ShadowOfASelf
Member
- Feb 10, 2026
- 58
I've been thinking about this a lot, because I want to CTB due to a chronic health condition that's made my life intolerable (to me, and given that I'm the only one who has to live it, it doesn't matter if other people think the condition is not intolerable). I've been miserable every day for a year now and all I think of is just wanting an end to the suffering. When my mom saw how much I was suffering (and that I had already been considering it, to the point I was voluntarily admitted to a psych ward), she said she would support me in trying to get medically assisted suicide. That calmed me down a lot, and I found it was easier to get through each day with the thought that I might have an end in sight if things never got miraculously better.
And then we tried, but they don't consider me a priority and I think I screwed up the phone call because I didn't stress how much pain and suffering I was in because they sounded like they were understanding people (I suck at reading people and I'm way too naive about bureaucracy and strangers sometimes ): ) and now that it sounds like it's off the table, at least any time soon, I would need my doctor's approval and stuff like that because my government isn't going to help me find doctors to approve due to, again, me not being seen as a priority, I'm back to looking into methods to CTB ASAP, ODs, hanging, stuff that I'm sure not just my family and friends, but society in general would not want me to do or to deal with. And these are all like not great options because they're unreliable or will just land me in a psych ward where things get worse. Or I could jump and probably traumatize my family and everybody else, but I guess that wouldn't matter since I'd be gone.
My mom is currently looking into Switzerland, but it's just... so much more... I'm already enduring my physical health issues and then the mental and emotional toll it's taken, that all of what made my life enjoyable has been robbed from me, and just the constant pointless doctors appointments and scans that are unhelpful or unrevealing. And just the thought of even MORE interviews and assessments and stress to get to Switzerland if I even get approved. Why do all that, when I can just jump and not deal with any of it?
And that's where I think all the opposition to safe, accessible end of life for anybody who wants it don't understand. Having that option HELPS for a lot of people, it takes the obsessive thinking out of the equation because you don't need to think about how you're going to end your pain, how you're going to keep people from finding you until it's too late, or the constant fear and anxiety of being found out, the ostracization from friends that you want to end it which just adds to more loneliness. When I said my family was looking into assisted suicide a lot of my friends basically freaked at me and even though it would be safe and legal they basically just stopped wanting to talk to me. So that just makes me feel like "what's the point, why not end it now?"
I GET the eugenics arguments, I get the "not solving societal problems instead" argument, I get all that, but the truth is there are people who are suffering and people who do want an end to their existence and ironically it makes it easier for them to live another day, or to stop thinking about suicide, or to not have their mental health degrade more if it were more easily accessible and acceptable socially. I could live out my last few months knowing that this suffering isn't forever or whenever I get "lucky" enough that either an attempt or an accident kills me, I could be surrounded by friends and loved ones. The thought of knowing I have an option makes it easier to go on.
Even now, I have a couple options available to me, they're not GREAT options and there's a not unlikely chance I could survive them but I think I can do them at will when I want to and that's helped me a lot. I don't feel trapped. I mean it sucks that my family will find out after the fact, but it makes it a little easier to live another day knowing that I could at least attempt an exit the next day if it's too bad.
But don't take my word for it:
There's actually a Toronto Star article about MAID which says similarly:
When you know you can go whenever you want on your own terms, then you don't feel like you necessarily have to every day, you can weigh it day by day, "do I feel bad enough I want to end it now, or is there enough in my life and the world right now to experience another day on it?" When you don't have that choice, when you feel trapped, when you feel society has imprisoned you in your life/body/mind, then all you want to do is escape, like any other prisoner.
Choice makes such a huge difference to the human psyche.
Does anybody else feel this way too? Would the option to an accessible, guaranteed, and safe death make it easier on you to keep going knowing you could take it at any moment? For those who have exit plans that they could do at any time, does it help you get by day by day knowing that you can choose when to catch the bus?
And then we tried, but they don't consider me a priority and I think I screwed up the phone call because I didn't stress how much pain and suffering I was in because they sounded like they were understanding people (I suck at reading people and I'm way too naive about bureaucracy and strangers sometimes ): ) and now that it sounds like it's off the table, at least any time soon, I would need my doctor's approval and stuff like that because my government isn't going to help me find doctors to approve due to, again, me not being seen as a priority, I'm back to looking into methods to CTB ASAP, ODs, hanging, stuff that I'm sure not just my family and friends, but society in general would not want me to do or to deal with. And these are all like not great options because they're unreliable or will just land me in a psych ward where things get worse. Or I could jump and probably traumatize my family and everybody else, but I guess that wouldn't matter since I'd be gone.
My mom is currently looking into Switzerland, but it's just... so much more... I'm already enduring my physical health issues and then the mental and emotional toll it's taken, that all of what made my life enjoyable has been robbed from me, and just the constant pointless doctors appointments and scans that are unhelpful or unrevealing. And just the thought of even MORE interviews and assessments and stress to get to Switzerland if I even get approved. Why do all that, when I can just jump and not deal with any of it?
And that's where I think all the opposition to safe, accessible end of life for anybody who wants it don't understand. Having that option HELPS for a lot of people, it takes the obsessive thinking out of the equation because you don't need to think about how you're going to end your pain, how you're going to keep people from finding you until it's too late, or the constant fear and anxiety of being found out, the ostracization from friends that you want to end it which just adds to more loneliness. When I said my family was looking into assisted suicide a lot of my friends basically freaked at me and even though it would be safe and legal they basically just stopped wanting to talk to me. So that just makes me feel like "what's the point, why not end it now?"
I GET the eugenics arguments, I get the "not solving societal problems instead" argument, I get all that, but the truth is there are people who are suffering and people who do want an end to their existence and ironically it makes it easier for them to live another day, or to stop thinking about suicide, or to not have their mental health degrade more if it were more easily accessible and acceptable socially. I could live out my last few months knowing that this suffering isn't forever or whenever I get "lucky" enough that either an attempt or an accident kills me, I could be surrounded by friends and loved ones. The thought of knowing I have an option makes it easier to go on.
Even now, I have a couple options available to me, they're not GREAT options and there's a not unlikely chance I could survive them but I think I can do them at will when I want to and that's helped me a lot. I don't feel trapped. I mean it sucks that my family will find out after the fact, but it makes it a little easier to live another day knowing that I could at least attempt an exit the next day if it's too bad.
But don't take my word for it:
There's actually a Toronto Star article about MAID which says similarly:
When you know you can go whenever you want on your own terms, then you don't feel like you necessarily have to every day, you can weigh it day by day, "do I feel bad enough I want to end it now, or is there enough in my life and the world right now to experience another day on it?" When you don't have that choice, when you feel trapped, when you feel society has imprisoned you in your life/body/mind, then all you want to do is escape, like any other prisoner.
Choice makes such a huge difference to the human psyche.
Does anybody else feel this way too? Would the option to an accessible, guaranteed, and safe death make it easier on you to keep going knowing you could take it at any moment? For those who have exit plans that they could do at any time, does it help you get by day by day knowing that you can choose when to catch the bus?
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