Suicide as a Rational Option

[Lonewulf]

No.I believe it is rational for someone with a terminal illness who is experiencing great pain and has no hope of recovery. Suicide for the young and healthy who are clinically depressed isn't rational because your brain is just not working right

Can you prove this conclusively? That the conclusions that one arrives at must be indicative of mental illness?

 

[The Atheist]

No.I believe it is rational for someone with a terminal illness who is experiencing great pain and has no hope of recovery. Suicide for the young and healthy who are clinically depressed isn't rational because your brain is just not working right and although you feel despair, there is always room for improvement. Mental illness is not always caused by a chemical imbalance, it can be a learned viewpoint, it can be caused by horrendous things that have happened to you, but with therapy and medication these things can be overcome. At that point, you may be in terrible psychological pain but it can be alleviated, as opposed to physical pain the surity that your life is soon to end.

Suicide's an issue I've never had to face any part of, and I trust I never do.

Your posts are a testament to you and I hope anyone having suicidal thoughts listens to you. People like you make the internet a benefit to mankind.

Bloody outstanding stuff.

 

[Starthinker]

No.I believe it is rational for someone with a terminal illness who is experiencing great pain and has no hope of recovery. Suicide for the young and healthy who are clinically depressed isn't rational because your brain is just not working right and although you feel despair, there is always room for improvement. Mental illness is not always caused by a chemical imbalance, it can be a learned viewpoint, it can be caused by horrendous things that have happened to you, but with therapy and medication these things can be overcome. At that point, you may be in terrible psychological pain but it can be alleviated, as opposed to physical pain the surity that your life is soon to end.

The problem is, for someone going through tough times alone they don't see all those outs. They don't see counselling or medication. They don't see alliviation, thus suicide seems the logical choice. I think in many cases it takes an outside person to help someone see that. Like I said in my earlier post, someone truly at the end of the rope simply doesn't see the future or that there's help available.

Believe me, I know.

 

[Roma]

Like I said in my earlier post, someone truly at the end of the rope simply doesn't see the future ....

Or maybe they do see the future and make a rational choice for themselves that they don't want to continue living.

I can live with pain, others can't, who am I to tell them that they are irrational if they decide not to live in pain. Who am I to tell anyone what is a rational amount of suffering to live with. Not everything has a cure and pain cannot always be eliminated. My friend was neither in pain nor suffering from any physical ailment, she was suffering from mental illness , and that is a true Pandora's box of suffering.

 

[Tsukasa Buddha]

My little self humour is that I fail at life so bad that I fail at suicide.

Which is actually true, but besides the point.

When I was suicidal, it was because of emotional distress, but the trigger was a determined, hopeless future. Obviously, that future didn't turn out, but at those times it seemed like those nightmare scenarios are what will happen, not just what is one possibility out of many. For me, it relates to viewing the past as a mirror for the future, which is obviously untrue.

But oddly, does anyone know Epicurus' proof about why we don't need to fear death? He argued that since after death we no longer exist to experience anything, there is nothing to worry about.

Except that is exactly what started my worrying. I remember it clearly, I independently thought of that while I was brushing my teeth one day before school. It really bothered me, and it made death and life seem like such a meaningless thing. Because that is how life will end, it is just so unfathomable, which gave Epicurus calmness and me anxiety.

I thought of it being a chemical imbalance, too. But it did little to ease anything.

Of course, now I don't feel that way. It took a lot of different medications and psychologists to get this way, but also help from others that made life seem less hopeless.

I wouldn't say that those ideas are gone or resolved, it is just that things seem so much better now that I don't ruminate over them.

Naturally, "better" is a relative term. But still.

One of my favourite ideas that I learned from therapy is "victim vs survivor" thinking. "Victim" is problem focused, and leaves one stuck, sad, and in the past. "Survivor" is solution focused, and leads to hopeful thoughts about the future.

Also, there are the "cognitive distortions" that deal with fallacious thinking that lead to such bad moods.

However, I will say that I have mixed feelings about the psychiatric help. For me, they promised so much that I got my expectations too high, which lead to another crash. Also, I don't like many doctors. Some practically live by the DSM-IV, and others are more "talk" focused. I found the best for me to be CBT and DBT skill focused.

Just my random two cents .

 

[Roboramma]

1) Pleasure. You enjoy life and wake up every day to squeeze the pleasure out of it like a big Orange.
This seems valid; if life is really fun for you, it does not have to mean anything for you to enjoy it.

Sure, but why is pleasure any different from anything else I may happen to value? Why do you consider pleasure worth living for but, for instance, learning (for it's own sake) not?

Personally I think that put place value on things myself. There may not be some absolute way to measure the value of a thing, but if I value it then, obviously, I value it.
Yes, I value pleasure, but I also happen to value other things. For instance, the happiness of those I care about.

2a) Emotional Responsibility. You have others who count on you emotionally and you don't want to hurt them.
This does not seem valid. If you are not happy and enjoying life, there is NO way you are helping others enjoy it. You cannot give what you do not have.

That's obviously false. I've known depressed people whose friendship I nevertheless valued.
Hell, if I were stranded on an island with someone, no matter how depressed they were I'd rather they stayed alive than leave me there completely alone.
I don't really understand how you came to the conclusion, "If you are not happy and enjoying live, there is NO way you are helping others enjoy it."
I'm sure I've read (and enjoyed) books by people who weren't happy when they wrote them, for instance.

2b) Financial Responsibility. You have kids or parents or others who are counting on you to support them.
This does not seem valid either. If you don't support them, someone else will. Money can't buy happiness, etc. If all you are good for is money... jeez, that is pathetic for both you and your dependents. (If you are happy then the question does not arise; you stay alive for that reason, not due to your financial responsibilities.)

If you don't support them, someone else will? Really?
Have you ever heard of orphans? I don't think foster care is the same as being raised by your natural parents.
Whatever options they have after you are gone (and they may sum to greater than nothing) are still fewer than they had when your support was also available.

If Y is positive, X+Y>X.

3) To leave a legacy. (Be remembered, accomplish something, etc.)
Please. This is monopoly money. Nothing counts when the game is over.

Nothing counts to who?
If I consider my legacy to be valuable, then it is valuable to me. On what basis do you decide what is and is not of value?

If you a

 

[Rairun]

Honestly, I don't know how some of you can say that suicide isn't a rational option except when you're terminally ill. There is nothing about suicide that makes it irrational. Suicide is just like any other action: it only becomes rational or irrational when you take the doer's values into consideration. You're just projecting your own values onto others. I admit you could say that suicide is good or bad according to your own morals, but irrational? I'm sorry, but irrationality presupposes people acting against their own interests--even if you think their actions are "wrong", that hardly means they are being irrational.

I'm not saying that people aren't often irrational when they try to commit suicide. If someone I was close to tried to kill themselves, I would stop them. I would talk to them, and I'd try to make sure they knew what they were doing. If we were close enough for me to know they were being irrational, I wouldn't let them try again. But if I realized that was what they really wanted, I'd let them go.

If it were a stranger, I don't think I would interfere. Maybe I would if they were clearly overly emotional, but that's about it. If it's clear that someone isn't killing themselves on a whim, stopping them is an extreme form of violation. It means that their body isn't their own. Even if it turns out to be a mistake, an irrational decision, people should have the right to make mistakes.

And I say this as a person who has never considered suicide. I love life, and it would take a lot for me to want to give it up. But I realize that people don't always feel the same things I feel. They don't want the same things I want. It's presumptuous to think otherwise. I'm very glad there are people out there who found help when they needed it, but that doesn't mean everyone who wants to commit suicide is the same.

 

[Starthinker]

Or maybe they do see the future and make a rational choice for themselves that they don't want to continue living.

I can live with pain, others can't, who am I to tell them that they are irrational if they decide not to live in pain. Who am I to tell anyone what is a rational amount of suffering to live with. Not everything has a cure and pain cannot always be eliminated. My friend was neither in pain nor suffering from any physical ailment, she was suffering from mental illness , and that is a true Pandora's box of suffering.

I would never tell someone how to feel. I've said that again and again. I also wasn't talking about the terminally ill. All I'm saying is someone under stress, depressed, feeling trapped and alone is not in the best position to be thinking about the happy times in the future they may miss or that there are actually people out there to help. To them, suicide seems like the logical way out. Like you said in your first line, they don't see a future and decide that, well, that's it. Game over. They don't think that, hey, I'm 22 and have my whole life ahead of me.

Just to clarify, my position is that a person who is suicidal is most likely to need another person the help them find the reasons to keep on going. Again, not talking about terminally ill or someone in physical pain. I don't have experience with that.

I was minutes away from death and already unconcious when a fluke saved me. I still believe that I should have died that day. Do I regret trying to take my life? No. Sometimes I still wish I would have succeeded, life isn't that great for me. Would I try it again? I don't know, but I have a support system now. People watch out for me. If not for this outside influence there were times I would have tried again. If you know someone who might be thinking about it just keep an eye on them. Be their friend. Don't tell them how to feel, but do try to help them feel a little better. That's where the cracks form and the light begins to shine in their life again. No two people contemplate suicide for the same reason, so there is no one answer, just be there for them. Sometimes just knowing that someone is thinking about you is enough to keep going.

Tradition holds that ghosts are around because they have unfinished business and I've never been able to shake the feeling that I'm just a ghost trying to find the reason why I'm still around. I encourage anyone who is thinking about taking their life to PM me, or anyone on this board, or talk to thier boss, or siblings, or even a priest or minister, or call a hot line. You're not alone and things are not as hopeless as it seems. If you can't see that, then seriously, that's when you need to talk to someone the most.

 

[Moochie]

<snip>


To suggest that killing yourself is the best, most "respectable" or kind option is incredibly insensitive. Suicide is a violation of rights. It doesn't just end with the death that person, it impacts everyone who that person was connected to, and can have devastating results on those closest.
'Dum spiro, spero.' It is never the 'rational option'.

In my own personal "religion," which I make up as I go along in life, it's occurred to me that since I didn't bring myself to life, why should I remove myself from life? The thought did occur to me once, as I've mentioned in another post that was made before I'd read the entire thread. The "reason" I didn't is because I realized that I had the power to change the circumstances that were making me have such thoughts. As soon as I was lawfully able to leave an emotionally draining and dysfunctional family, I did just that. Going out into the big wide world was scary for me as a 16-year-old, especially since I'd led a rather sheltered life (through no choice of my own), but doing so was the best decision I ever made.

ETA: There's a heap of excellent advice (and some not so excellent) in this thread. I would beg of anyone thinking of ending their life please, PLEASE, reconsider. Talk to someone here, or someone you feel comfortable around, and discuss it. Things can change. Life can be better. You can feel better.


M.

 

[Niggle]

I miss my mom so much, and it's so painful, I know I'd be a real dick to do that to my kids, my grandkids, and my husband, who all love me very much.

No, life isn't any fun anymore, and I have no hope, but damn it. I'm not a dick.

Please PM me if you need to talk. I have big shoulders and wear soft, absorbant T-shirts. I haven't been through what you have, but maybe something that's helped me can help you.

 

[Roma]

Okay this is not funny for me anymore,
I have a best friend whom I swear has lost more people in her life to murder except for someone living in a war zone.
I, on the other hand, have lost more people in my life to suicide than is anywhere near normal.
This afteroon I lost another person in my life, a 16 year-old girl who had everything to live for, bright, healthy, no apparent problems, just commited suicide. Her mother cannot explain it.
So now I'm just sick about the last post I wrote in this forum site.
This is nothing to joke about or philosophise about.
Niggle I wish to God that girl had known you and called you, we all have to make an extra effort to take suicide seriously and do everything in our power to help the people who are struggling to keep living.
No suicide is not rational.

 

[Roadtoad]

Good God, Roma. I'm so very sorry...

 

[Roma]

Good God, Roma. I'm so very sorry...

My friends and I are just dumbfounded, all we can say is that it's not fair,
over and over again, it's not fair.
We just can't understand why a girl with everything to live for committed suicide.
There was no warning, no anything!
It was like her walking down a bright, lovely tree lined avenue in a nice part of town and getting killed by a drive by shooter.
This isn't making any sense to any of us, it's just not fair.

 

[Roadtoad]

My friends and I are just dumbfounded, all we can say is that it's not fair,
over and over again, it's not fair.
We just can't understand why a girl with everything to live for committed suicide.
There was no warning, no anything!
It was like her walking down a bright, lovely tree lined avenue in a nice part of town and getting killed by a drive by shooter.
This isn't making any sense to any of us, it's just not fair.

Right now, my MiL is in a lockdown facility for threatening to kill herself. She's deliberately taken ODs of her prescription meds, but is furious that we've had her sent to this facility.

But what do you do? If you love the person, why would you allow them to harm themselves? Especially when they've done something that practically mandates action.

No, it's not fair. At what point does anyone have the right to declare they have NOTHING to live for? It may be your life, but you share it with others, and you really don't have the right to deprive others of the gifts and abilities you possess.

A sixteen year old? She hasn't even had the chance to try. I agree, this isn't right. I could only wish that she'd been willing to talk to someone. There's got to be a reason behind this.

I'm so sorry, Roma. I only wish there were something I could offer. I have nothing.

 

[Roma]

Roadtoad you have no idea how much you have helped just by writing that post above.

About two hours ago my 14 year-old daughter was put in handcuffs and arrested for assault with a weapon and uttering threats. She has a serious behaviour problem and a learning disability. She has been refusing to go to any appointments that have been set up for her to get help. The police have been to my house so many times that tonight they made the decision to take her in and charge her telling me that it would be the best way to get her help.
She's on a suicide watch, she tried to hang herself 3 times last year, I'm sure she's furious with me now too.
That 16 year-old girl hung herself yesterday at home in her own bedroom.
What are we supposed to do?
I am so weary, I came to the forum site because I remember reading posts from other people who are going through stuff just like this, it was a thread called "wow, am I down", but that was such a long time ago I can't find it, then I read your post Roadtoad, thank-you, I am pretty alone out here.

 

[Lonewulf]

Yeah, this is getting to the point where I wouldn't touch the discussion with a ten foot pole. Way too emotionally polarized for any comment to go forgiven here. Let me just say that anyone below the age of 18 is probably in no state of mind to be able to rationally kill themselves one way or the other, just simply given that it's hard to have a good level of perspective at that age (not even factoring chemical imbalance or the like into the equation).

But still, I feel the need to comment on the above:

No, it's not fair. At what point does anyone have the right to declare they have NOTHING to live for? It may be your life, but you share it with others, and you really don't have the right to deprive others of the gifts and abilities you possess.

I don't know why, but this kind of thing scares me. While I sort of can understand where you're coming from, it really seems to suggest that one should be forced to live against their will... in certain situations, I definitely don't agree with that (mercy killings come to mind), and in other situations (young, chronically depressed, bipolar, etc.) situations, I can definitely see where you're coming from...

but if it isn't the individual themself that makes the decision...

Well, one way or the other, the sound of it gives me an instinctive negative gut reaction. It's practically as if you are stating "You have no right to decide for yourself".

 

[Roadtoad]

LW: forgive me. I just got in this morning, and I'm headed out tonight.

There are limits and rational considerations. If you have terminal cancer, and you're suffering incredible pain day in, day out, I have no right to keep you from ending your suffering. That's simply inhuman.

But a child? Or even a healthy adult? How do you justify that?

I came home to discover my MiL is at it again; she's threatening suicide. It's beginning to emerge that what's going on is she's begging for attention. She wants everyone to be at her beck and call. As soon as she's called on it, and things get a little tough, she behaves like an adult. When we return to our lives, when we go to work and pay our bills, she starts up again. It's not that we ignore her, we simply have priorities. She gets visits on the weekends at her home, and she can call and talk to anyone she chooses just about any time. She's simply being narcissistic.

But, we can't be absolutely sure. And you cannot take the chance. If there's truly something wrong, it needs to be discovered, and dealt with.

I'm sorry, but when it comes to kids, there is NO alternative. The first time, you come in, all flags flying. You do what you can to get a child help.

I'm not saying this well; I've had little sleep, and I'm out again this evening. If I'm coming across harsh, that's not the intent. But, to my mind, there's a world of difference between my MiL and these girls.

 

[Erigena]

But here's the biggest point, life is strange and varies unexpectedly.

The Berlin wall came down, women got the vote, the slaves were freed. The world changes, and in a smaller way, the conditions of an individual life change, often very unexpectedly.

So say you are now getting no pleasure from your life. How do you measure how much pain it's reasonable to put up with on the chance that your situation could be different tomorrow.

Of course there are situations where it is vanishingly unlikely that current pain will abate, certain types of disease, etc. But overall, the fact that tomorrow could be an improvement, unless you can logically conclude that a meaningful improvement in a reasonable amount of time is completely impossible, there's no reason not to wait another day at least and see if things get better. After all, you don't lose out nearly as much by missing a day of not existing as you do in missing a possibly good day.

I agree with what you said about life changing unexpectedly and that if they don't stick it out, they will never know if their circumstances might have changed for the better. I think once a person reaches a point where suicide becomes an option, they aren't able to see that their situation could improve. They only see the unexpected changes that led them to consider suicide in the first place.

 

[Erigena]

I would never tell someone how to feel. I've said that again and again. I also wasn't talking about the terminally ill. All I'm saying is someone under stress, depressed, feeling trapped and alone is not in the best position to be thinking about the happy times in the future they may miss or that there are actually people out there to help. To them, suicide seems like the logical way out. Like you said in your first line, they don't see a future and decide that, well, that's it. Game over. They don't think that, hey, I'm 22 and have my whole life ahead of me.

Just to clarify, my position is that a person who is suicidal is most likely to need another person the help them find the reasons to keep on going. Again, not talking about terminally ill or someone in physical pain. I don't have experience with that.

I was minutes away from death and already unconcious when a fluke saved me. I still believe that I should have died that day. Do I regret trying to take my life? No. Sometimes I still wish I would have succeeded, life isn't that great for me. Would I try it again? I don't know, but I have a support system now. People watch out for me. If not for this outside influence there were times I would have tried again. If you know someone who might be thinking about it just keep an eye on them. Be their friend. Don't tell them how to feel, but do try to help them feel a little better. That's where the cracks form and the light begins to shine in their life again. No two people contemplate suicide for the same reason, so there is no one answer, just be there for them. Sometimes just knowing that someone is thinking about you is enough to keep going.

Tradition holds that ghosts are around because they have unfinished business and I've never been able to shake the feeling that I'm just a ghost trying to find the reason why I'm still around. I encourage anyone who is thinking about taking their life to PM me, or anyone on this board, or talk to thier boss, or siblings, or even a priest or minister, or call a hot line. You're not alone and things are not as hopeless as it seems. If you can't see that, then seriously, that's when you need to talk to someone the most.

I can't tell you what to do or how to feel, but even without knowing you, I'm sure that there is someone whose life would be ruined if you weren't in it.

 

[Roma]

Roadtoad you're not coming off as harsh at all.

My best friend has an eighty-seven year-old aunt that she has just placed in an assisted living center and that old woman behaves pretty much like your, MiL.
Things have improved quite a bit since that old woman was put on some anti-anxiety medication. My friend tells her that the medication is for her "chest condition".
Whatever works, at least it has helped with her.

Good luck.