1st Post

[papulin]

It's my first post, and I haven't written in a very long time, please forgive if I am inadvertently crossing etiquette boundaries. It is certainly unintentional.

I am in my 40s, and have struggled with committing suicide for many years. What I struggle with is whether this is an impulse or a kind of inappropriate self-pity I surrender myself to... as a way to make myself feel better. Whether it is really a narcissistic impulse or a rational, practical decision.

In many respects, I've had a blessed life. I went to a prestigious university, worked for very well regarded firms, married a beautiful and loving wife, and today I have two children who are just great. I always had great expectations for myself, and I did very well professionally up until about eight years ago.

I wrote a very long summary of what happened but I realize it was a rather public legal case and the details could be used to identify me. In summary, my professional life and consequently aspects of my personal life were destroyed eight years ago. I no longer have real professional prospects and without that I feel my life is over. Because 'achievement' had been such a driving force in my life, I find myself rather pitiful in that the person solely responsible for the obliteration of all sense of purpose in my life... is me.

I recall very clearly thinking, over the years, that my greatest fear is exactly what I've become - paralyzed by shame, embarrassment, an inability to explain my actions from eight years ago, and an overwhelming sense of despair washing over me that none of this is going to get any better.

Here's the problem, as I see it. There is really no permutation of paths forward where I won't continue to feel this way - and that is not a life worth living. And it pains me to say this, I love my wife and children very much, but it doesn't fill the large void within me which is my sadness and despair over having no professional prospects, and as such, no sense of purpose in life. Another backdrop to this is I've 'gambled' away the majority of our family's savings (a rather large amount I earned in my career through my twenties and early thirties). The one way I've tried to cope with anxiety, depression over the past several years has been trading, rather compulsively and unsuccessfully.

Perhaps it's all illogical. I've been to support groups, and my other fear is that I'm just being a glutton in self-pity which I am told is really the most selfish and narcissistic of emotional impulses. Do I really have the courage & determination to follow through? Or am I just wallowing in self-pity?

It takes a combination of determination & despair to commit suicide. I've been a passive 'member' of this community for years, when previously was on Reddit and previously was permitted on Google Groups. Am I just ... a coward?

I once felt that my family would be better off without me. My wife is charismatic and beautiful, I am sure she could remarry. And I feel, somehow, the short-term pain caused by my suicide is less than the long-term suffering from a father and spouse who is a failure. I have been a shadow of who I was and I have to believe that somehow affects everyone in my family in sublime ways. Wouldn't it be better to just rip the band-aid off?

 

[Iwantoknow]

Welcome,

It sounds like you are in a lot of pain.
I can relate to professional achievement being very important. My happiness and self-esteem is affected by how I do in my job to an unhealthy level.
I can just imagine how it feels being in situation you are describing, for me it sounds devastating and I am not surprised you been dealing with it with gambling and find yourself thinking about suicide.

Have you considered going to a therapist to talk about it?
Do you feel you can talk with your spouse about these things openly?

 

[papulin]

Welcome,

It sounds like you are in a lot of pain.
I can relate to professional achievement being very important. My happiness and self-esteem is affected by how I do in my job to an unhealthy level.
I can just imagine how it feels being in situation you are describing, for me it sounds devastating and I am not surprised you been dealing with it with gambling and find yourself thinking about suicide.

Have you considered going to a therapist to talk about it?
Do you feel you can talk with your spouse about these things openly?

Thank you for your reply. I don't know if it's pain, perhaps more a quiet desperation (to quote Thoreau). Despair. And it's just been there so long I can only vaguely remember what life was like before this.

I recall thinking very clearly, 7 years ago, that I had a foreshadowing of what lay before me: a perpetual overhang of shame, no opportunities, wasting my life & time in self-pity and remorse. And you know what? It has largely been that. It's terrible. And I don't want to continue to live like this.

In terms of seeing a therapist, I did see one for a brief period of time. I found it to be largely unhelpful, I also was prescribed Lexapro which didn't help me.
I find myself often perusing this site (as I did its predecessor on Reddit) to an unhelpful, perhaps unhealthy, degree.

My wife... she knows it has been rough. It has been rough for her being my spouse and it's certainly not the life I would've wanted for her, to have a spouse ... who is in many ways such a failure. But she's a positive person, tries to get me to focus on our daughters who are wonderful. One element she hasn't really had to worry about (yet) is our deteriorating financial situation (we largely live from savings from my earlier, successful career from my twenties-early thirties).

Sometimes I wish for an impulse so overpowering that I just go to the top of our building (it's a 10 story condo building) and jump off. And I worry, would I regret it at the last moment? But what would life be like otherwise?

At my age, in my forties, I know (and/or knew) a handful of folks who'd taken their own lives. One in high school (he was bullied, I really wish he could've looked past high school which is a momentary blip in life), one from college (he was depressed), a former co-worker or two (who knows what happened).

In a different thread on this site, someone who works in mental health wrote that he hears the stories of some of the folks who've attempted suicide and thinks "I'd want to commit suicide too were I in your shoes". I wonder what he/she would think of my circumstances.

 

[AutoTap]

Welcome to the community

 

[bov]

Welcome. You've been very vague about your circumstances so it's hard to say.

 

[hoping to lose hope]

OP it seems that the path you always walked has been shattered and instead of changing your perspective by taking a different path you are still walking along the rocky road causing you pain.
Suicide is up to you but if the cause of your wanting to die is something you can change by acquiring a new view on the world and what life should be then I think it is worth attempting to do so.
Let go of who you were and reinvent yourself.
You can no longer value the things you did in life but there is no reason you cannot find new things to value.

Welcome. You've been very vague about your circumstances so it's hard to say.

The details do not matter we understand the gist of it.

 

[Ghost2211]

Welcome to the group. I'm a parent as well. May I ask how old your girls are?

 

[AutoTap]

I'm quoting, "In a different thread on this site, someone who works in mental health wrote that he hears the stories of some of the folks who've attempted suicide and thinks "I'd want to commit suicide too were I in your shoes". I wonder what he/she would think of my circumstances"

I think it's because there are some people who have gone through a lot of abuse, have a lot of disorders, and those who can't be helped. I hope this helped

 

[sadworld]

Welcome to SS! I hope you enjoy your stay!

 

[papulin]

Thank you for the engagement. It is helping a lot, b/c it has been hard for me to lean on friends. I feel after all these years, I am becoming a burden to them.

@bov "You've been very vague about your circumstances so it's hard to say." I was involved in a very public legal situation where I became, effectively, a patsy. My own defense attorneys manipulated me for their own career advancement. And amazingly, years later, I had the case thrown out, but the damage is there nonetheless. "The plight of the accused", in a sense.

@RoseyBird My daughters are 5 and 8. They, and my wife, are really wonderful. Of course what pains me the most is the idea that if I committed suicide it would scar them. But then again, I know my wife could meet someone new who might be a great father to them. I am sometimes a good father, sometimes I think I take out my own sense of failure, frustration, disappointment out on my family through outbursts, etc. And then I feel terrible about it, & resume ideation. It has been awful. Funny thing, a few years ago, I was almost 'determined' to commit suicide; I wrote letters to my daughters for when they were older, made some preparations. It has been many years of scraping along bottom. I don't think bottoms are 'V-shaped'. For me, it has been just scraping for so long. It's a life I feel is not worth living.

@hoping to lose hope "instead of changing your perspective by taking a different path you are still walking along the rocky road causing you pain". This is what everyone says. But I am who I am. I worked hard, went to a top university, had a blessed career, was consistently the youngest amongst my colleagues (in a good way, promoted early and often). And the absence of that... is more a sense of a loss of purpose. It has left me bitter, empty, a shadow of my former self.

I'm sorry for digressing. I know many have it far worse off than me. And yet I can't help who I am. And believe me, I've tried! It's been many years like this.
When I started perusing these threads everything was about N. It is interesting to me the SN method that has been discussed. I do wonder what the best way to do it is so that my friends and family can 'save face' and not have it reported as suicide.

 

[hoping to lose hope]

Look Op at the end of the day you are an adult and this whole life thing we never really signed up for but keep getting mailed a subscription to every second- we can just toss it out if we want.
(⌒_⌒;) Good luck deciding whatever.

 

[Ghost2211]

I respect and understand your choice. I can also empathize and understand the struggle as a parent. I do feel a need to point out you're not expendable as you seem to feel you are. Your wife won't just move on like you didn't exist and your little ones won't just take a new daddy. I'm not saying don't do it, but rather come to terms with that you are valuable in the eyes of others.

 

[bov]

if

probably not a question of "if" unfortunately :/

 

[LigottiFan19]

My daughters are 5 and 8.

You have created hostages. When you do that, you forfeit a great deal of your autonomy.

Find coping mechanisms, manage your despair, do not betray those innocent people who did not ask to be here. "Better off without me" isn't for you to
decide. Many terrible things befall children who lose a parent. Do not make your last act one that violates children.

Having said that, your focus needs to be sustaining yourself, and I'd be happy to talk about that with you.

 

[HadEnough1974]

It's my first post, and I haven't written in a very long time, please forgive if I am inadvertently crossing etiquette boundaries. It is certainly unintentional.

I am in my 40s, and have struggled with committing suicide for many years. What I struggle with is whether this is an impulse or a kind of inappropriate self-pity I surrender myself to... as a way to make myself feel better. Whether it is really a narcissistic impulse or a rational, practical decision.

In many respects, I've had a blessed life. I went to a prestigious university, worked for very well regarded firms, married a beautiful and loving wife, and today I have two children who are just great. I always had great expectations for myself, and I did very well professionally up until about eight years ago.

I wrote a very long summary of what happened but I realize it was a rather public legal case and the details could be used to identify me. In summary, my professional life and consequently aspects of my personal life were destroyed eight years ago. I no longer have real professional prospects and without that I feel my life is over. Because 'achievement' had been such a driving force in my life, I find myself rather pitiful in that the person solely responsible for the obliteration of all sense of purpose in my life... is me.

I recall very clearly thinking, over the years, that my greatest fear is exactly what I've become - paralyzed by shame, embarrassment, an inability to explain my actions from eight years ago, and an overwhelming sense of despair washing over me that none of this is going to get any better.

Here's the problem, as I see it. There is really no permutation of paths forward where I won't continue to feel this way - and that is not a life worth living. And it pains me to say this, I love my wife and children very much, but it doesn't fill the large void within me which is my sadness and despair over having no professional prospects, and as such, no sense of purpose in life. Another backdrop to this is I've 'gambled' away the majority of our family's savings (a rather large amount I earned in my career through my twenties and early thirties). The one way I've tried to cope with anxiety, depression over the past several years has been trading, rather compulsively and unsuccessfully.

Perhaps it's all illogical. I've been to support groups, and my other fear is that I'm just being a glutton in self-pity which I am told is really the most selfish and narcissistic of emotional impulses. Do I really have the courage & determination to follow through? Or am I just wallowing in self-pity?

It takes a combination of determination & despair to commit suicide. I've been a passive 'member' of this community for years, when previously was on Reddit and previously was permitted on Google Groups. Am I just ... a coward?

I once felt that my family would be better off without me. My wife is charismatic and beautiful, I am sure she could remarry. And I feel, somehow, the short-term pain caused by my suicide is less than the long-term suffering from a father and spouse who is a failure. I have been a shadow of who I was and I have to believe that somehow affects everyone in my family in sublime ways. Wouldn't it be better to just rip the band-aid off?

Welcome to ss. We're in the same boat. I can relate to much of what you've written. I'll respond in detail tomorrow. I've just taken my sleeping pills.

 

[awfullife]

OP I'm in a extremely similar situation re: high flying career in 20s and 30s. Now it's all over. Only difference is my wife divorced me and my financial failures caused me to lose custody of kids. (Pay your 6k month child support/ alimony, you must have at least one bedroom for each kid, homeless dads cant have custody! )

Hang in there buddy. That's all we can do. I will never have another Thanksgiving or Christmas with my kids.

 

[Donk]

Welcome OPs. I'm in my 40s as well and married (no kids). You sound like you were very career oriented and you found joy in your success. I'm sorry you've lost the one thing that you leaned on to have a fulfilling life. Although I'm sure you find joy in being a husband and father. As far as trading is the concern, it's a suckers game. 80% of traders lose all their capital in the first month of trading. You are also competing with sophisticated algo bots. it's almost impossible for retail traders to have a positive ROI day trading. Anyways, I can relate to your pain and suffering. feel free to PM me if you need to talk to someone. Take care.

 

[Reach]

In a different thread on this site, someone who works in mental health wrote that he hears the stories of some of the folks who've attempted suicide and thinks "I'd want to commit suicide too were I in your shoes". I wonder what he/she would think of my circumstances.

For me this one a bit stupid to say. For example a multi millionaire might commit suicide which seems totally stupid for someone who's planning to commit suicide due to being poor as hell.

Saying something like, 'if I were you' is not something I'd do when it comes to suicide. Suicide is something extremely personal, more than anything.

Maybe someone would be extremely happy having kids and a beautiful wife like you do (many guys here are considering suicide because they can't find this in life).

 

[bov]

I don't think OP is stupid at all, but this logic feels a little pat: "my wife is beautiful therefore she'll find someone new and my kids will still have a dad and this whole imagined scenario would be better than if I, a failure, stuck around"

 

[papulin]

I don't think OP is stupid at all, but this logic feels a little pat: "my wife is beautiful therefore she'll find someone new and my kids will still have a dad and this whole imagined scenario would be better than if I, a failure, stuck around"

@bov @Reach. There have been a number of celebrities and business magnates who've committed suicide as a result of mental illness or some misfortune. It's very easy to rationalize the 'relativity' game, comparing one's situation to another.

I am always impressed by the courage of folks on this site who have the fortitude to follow through with their plans. And I do worry for my wife and kids - I think humans as a whole are very resilient (though I, arguably, am not). And my feeling is short-term pain might be outweighed by a better long-term life for them vs. being saddled with the burden of a mercurial father who can't get over his own failures & mistakes.