Discussion Have you ever stopped a suicide attempt?

[Your Own Ghost]

I've been on both sides of suicidal action. First when I was fifteen, but then when I was twenty-one…

I was dating this woman who shared many of the experiences that I had. She had been locked up in mental health, medicated out of her mind, engaged in self harm, etc. Back then we thought we could multiply negatives and create a positive out of the situation. We thought we would be able to recognize the signs in each other.

In the middle of the night she had cut a leather strap from an old horse saddle she kept around for the memories and tied one end to her bedpost and the other to her neck. She yelled, I don't know what, but it was enough to wake me up from the couch. I got up and couldn't find her. I double checked everywhere, and then I saw her fingertips on the bedroom window sill. When I looked over she let go.

She blacked out and started convulsing almost right away as I tried to pull her back up. I wasn't strong enough. I was screaming, her body was hitting the side of the apartment below, and the neighbor came out and held her up enough to take the pressure off. I somehow ended up on the ground and ran into his place to get a knife to cut her down. She came to almost as quickly, but crawled around on the ground making horrible gasping noises.

The paramedics who took her to the hospital told her to do it right next time because they didn't want to come back again - she had also tried to OD some months before we started dating and they busted her door down. In the hospital, her face and eyes were bruised. But oddly enough, she seemed like she was in good spirits. Meanwhile, the skin from my chest down past my stomach was bruised and scraped off from the window sill. I went and bawled like never before on the curb outside the emergency room.

Our relationship didn't last long after that. I visited her almost every day in mental health, but the warning signs were all over the place. Her suicide note she wrote that night didn't even mention me – she talked about her last boyfriend, her daughter she didn't have custody of, her situation, but not me. It wasn't about me. And I never really had any relationships since then – that may not be the sole reason, but that was the last time I ever felt comfortable with another person. People tell me I'm good looking, intelligent, and whatever, but the few times I did try I quickly got nervous. My sense of dread I usually carry around amplifies.


But this is worth thinking about, in my opinion. We belong to a pro-choice website, and I truly believe people should have the choice, but this is juxtaposed to the reality of finding someone you know ready to drop out of the window. I think few of us would stand by in that moment and say, "I respect your decision. Goodbye!" If they would, I would be wary of such a person in all circumstances. But something else kicks in. You don't even think. You scream. You plead. And no matter how little you may think others care about you, they will do the same for you.

Add this knowledge, this experience, to the myth of suicide being easy. When I finally go, it will be anything but easy.

What's your experience?

 

[Ssrejisser]

Wow, what a story. This must have been a powerful experience.

 

[Your Own Ghost]

Yeah, it definitely stuck with me. Even now… fourteen years later, I get upset writing about it. When I go past that apartment complex I have flashbacks.

But I did something similar to my mom when I was fifteen… took a bunch of pills and she found me collapsed over the side of the bed before I slipped into a coma. I always felt like I should apologize, but I always knew the day would come when I would try again. I wonder what kind of cruel or evil person that makes me – to know that pain but still accept the inevitability of my suicide anyway?

 

[seekingoblivion]

The paramedics who took her to the hospital told her to do it right next time because they didn't want to come back again

Wow. Just Wow.

 

[AnnihilatedAnna]

I wonder what kind of cruel or evil person that makes me – to know that pain but still accept the inevitability of my suicide anyway?

It doesn't make you cruel or evil. If you are in that much pain I think it is justified. It doesn't ever take the guilt away though. If there is one thing I've learned from everything it is that you should always do what's best for you. When I think about ctb I still think about my father because I'm going to leave him and that thought hurts like hell, and I think because I feel guilty and that I hurt over it, I'm not cruel or evil.

 

[seekingoblivion]

That's a hell of an experience you had there mate! Holy fuck! I had to take my cousin to the hospital but nothing as dramatic as your experience. I was 19. It was after we spent a weekend drinking and clubbing. On a Monday night. In the morning we parted ways cause I had to go to school and to meet my old man about a certain thing. He just went on drinking with friends. In the evening I got back to where we were staying and worked on dinner and he showed up about an hour after I did drunk off his head. He was saying some emotional stuff and talking about ending his life and I was trying to be supportive and caring as I've always been with him and it seemed like he was starting to calm down. I went to check on the food and then I heard my bedroom door close and lock and I got worried and went to check on him. He opened the door saying he's taken all my medication (I've been hypertensive for years) and it was like holy motherforking shirtballs. I started walking him to the car and when we got out he stood for a bit then fell to the ground. I got someone to help me lift him and put him on the back seat. I called my dad cause I didn't know what to do and where to take him and at that point I was starting to panic. We agreed to meet at the hospital we knew he was admitted to the last time he tried to kill himself. I called his mum but she was like I'm not gonna deal with that you deal with it which to this day garners a very strong WTF in my head. So I get to hospital and I find my dad and apparently his mum called to tell him that their hospital membership at that hospital was expired and that it would be too costly so we'd have to take him to a government run facility. Then my dad criticized me for apparently not being quick enough so he told me to drive his car and he'd drive my mum's car (that's the car with my cousin laying in it). So I followed him closely all the way and when we got there I rushed in to get somebody to help bring him in and they just told me to get a wheelchair so I got one and this man who worked with my dad before came to the car looking all worried (cause he thought I was bringing my dad to the hospital). He starts asking what happened and I tell him straight my cousin swallowed pills and proceed to ignore all follow up questions while I'm getting my cousin out and putting him in the wheelchair cause for fucks sake we've wasted a lot of time already. I take him in and leave my dad and his friend talking by the car. It was a ridiculous night. After my cousin was on IV and the whole process was started I went back outside to get my dad who was still talking to his friend. Man that night was just WTF for me all the way.

What happened to the lady in your story? Would you happen to know?

 

[Your Own Ghost]

What happened to the lady in your story? Would you happen to know?

There's this book by Chuck Palahniuk titled "Choke". It's been a while since I've read it, but the general plotline follows a protagonist who realizes that people's sense of empathy toward another human being changes when they think they have "saved" the person. He uses this to his advantage as he goes to restaurants and makes himself choke on food only to be saved by some random individual who then proceeds to check up on him, send him birthday cards, is interested in the things he does, etc.

The things the English language doesn't have words for.

Several years after I cut the makeshift noose from my girlfriend's neck, I contacted her on Facebook. She was doing alright – as far a depression would allow. Life just… adapted to the reality of still breathing. But I realized the most significant moment we shared she wasn't even conscious for, and how I thought about her was deeply tied into that moment. Eventually conversation just fizzled out because we didn't have much in common anymore beyond that. But the last time I talked to her, her daughter still had a mom. Her mom still had a daughter.

How has your experience affected your relationship with your cousin? How has that shaped your thoughts as you search this site?

 

[Jean Améry]

I've been on both sides of suicidal action. First when I was fifteen, but then when I was twenty-one…

I was dating this woman who shared many of the experiences that I had. She had been locked up in mental health, medicated out of her mind, engaged in self harm, etc. Back then we thought we could multiply negatives and create a positive out of the situation. We thought we would be able to recognize the signs in each other.

In the middle of the night she had cut a leather strap from an old horse saddle she kept around for the memories and tied one end to her bedpost and the other to her neck. She yelled, I don't know what, but it was enough to wake me up from the couch. I got up and couldn't find her. I double checked everywhere, and then I saw her fingertips on the bedroom window sill. When I looked over she let go.

She blacked out and started convulsing almost right away as I tried to pull her back up. I wasn't strong enough. I was screaming, her body was hitting the side of the apartment below, and the neighbor came out and held her up enough to take the pressure off. I somehow ended up on the ground and ran into his place to get a knife to cut her down. She came to almost as quickly, but crawled around on the ground making horrible gasping noises.

The paramedics who took her to the hospital told her to do it right next time because they didn't want to come back again - she had also tried to OD some months before we started dating and they busted her door down. In the hospital, her face and eyes were bruised. But oddly enough, she seemed like she was in good spirits. Meanwhile, the skin from my chest down past my stomach was bruised and scraped off from the window sill. I went and bawled like never before on the curb outside the emergency room.

Our relationship didn't last long after that. I visited her almost every day in mental health, but the warning signs were all over the place. Her suicide note she wrote that night didn't even mention me – she talked about her last boyfriend, her daughter she didn't have custody of, her situation, but not me. It wasn't about me. And I never really had any relationships since then – that may not be the sole reason, but that was the last time I ever felt comfortable with another person. People tell me I'm good looking, intelligent, and whatever, but the few times I did try I quickly got nervous. My sense of dread I usually carry around amplifies.


But this is worth thinking about, in my opinion. We belong to a pro-choice website, and I truly believe people should have the choice, but this is juxtaposed to the reality of finding someone you know ready to drop out of the window. I think few of us would stand by in that moment and say, "I respect your decision. Goodbye!" If they would, I would be wary of such a person in all circumstances. But something else kicks in. You don't even think. You scream. You plead. And no matter how little you may think others care about you, they will do the same for you.

Add this knowledge, this experience, to the myth of suicide being easy. When I finally go, it will be anything but easy.

What's your experience?

I'm sorry to hear about your horrible experience with your ex-gf. Sounds like a nightmare. It seems to me she didn't really care about you given that she was willing to put you through that. That was a shitty thing to do on her part.

Stories like this are the reason why one should never involve another in one's suicide: it'll wreck their mind with guilt, make the execution of the plan infinitely harder and may even result in legal charges against the person who witnessed it and didn't help.

I can attest to how traumatizing it is to be directly confronted by another's suicide attempt: for me it was my mother who tried to off herself with pills and alcohol and ending up puking her guts out in the kitchen sink just when I returned home. That really fucked with my mind. I was actually happy and content before that, after my world changed and the black dog has haunted me every since.

Not helping in that situation would probably be disasterous for one's own emotional state and as stated before could very well result in legal trouble.

Legality aside I think there is a world of difference between a rational, humane suicide (like drinking N) in front of witnesses and what transpired that night between you and your ex-gf.

 

[Begemont]

Well I've saved my mother (at least) 3 times from death when I was between 7 and 10 years old. To this day I don't know whether they were suicide attempts, but I think they might've been. Would explain a lot. There is a chance they were also accidental or purely because she was negligent of her condition, but the more I think about that... It seems unlikely.