long time. I thought that if I died, my Grandmother might do something stupid too after already losing one Grandchild, so I never would go through with doing such a thing to her. That would indeed be selfish and inconsiderate.

I stayed on in school for 3 years until I was 19. During this time, I'd gotten a girlfriend in the year below whom I'd really loved, and lost her within 17 months. During this relationship, my Great-Grandfather (my Grandmother's father) had died to pneumonia brought on from the dust in his lungs from working in coal mines most of his life. He was like my father figure and he treated me like his son. The girlfriend helped me a lot to get through this. I was doing well in my subjects for the most part, but after this breakup, shit just went downhill. During the nights I would spend a refreshing lonely hour walking to the Tesco's in town, pick up some beers, and walk back home. I would then drink most/all my beers while playing games and posting on SF all night, going to sleep at like 5/6am, then sleeping in to the afternoon and missing school. Wake up, play some more games, maybe go to the gym if I felt like it, post more on SF until I went to Tesco's again, rinse and repeat.

My attendance by the end of my last year of Sixth Form (high school to you Americans) was between 40 and 50%. I was lucky to apply for the Foundation course of the Police Sciences degree because they accepted me despite my shitty final grades. I then started university, and those four years were the best time I've ever had in my life. They were exactly what I was waiting for, the chance to get away from my shithole hometown, get some independence, and some new friends and relationships. The alcohol stayed for the most part, however it was socially acceptable, and almost expected, to be an alcoholic university student.

Not sure if this helps others in any way, but I believe there is a silver lining to every dark cloud. You just have to wait for it. It's worth it.

So yeah, during my first seven or so months on this forum, I was a depressed alcoholic failing school. The people I'd met and the friends I'd made here during that time helped me more than they could even imagine.

Edited July 4, 2013 by Raven

[MacLovin]

Personally, life's always interesting. I've always gotten into things that seem crazy.

[Rapier]

"man life is so complicated and exhausting and I just want to die- oh hey look they built a robot with enough fine motor control to throw and catch an egg"

Basically, it's like this. Is life hard? Yes, it can be hard. Is the world cruel? Yes, it can be cruel. But seeing the world in a black and white view is dumb, to say the least. There are good things in the world that I like and people that I love. No way in hell that I'm giving up on living. Life is worth fighting for imo, even if you have a pretty crappy one at the moment.

[Vashiane]

Some days, the only thing that stops me is my family. I mean, they can go somewhere, just out on the town or whatever, all of them, and the gun is right there. It's in my father's closet. Loaded. I can just... take it.

But I step into that closet and wrap my hand around the handle and I just can't do it, because there are people who actually care enough about me to want me to live, even if they have funny ways of showing it. That's family for you, you'll rarely find another person who will love you unconditionally like they do.

And she's an odd bird and she doesn't know what the hell listening is, but my mother couldn't take losing me too. I can't... do that to her.

So, yeah. That's my answer for now, until I find a better one. I'm trying. There's a multitude of reasons out there, and one day, I'll hate the idea of committing suicide again like I used to.