I went through a rough patch in January and February where suicide seemed like the only answer. On Feb 10th I was experimenting with a belt around my neck, similar to what Robin Williams did. I applied a bit of pressure to see how it would feel, and quickly let go. It was less than 1 second of pressure. I went to bed not thinking anything of it.
The next day my neck was a bit sore, but I thought I just bruised my adams apple. Over the next few days I started having weird psychological symptoms and writing weird emails. I remember being really tired. I went to take the garbage out and was feeling really confused so I taxied to the emergency room. I told them I crashed my bike and injured my neck. They did xrays of my neck and a CT scan of my brain, and said both looked fine. A few days later the police picked me up as I was found wondering around my city aimlessly. They committed me to the psych ward.
Once in the psych ward, they put me on a bunch of meds and said I had a psychotic episode, and no more. I told them about the belt episode, so they redid the CT scan and said my brain looked fine. They also did a EEG which was within normal bounds. My family is all on the other side of the world, so I kept them up to date using my phone. The doctor told them not to come visit me as it would increase my feelings of guilt, and I was looked after.
Once I was discharged, I felt not bad (around Mar 1), but since them I'm continued to feel confusion and generally unwell. I paid for a private MRI last week since it seemed clear to me that I had some type of brain damage. Looking at the MRI, there is massive damage in a few areas and necrotic areas of tissue. Like literally a massive hole in one area. My neck still hurts a bit two months later, so I'm guessing I did damage there. My blood O2 stats are fine though.
The irony is the suicidal impulses went away, but now I've permanently wrecked my brain.
While I'm generally feeling unwell, and I spend most of my day in bed, I still can have text based conversations with my family abroad, and meet the odd friend for beer. But I can tell I'm slowly becoming a vegetable as my problem solving ability is mostly gone, and I've mostly become reactive in conversations. My friends just think its the meds and I'll snap out of it, but I know my life is over at this point and I've wrecked the happiness of my family too no matter what I do next.
The thing is, I don't want to live like this, nor do I want to spend 40 years basically sleeping in my sister's basement as an invalid. So at some point here I think I may have to finish the job, if nature doesn't do it for me (I seem to be getting worse weekly). Let this be a cautionary tale for anything experimenting with hanging.
The next day my neck was a bit sore, but I thought I just bruised my adams apple. Over the next few days I started having weird psychological symptoms and writing weird emails. I remember being really tired. I went to take the garbage out and was feeling really confused so I taxied to the emergency room. I told them I crashed my bike and injured my neck. They did xrays of my neck and a CT scan of my brain, and said both looked fine. A few days later the police picked me up as I was found wondering around my city aimlessly. They committed me to the psych ward.
Once in the psych ward, they put me on a bunch of meds and said I had a psychotic episode, and no more. I told them about the belt episode, so they redid the CT scan and said my brain looked fine. They also did a EEG which was within normal bounds. My family is all on the other side of the world, so I kept them up to date using my phone. The doctor told them not to come visit me as it would increase my feelings of guilt, and I was looked after.
Once I was discharged, I felt not bad (around Mar 1), but since them I'm continued to feel confusion and generally unwell. I paid for a private MRI last week since it seemed clear to me that I had some type of brain damage. Looking at the MRI, there is massive damage in a few areas and necrotic areas of tissue. Like literally a massive hole in one area. My neck still hurts a bit two months later, so I'm guessing I did damage there. My blood O2 stats are fine though.
The irony is the suicidal impulses went away, but now I've permanently wrecked my brain.
While I'm generally feeling unwell, and I spend most of my day in bed, I still can have text based conversations with my family abroad, and meet the odd friend for beer. But I can tell I'm slowly becoming a vegetable as my problem solving ability is mostly gone, and I've mostly become reactive in conversations. My friends just think its the meds and I'll snap out of it, but I know my life is over at this point and I've wrecked the happiness of my family too no matter what I do next.
The thing is, I don't want to live like this, nor do I want to spend 40 years basically sleeping in my sister's basement as an invalid. So at some point here I think I may have to finish the job, if nature doesn't do it for me (I seem to be getting worse weekly). Let this be a cautionary tale for anything experimenting with hanging.
