Suicide in Family, Anyone?

[moondoggie]

My Ole Man shot himself in 1967,age 38. Me, I was 14. Because it was my rifle(22 cal) my Mother rarely spoke to me for the rest of her life. She drank herself to death and died 23 years later. The results of this catastrophic event was so devastating that I never married, have no family, few friends. And worst never knew love. And yet I still survive.

[goliath_91710]

Yeah. I feel like suicide is the most conceited thing anyone can do. My brother killed himself when he was nineteen; I was fourteen as well. It took him three tries. The first time was with a .22 rifle, but he was talked down. The second time he tried to OD on sleeping pills. Third time was a charm, with a shotgun while he was away at college. There are days when life seems unbearable to me, too. But then I think, what makes me so much better or weaker than anyone else that I can just give up, throw in the towel, poop out. There aren't other people, billions of others actually, who have it infinitely worse than I do? Plus, he never got to meet all of my nieces & nephews. I worry that there will be so many things I'll miss if I ever quit this miserable fucking excuse for an existence.

And all these beautiful trannies! Yeah, I'm gonna stick this one out, come Hell or high water.

[traLika]

A friend of mine has a tragic family - one of his brothers committed suicide and another recently died of alcohol poisoning.

[Nicole Dupre]

I know of a family of 6 brothers, and 3 committed suicide. Themost recent one killed himself when he was outed for liking shemale porn. True story.

[Jackal]

A relative of mine did but it was before I was born. He was apparently suffering as he was abused by a priest as a kid but nobody believe him (this was back in the 1960s) and that upset him very much. I've been hopeless and suicidal at times due to things like homelessness and violent encounters. Show some mercy and compassion for people who are parasuicidal or under mental distress. Encourage them to get help.

[maaarc]

found this on the web and thought I'd post it for those who might believe suicide is a character flaw or weakness. IMO this is a brain chemistry issue not a character issue.


Explaining Suicide


(N.B. This section is talking about suicide when linked with depression)

Quite simply, suicide comes when pain outweighs the coping methods to deal with pain. When a depressed person doesn't have the resources to deal with depression anymore that is when they'll often turn to suicide. Suicide also comes at the point where a person can no longer see any reason to live.

There are plenty of ignorant views about suicide and preconcieved ideas formed by people who have no experience or knowledge about suicide. The judgements made of suicidal people or people who have commited suicide are incredibly ignorant. To judge someone so harshly based on the immense suffering they go through and the fact they find it hard and painful enough to end their life is something I personally can't comprehend.

Read the descriptions of depression and try and understand what someone goes through to desire death so strongly as to actually commit suicide.

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Some people would argue that people who commit suicide are selfish. Selfishness is to do something for your benefit and your benefit only. Suicide, in the eye of the depressed person, is not for their benefit and their benefit only. Sometimes it is a mixture of helping themselves and helping others. Sometimes the main reason for suicide is to protect loved ones.

Depression will make a person truly believe that people they care about will be better off without them. Depression will provide a person with examples of ways they've harmed other people and had bad effects on other people's lives. Depression is such a powerful force that it will convince a person that suicide is the best answer, not necessarily for themselves but for the people they care about.

A part of them may argue, when thinking of suicide, that it would cause pain and suffering to their loved ones instead of helping. However, depression will turn this thought against the person, making them question themselves and making them feel that they're being selfish and arrogant to believe that anyone could miss or care about them. Also, while that voice of reason is there at the start, depressive thoughts grow stronger and stronger until they are the only thoughts. When someone gets to that point, the objection of "but it will cause so much pain" no longer exists in their head and the only things left all support the action of suicide.

However much pain suicide does indeed cause, it is very rare that a person who commits suicide intends to cause this pain. In the vast vast majority of cases they believe they will be helping the people they care about.

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Some people would argue that it is attention-seeking. This has never made sense to me. How exactly are they going to get any rewards of this attention when they're dead? Films can give the impression of this kind of suicide - but they are are films.

Also, you have to ask yourself what exactly is wrong with "attention-seeking" in this situation? For a depressed person I would advise that the best thing they can do is to seek attention to help them overcome the illness they are battling. If anyone is justified in wanting attention, someone suffering from depression is. Most of the people who judge suicide would say that sufferers of depression should get help instead of commiting suicide, in which case they are also reccomending they seek attention.

Most people with depression actually hide away from attention and will do everything they can to hide the fact that they have depression, partly for their own supposed benefit and partly because they don't want to burden others. Depression is anything but an attention-seeking illness when it generally consists of a person hiding their incredible suffering and therefore, in most cases, worsening it.

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Some people would argue that someone who commits suicide is weak. I'll agree that it's the easy way out. That's the whole point of suicide: taking the easy option of death rather than the hard option of life. But that doesn't necessarily make it weak. People take the easy options all the time.

It isn't a sign of weakness. It is not simply a matter of will-power. If someone were to drop bricks on your shoulders, however much willpower or strength you had, eventually you'd fall to the ground. Depression is like this and when it becomes overwhelming enough, suicide is the result.

Getting other illnesses isn't seen as weak. Dying from other illnesses isn't seen as weak. Suicide is not the result of weakness. Suicide is the result of an illness. There has in fact been research to show that depression cuts off the chemicals in your brain that go to the area where your basic instinct to survive is.

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People get judged by others for not having "good enough" reasons to commit suicide. The fact they have depression is the reason. Their illness is the reason. Just like cancer is the reason people with cancer die. Someone who commits suicide because of depression isn't capable of seeing that things may get better, that they will cause pain, that they can get rid of depression, that they're able to change and they are not capable of weighing up the logical reasons for and against suicide. In a scenario such as this, when truly believing all that a suicidal person does, it almost seems the logical thing to do.

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Of course, statistically, some people will be selfish, attention-seeking and/or have weak characters. But that is by no means a justification to immediatly judge all others who have considered or commited suicide.

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Even if we were to say that suicide was selfish, attention-seeking and weak this would be an attack on the act. It should not be an attack on the person. When depressed, a person is not themselves. It is depression controlling their emotions, controlling their thoughts, controlling their behaviour and controlling their actions. The majority of things they say and do will not reflect their true character.

Suicide is not the answer. It is a bad decision, causes pain and wastes a life that has potential to change for the better. It is a permenant answer to a temporary problem. I want to do all that I can to make sure people don't have to reach the point where they're deciding whether to end their life. But depression does this. Depression controls the mind and means that someone cannot think logically or rationally in this situation. You should not be judging or criticising the character of a person when it is an illness which totally overrides the character that has caused suicide.

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The fact is people are suicidal. People do commit suicide. Judging and criticising them does nothing; in fact it is detrimental and only suceeds in isolating people with depression, lowering their self-worth and pushing them towards suicide even more. Trust me: suicidal people very likely already believe they are weak and already hate themselves for their supposed selfishness and attention-seeking nature. Unsurprisingly, believing these things about themselves makes them more suicidal. So if you think that saying these things will shock a person into changing their mind, you're almost definitely wrong.

Suicide is a terrible thing. If you're truly opposed to it, you'll stop increasing the likelihood of it.


http://www.freewebs.com/understandingdepression/suicideselfharm.htm

[caitlintg1975]

I had a cousin who was a post op TG kill herself on Christmas Eve several years ago. Its too bad shes no longer around, theres so much we could have talked about.

[bulldog]

As someone walking this road himself right now, I know how every one of those people felt.......

[Odelay]

I met and entered into a LTR with a beautiful woman a few years after her brother and then her mother committed suicide. She often had thoughts of suicide too, but managed to find some real purpose in life and live on. I believe it's a tough situation for families. Moondoggie, if you're anywhere remotely close to Chicago, I'd swing by and have a beer with you sometime. I don't need much of a reason to make friends. It's what keeps me interested in living my own single, never married, childless life.

[moondoggie]

please seek help if your suicidal. There are many people who care and can give you support. No one has lived a harder life then my self and with help of others I've managed to go forward. Life is worth living just call for help.

[Femboyurge]

It's absurd that your mother blames you just because it was your gun. If he had deliberately killed himself in a car crash with your car, would she have blamed you then too? Of course not. If he didn't had had a gun he would have chosen another method but he would have done it.

[Prospero]

An Italian transexual I knew quite well - but had lost contact with - killed herself in London a couple of years ago. I gather she hanged herself.

[Prospero]

Oh - and the ease with which one can kill oneself with a gun makes it far easier to end it all. Take an overdose or whatever and you might be saved. A gun in the mouth...no way. Another reason to rethink the laws on gun ownership - whatever the constitution says.

[Jericho]

Oh - and the ease with which one can kill oneself with a gun makes it far easier to end it all. Take an overdose or whatever and you might be saved. A gun in the mouth...no way. Another reason to rethink the laws on gun ownership - whatever the constitution says.

Maybe we should ban tall buildings, too. :shrug

[danifan]

As someone currently struggling with these thoughts myself (to the point of being signed off work and under limited medical supervision), I can understand the pain for surviving friends and family...but unless youare or have suffered from these thoughts, you can never understand the sheer emotional duress that overrides the survival instinct. If I had a gun, I'd have been gone ages ago as that's the swiftest way out...as it is, it's a day to day ordeal at the moment...

[bassman2546]

found this on the web and thought I'd post it for those who might believe suicide is a character flaw or weakness. IMO this is a brain chemistry issue not a character issue.




http://www.freewebs.com/understandingdepression/suicideselfharm.htm

This is a great article. Thanks for posting it. People have to realize that suicide is not just killing yourself. It's the result of dealing with something unbearable, primarily depression. People don't ask for depression, it happens. It's chemical and, up until recent years, not many people had a clue how to deal with it, doctors included. People have to understand that having a bad day and depression are two different things. "I'm depressed today" only to be better tomorrow isn't the same as someone who is deeply depressed day in and day out to the point where they don't want to live. The first example will be fine the next day. The latter, that depends on treatment and being able to seek it with the help of loved ones as support.

To say that it's weak to kill yourself? I disagree with that as well. What is weak, is a person who goes through life accomplishing nothing because they're afraid to take risks and have the fear to succeed at something, however minimal. At the end of the day they look back and accomplish nothing and have affected their families members because they chose to be a loser. I challenge that same person to put a gun to his/her head and pull the trigger. Which one is the easy way out now, asshole?

My father put a gun to his head on March 25, 1987 and took his own life. I was barely out of my teens and was half/half suprised by it, along with devastated. While my father was going through his alcoholism and depression, I didn't know how to handle it. His verbal abuse caused me to leave the house every time he came home drunk. This was not the best approach, but like I said, not many people knew how to deal with such a situation, let alone a young man dealing with it. It caused some hard times after the fact, but I felt I grew much more, as a person, as a result.

On June 25, 2003, my uncle (my father's brother) did the exact same thing and took his own life. Another tough ordeal but it really drove the point home that depression (and he did suffer from it as well) is much more chemical and hereditary than people realize and fortunately today, it has become more treatable with medication and counselling. I think a lot of lives have been saved today as a result.

So for those who think they have suicide all figured out and that the victims are weak, gutless, selfish and arrogant, think again before you make such a statement and educate yourself rather than project ignorance. Hopefully you'll realize how arrogant and weak you were for not educating yourself on the subject and forcing upon others such ridiculous ignorance.

[Dino Velvet]

Not quite sure. A cousin of mine either committed suicide or she was so far gone she wasn't keeping track of her meds and OD'd. I don't push my aunt and let her tell her story about her own daughter. My cousin had a history of narcotics abuse and was also bi-polar. I hope she's found peace.

[shaustin]

Oh - and the ease with which one can kill oneself with a gun makes it far easier to end it all. Take an overdose or whatever and you might be saved. A gun in the mouth...no way. Another reason to rethink the laws on gun ownership - whatever the constitution says.

Don't be so sure of a gun in the mouth having a 100% death-rate. It depends on type, calibur, and how you position it. I actually know of two people to survive a gun in the mouth.

One was actually an attempted homocide with a pistol, a "pimp" put the gun in the girls mouth and pulled the trigger then walked away thinking she was dead. The bullet went through and out the back of her head between the jaw and spine, and she recovered though she has many medical problems now, if I remember correctly she has to be force fed charcoal or something regularly at the hospital because she can't eat food normally.

I also once met my buddy's brother-in-law's first wife briefly when she showed up at his house to drop something off. She was disfigured so I asked about it once she had left, found out she had many mental disorders that caused the split, then a year or two later she decided to put a shotgun in her mouth. Of course it was a 20-gauge with bird shot shells, so she ended up survivng and having her face mutilated, as well as quite a few painful pieces of lead still stuck in her head after a half dozen surgeries. The worst part was that her depression doubled or tripled and she would rarely leave her house let alone ever go anywhere in public, and after all that she has a crippling fear of trying to make an attempt on her life again. So now she sits in a dark room in a house without mirrors and just waits to die every day.

[bluesoul]

My Ole Man shot himself in 1967,age 38. Me, I was 14. Because it was my rifle(22 cal) my Mother rarely spoke to me for the rest of her life. She drank herself to death and died 23 years later. The results of this catastrophic event was so devastating that I never married, have no family, few friends. And worst never knew love. And yet I still survive.

nothing bad has happened in my family (unless you count the family members that have died of old age). i had a pretty good up bringing and my vacations were spent travelling to antwerp, turin and lyons. i still take these sojourns regularly, though i've also included ljubljana, kiev and basel.

between you and me, if you get the new chase gold card, you get great travel points that include vip lounges and priority boarding.