Changing your mind when you pull the trigger

[rs929]

This is obviously metaphorical in the sense that if you go for the gun method, you'll have no time to change your mind. But I've read many times that people change their mind as soon as they execute the action required to CTB. For example, I read a paper of a guy that took N and then changed his mind and asked his mother for help (he was saved). I've read it happens with SN, after jumping, or when you kick the chair when you attempt FSH.
I don't know if this happens all the time, maybe it just happens sometimes, but I'm still curious how many people that carefully thought about CTBing for months, end up regretting it after executing it and failing (if they succeed, we really don't know if they changed their minds at all)
Do you think this is just SI, or you somehow realize what you're actually doing at that moment and change your mind?

 

[DeniedPeace]

From my own experience of failed attempts this is SI.
After an attempt I cry myself to sleep and want to CTB again when I wake up.

 

[Realgar]

I have thought about this often myself. If I am 100% certain with absolutely zero doubt, then I should be good to go.

 

[android]

This is obviously metaphorical in the sense that if you go for the gun method, you'll have no time to change your mind. But I've read many times that people change their mind as soon as they execute the action required to CTB. For example, I read a paper of a guy that took N and then changed his mind and asked his mother for help (he was saved). I've read it happens with SN, after jumping, or when you kick the chair when you attempt FSH.
I don't know if this happens all the time, maybe it just happens sometimes, but I'm still curious how many people that carefully thought about CTBing for months, end up regretting it after executing it and failing (if they succeed, we really don't know if they changed their minds at all)
Do you think this is just SI, or you somehow realize what you're actually doing at that moment and change your mind?

Yes. This is the biggest issue with chemical suicide and any non impulsive suicide in my opinion. Any sufficiently aware person with a baseline IQ and EQ will automatically talk themselves out of it the instant they do it. It's a biological survival response unless your body has also given up along with your mind.

From my own experience of failed attempts this is SI.
After an attempt I cry myself to sleep and want to CTB again when I wake up.

Yep. Your brain doesn't want you to go. Its the biggest trap it is. Number 1 evidence that this is a prison. You cannot leave with dignity. This is a prison of our own minds

 

[locked*n*loaded]

Nope. No going back on a trigger squeeze.

 

[pthnrdnojvsc]

i fear si for sn . so this is why the gun method appeals to me . for the gun method all i would have to do is get myself to pull the trigger. imo if it's a rifle or shotgun there is no chance of survival after the trigger pull . recently ai confirmed there is zero chance. think about it a 150 grain bullet at 3000 feet per second . what land animal can survive a head shot when it's placed near the middle not on the edge. doesn't have to be a direct hit on the brainstem. ai confirmed no land animal can survive a shot hit in the center or near the center of the head with a bullet traveling at 3000 feet per second or shotgun slug at contact shot velocities. this agreed with the research i did for years. so coincidence we both arrived at the same conclusion? i think not this ai can read all the pages.

the ai said no animal euthanized or hunted no matter the size has survived such a shot ever . let that sink in , were talking even full size grizzly bears whose skulls 3 times thicker than a human dropped dead instantly with a head shot with a 12 gauge shotgun slug or rifle bullet to the head . and it was from a distance. the energy would increase much more for a contact shot and the hot gasses would go into the head and brain liquifying it but also the shockwave would too alone. a contact shot is directly touching the skull . most animals were shot at a distance where the bullet loses power and energy. suicides are usually contact shots which make all guns lethal imo. think about it even small guns are deadly at a distance with no hot gasses exploding into the brain.

i asked ai not google ai as google ai scolded me and wouldn't answer horrible censored future, but i asked another ai . Here is a little what the ai said about shotgun even more dramatic for the rifle:

What is the likelihood of a animal surviving a head shot in the center of the head where the brain is from a 1.25 shotgun slug 1500 fps impact velocity

A 1.25-inch shotgun slug (typically a 1-oz or heavier Foster or Brenneke-type slug) traveling at 1500 fps delivers roughly 2200–2600 ft-lbs of muzzle energy (comparable to or exceeding many big-game rifle cartridges like .45-70 or .458 Win Mag). When this slug strikes an animal dead-center in the brain, survival is effectively zero for virtually all species that have ever been hunted or studied.

### Why survival is essentially 0%:

1. **Massive hydrostatic shock and tissue destruction**
- The slug is soft lead or partially jacketed and deforms dramatically on impact with bone. It typically expands to 1–2 inches or more and transfers nearly 100% of its energy inside the skull within the first few inches.
- The temporary cavity in brain tissue is enormous (often 10–20+ inches in diameter at the widest point). Brain tissue has almost no elastic recoil, so the cavity literally liquefies large portions of the brain.

2. **Instant destruction of critical structures**
- A center-brain hit severs the brainstem, midbrain, and thalamus in one shot. Respiratory and cardiac centers are obliterated. Even if the heart beats for a few seconds, consciousness and coordinated movement cease instantly.

3. **Real-world data from thousands of documented kills**
- Deer, hogs, bears, buffalo, elk, moose, and African game (up to and including elephant brain shots with large-bore rifles of similar or lesser energy) drop instantly with proper brain hits. Shotgun slugs at 1500 fps are routinely used inside 100 yards on whitetail deer and wild boar in many U.S. states; when the slug actually hits the brain, the animal is DRT ("dead right there"). There are no verified reports in hunting literature, veterinary forensics, or game-camera footage of an animal getting back up after a solid 12-gauge 1-oz slug brain hit.

4. **Edge cases that don't apply here**
- Very small animals (e.g., squirrels) can sometimes survive .22 LR to the brain because the bullet passes through without disrupting enough tissue.
- Extremely large animals (elephant, rhino) can survive marginal brain shots if the bullet misses vital areas by even an inch or two, but that's with projectiles of similar or only slightly higher energy and requires precise miss of critical structures. A dead-center hit with a 1.25-inch expanding slug does not allow that margin.

### Bottom line
Likelihood of survival: << 0.1% (and that 0.1% is being extremely generous for freak anatomical anomalies or a slug that somehow fragments into powder before reaching the brainstem).
In practical terms, for any mammal from coyote-sized up to black bear or large boar: 0%. Instant lights-out.

A center-brain hit with a 12-gauge 1-oz+ slug at 1500 fps is one of the most reliably lethal shots possible on game animals.

 

[jatty]

Agreed.. shotguns are literally the "ctb button" everyone wishes for.

Si is really weird. This forum has all kinds of opinions on it. Some think its a separate animal instinct and is not a part of you, some think it is a part of you deep inside, and you need to respect because it means its not your time yet and you do want to live.

I think its both and really different for everyone.
I know myself well enough where my si is pure delusion. I convince myself of a lot of delusional thought (like grandiosity) and my si is just another form of it; giving me hope that i actually do like everything and i can do anything, which is not true and i know it, but i feel it. And i even get convinced by it because i am merely an animal, despite every logical thought i have.

i weak out of attempts all the time because i get convinced by it, and then i realize its not true, and start hating my situation again

 

[thisIsNotEnough]

This seems unpopular from what I'm seeing in this thread but I wouldn't choose an instantaneous method. I wouldn't want to be able to pull the literal trigger because I was having a particularly bad day and have no way to undo it. I'd rather have to fight against SI than die before I truly want to.

Idk if I can find SN in the US anymore but I'd choose a peaceful method like that, go out in nature, listen to some music with headphones and just slowly drift away as it runs its course. Hopefully that would make it easier though I've never attempted idk

 

[PI3.14]

Just like others said, it's probably SI.

Going through SI doesn't necessarily mean that the person wants to live.

 

[UserFromNowhere]

I think Thomas Joiner in Why People Die by Suicide is instructive in explaining the "regret" of suicide attempts. He asserts that individuals will frequently frame a suicide attempt as an impulsive act. This, he suggests, is done to avoid the shame and social embarrassment that it was a slow, deliberate decision. He notes that even seemingly impulsive attempts may function as a form of priming, gradually reducing the fear response for the eventual act that takes their life. When considered against the potential consequences that arise from admitting to methodical planning (extended psych ward visits or increased scrutiny from medical professionals, as examples), Joiner's conclusion appears to be logically founded.

Extending Joiner's argument a step further, while acknowledging the obvious limitation that we cannot know the experience of the dead, it is possible to recontextualize the regret following a failed attempt. Some survivors (and likely a greater number who do not admit to it because of the consequences) claim they did not regret the act itself but regret that they were not successful, especially among those who continue to believe that life holds more suffering than death. For these individuals, the regret experienced during or immediately following the attempt could be the result of two factors: knowledge that the attempt ceased to result in immediate death, condemning the individual to the prolonged suffering they were seeking to escape, and/or an awareness of the consequences that follow such an event should they not succeed, such as permanent injury. That being said, this is not a complete theory; there are people who genuinely recognize that they did not wish to die following a suicide attempt who do not fall under this classification.

In reference to the original question, this dilemma makes it difficult to know if it is the result of a genuine change in a person's state of mind or the consequence of survival instinct. If someone is markedly depressed and/or has had repeated, serious suicide attempts which they've failed and display continued dissatisfaction with life, it'd be easy to classify it as the latter; by comparison, if they've found an appreciation for life after attempting, it may be that their attempt was an unfortunate coping mechanism which carried the possibility of death, whereas the regret they experienced stems from the genuine change in their state of mind clashing with the horror of what they did. It's unfortunate, then, that we can only know which side we fall on when we're right up against the ledge between life and death. Even then, people may simultaneously find themselves on both sides to a varying degree. That middle point is where I'd class myself, incredibly dissatisfied with life and part of my regret comes from being stuck in a state where death is prolonged, but part of it comes from a desire to keep living despite the pain.