It's wild how quickly your life can change. I have a very PSSD-like condition (severe anhedonia and chronic fatigue) from a single dose of MDMA and it really feels like my soul got taken from me. I feel like living dead forced to carry on and watch everyone be alive. I was studying at a top university, had my whole life ahead of me and then BAM. People don't understand at all, trying to explain extreme anhedonia to someone who has never experienced it is just impossible. Seeing people laugh and joke and be happy is heartbreaking cos I just feel like I'm trapped inside a glass cage, shut out from the world.
I'm so sorry you're going through this. I hope you manage to get out and get some relief.
I have a few questions, just about minimising the harm done to other people. Is there any way that you could let your parents know how you're feeling and give them some indication that you are thinking of ending your life? Perhaps this could help give them understanding and make it a bit easier for them when you go. The grief and pain caused to loved ones, especially family, is my biggest reason for staying at the moment and I'm trying to explain to them as much as I can how awful the state I live in is, just so that when I go they at least are able to understand a little. I'm wondering if that might be possible for you?
Finally, what will you do to make sure you don't hurt anyone upon landing? That would be my biggest worry about jumping.
Thank you for your response!!
It's crazy how these things can change everything. Same here, I had my whole life ahead of me, and then my soul, personality, etc. was deleted by what this med did to my brain. Nobody who is not having it happen to them understands, and I wouldn't either if it wasn't happening to me. Our brains are our entire beings and identities, and when things mess with them - we're not choosing to be this way, we literally cannot feel things - it's against our will, because our brains have been altered.
I have tried over and over to explain to my parents. They know that something drastically changed with me, but I don't think they fully understand and I don't blame them. I think they think that I just need therapy but I can't do therapy because I don't have emotions. If I had negative emotions at least I could, but I don't. It's like, the things that usually help people are closed to me. I can't spend time with loved ones or engage in hobbies or pursue interests to feel better because that has all been taken from me…I cannot feel love, joy, sympathy, empathy, compassion, sadness, fear, happiness, so there is no ability to do these things, there just isn't. It's not stubbornness, it's that my brain is not my brain. It truly is mind boggling. And I can't even feel distressed about my condition because I don't experience distress. Every moment is this bizarre chemical "calm" feeling (but not like a good kind of calm, more like this sickly chemical suppressed feeling? Idk how to describe it) that does not change even if my parents are sobbing in front of me, even if people are suffering in front of me, even if I am in a life threatening situation. And this is exactly what people describe happens to them with this condition, because the SSRI, it goes overboard and erases the ability to feel all emotions. I know that this will hurt my parents enormously (that's an understatement), actually I can't even feel guilty or bad about that because I *cant* experience guilt or "bad" feelings. Truly inhuman. I don't think they want to believe it is the medication, because that seems so much more "unfixable." But it is a night and day change, and no, I am not depressed - a clear differentiator between depression and these post-drug syndromes is what I described, that strange chemical calm feeling even in negative, sad, upsetting, painful situations - an inability to feel anxiety, stress response, adrenaline, fear, panic, sadness - which is not characteristic of depression. Depression does numb, but the numbness is often a loss of happiness and there is still sadness. The loss across the spectrum is a different thing. Plus, PSSD comes with its own unique physical symptoms, which I've got. For a year every minute of every day I experience numbness in my brain, a feeling of heavy dull squeezing pressure like a slab of concrete sitting behind my forehead (probably frontal lobe related) and various sensations in different parts of my brain that move around throughout the day. Burning, crawling, feeling of needles stabbing, pinpricking, "itchy" feeling. 24/7. This thing did something crazy to my brain … honestly there is so much about these drugs scientists don't understand, and they are blunt instruments. Everyone's brain is so different, and when a drug comes in and starts messing around with a neurotransmitter as vital as serotonin (which doesn't just affect mood, but lots of other purely physical things as well) tons of downstream pathways get modified and affected, dopamine, norepinephrine, GABA, glutamate, all of these other neurotransmitters change their signaling in response. Entire networks change. It's not just an isolated "more serotonin" kind of thing. I no longer menstruate, whole body is numb, vision is cloudy and dulled, lost sense of smell and taste, hearing is like being underwater.
Probably because of the loss of emotions, it's like all my memories are gone, I have no sense of time or place, severe cognitive issues, lost the ability to visualize, no longer feel hunger or thirst or tiredness or bodily sensations …
Oh I just wish I could turn back time and never took this pill…I wasn't even depressed, I had mild anxiety that could've been dealt with in other ways …I don't think my parents truly understand how bad this is since they're not in my brain … but I think I've done all I can to convey it and parts will still remain confusing. I can't really share that I'm suicidal because then they'll stop me or medicate me more. And honestly, the alternative is for me to remain living in their house, them seeing a zombie every single day, a walking meat sack that cannot love them cannot feel human emotion cannot work (because of the cognitive issues plus emotional anesthesia) cannot contribute to society cannot be human cannot have a life … I think the emotions thing is the worst because if I was disabled and unable to work but still had emotions, I would still be human, but I cannot live in the world without emotions, it's not possible. So I guess what I'm trying to say is that my parents already lost *me* to this drug, *me* doesn't exist anymore. The person who had those interests, those passions, those feelings, those dreams, is gone. Now it's an empty shell. I actually think while CTB will be horrific in the short term, in the long term it would be worse to have your child in this state that you don't fully understand and can't do anything about. They still have a little hope but as more time goes by they'll start to lose that, I can't have a relationship with them without emotions, it will be a million times worse than me CTB'ing. My soul is dead already, this is just taking care of the body. My parents would never be able to live a normal life having their child in this zombie inhuman state, it would permeate their every moment. It would be worse than losing me in this way because with CTB, there's an end, there can be grief, but remaining in this state it's like in limbo.
In terms of not landing on someone, that's definitely something I need to be sure about. I'm planning to do it at night, and make sure there's no one who could wander into the landing spot.
It's interesting how it affects everyone differently. I was also harmed by psych drugs except I don't experience anhedonia. Instead I have the complete opposite with severe akathisia, I experience all kind of emotions x10, anger, rage, sadness, adrenaline, fear etc. And I have persistent genital arousal disorder from this which is just as unbearable
That sounds awful I'm so sorry. It is crazy how it affects people differently. I have heard akathisia is literally the most torturous thing that can happen to a person. That plus PGAD sounds truly unbearable. It's wild how many crazy effects these drugs have that are not told to people before they take them … I know these things don't happen to everyone, but I guess I just wish they weren't promoted as so neutral and harmless, because then it's really hard for someone to weigh the pros and cons. The fact that they can have such wildly different effects shows how mysterious and complex the brain is - and how risky it is to mess with its homeostasis!
Why oh why does CTB have to be so complicated? Why can't there just be a button we can press to end it?
I'm starting to run into some logistical / mechanical issues with my plan. I can't seem to figure out - so basically I have extremely weak wrists from bouts of carpal tunnel, tendinitis, etc. I cannot bear weight on them. I am also extremely physically unfit, weak, etc. I can't do downward dog because I can't put weight on my wrists, for example. So my thought was to book a hotel, and some hotels explicitly say which floors their balcony suites are on so I'll know if it's high enough. I can look at reviews or contact hotel to ensure balcony is accessible/they haven't locked it off for some reason. I'll try to get a feel for the standard furnishings in their suites, look at reviews, I think most nice suites would have some kind of smaller dining table with chairs (I am willing to pay as much as i need to, I have a ton of savings from before I got this post drug condition and although it is wasteful and would obviously be better to leave it to parents, I'm willing to pay extravagant wasteful amounts of money if it'll get me a guaranteed CTB because that's worth its weight in gold). My plan was, so you see I can't get over the 42 inch railing by myself because I'm 5 feet and can't rely on using my wrists to hoist myself. I mean, I can use my hands and all they're not totally nonfunctional it's just I don't want to rely on having to put weight on them. So I figured if I can bring a standard 28" table over to the balcony (or maybe there's one already out there), stand on it, now the railing has effectively become 14 inches. But from there I'm at a loss, and with my condition it's extremely extremely extremely hard to think - I'm having a rough enough time planning this CTB my brain is mush…and I've lost the ability to visualize which makes it super difficult to like visualize these things out? Initially I figured I could just lean over and tip over, but I believe that would cause rotation, I would go inwards, I would splay horizontally, and I could hit the railing below, which could either cause me to fall back onto the balcony below or change my downward path such that I go inwards more, land on a balcony below …
How do people do this? Even someone who can hoist themselves, do people stand on the railing before jumping? But how are they not concerned that they might lose their balance and fall backwards back onto the balcony and hit their head rendering them unable to CTB? Do they sit on the railing? Isn't there the same issue? Won't the brain naturally send wobble/unsteady/unbalanced signals since you're so high up? I just don't get the mechanics of it at all and feel like there's something I'm missing … I don't understand how people aren't concerned they will lose their balance while navigating the railing up there … and how they ensure they are going far enough out horizontally …
This would apply for any jump actually, how do people navigate the railing aspect without being concerned they'll just fall back?
Any thoughts whatsoever, anything would be amazing! Please help SaSu thank you!! I cannot fail I need to CTB for the reasons given above and if I fail my poor brain will be given more drugs by well-meaning people (which I'm not saying they don't help some people, but everyone's brain is super different and for some people for some reason they are devastating…I'm already an emotionless vegetable from psych drugs so who knows what more will do to my brain…and then I would have lost my chance to exit with dignity, while people still remember how I was before the drugs …
I don't have any issue with the SI or hesitation or the jumping part since I don't experience fear or emotions … it's just the logistics. I know nothing is 100%, no method, no plan, and at some point I'm just going to do it, but I'm trying to be as prepared as is possible, and this whole part is confusing to me.