Discussion Thinking of others

[SinisterKid]

One of the constants I am finding in threads here is the frequent posters who are trying to be considerate to those who find them once they have CTB. Why? I do not have the answer to that. I was very single minded when I wanted to die and nothing and no one entered my mind apart from the unwavering thought of finding my peace. Is that selfish? I do not have the answer to that either.

I had considered my position for quite some time and each time, I could only see or envisage the same outcome. Some would say that was down to my altered mental state or it was because of my disability. I thought, for the first time in a long time, I was very rational. I obviously had to make some assumptions, which proved to be very wrong, about the overall situation as I saw it. I tried to be objective about the possible outcomes. At no time did I think about anyone who might find my body. I never thought once about how I may look. If I shit myself, I shit myself. If my face was contorted with pain, so be it. What that would do to anyone was not my concern. My sole and only concern was ending my pain and finding some peace.

I came here purely by accident. Searching for ways to die landed me here. But initially, the objective was the same. I have had a very close brush with death and one desperate last cry for help. I am not going to make any mistakes the next time. I aim to learn from what I already know and what I have unearthed here. But my concerns are not for other people. OK, not entirely true. My partner does not talk about the day she found me, dead on the floor. I will not put her through that again. But someone will find me, at some point and I am powerless to do anything about it. I cant just vanish unless I jump into a river/ocean and get swept away. Not my desired way to go. I could burn myself, but again, not going to happen. So I am left with the option that someone will find my remains.

Worrying about how others will feel, writing notes, e mails, putting my affairs in order, its all secondary nonsense, immaterial to what my goal is. Things that happen when I am dead and gone are completely beyond my control, so why concern myself with any of them? Is that reasonable or not? Just something for anyone to think about. And, it is down to personal preference how anyone wants to deal with this stuff, my way is not the only way, far from it.

 

[LogicalConclusion]

As you said, it really is personal preference. For myself, I'd rather that the police manage my body and then once they take me wherever my body will go, my friend can manage the rest. I don't want him to find me like that and traumatize him, and I feel bad that somebody will have to take care of the mess but I'd prefer it to be someone trained to deal with such situations. Ultimately, I want peace. Not just for myself but for my loved ones as well. There's only so much I can do but I will do what I can to minimize impact on them. How others react is beyond my control, but I am trying to do as right as I can for myself and for my loved ones. I don't know that it will mean much to them, but all I can do is my best.

 

[Jean Améry]

In a way you're right of course: after death this world including what happens to your corpse, who finds you and what that might do to them is no longer your concern. You will have simply ceased to be.

That being said the common assumption is that the world does not end when we do so if that is true obviously your death will have consequences on others. In that sense preparations one made in life will still have some consequences after one's death.

You're equally right about making a will, who will find you etcetera being of secondary importance: obviously without a self-inflicted death there is no suicide and all else becomes moot. If death is the desired effect clearly that's the all important priority and one should plan for it carefully and execute it with a clear head and with all the energy/willpower one can muster. To me that does not make the other stuff unimportant though.

Writing letters might ease some of the pain for those left behind. At the very least they might provide some insight as to why it happened. Perhaps even some closure. Arranging one's own funeral, taking care of one's affairs etcetera serve a very practical goal: communicating one's final wishes and at least make it clear one had the foresight and level headedness to think of this and plan for it. It might even help the person preparing for suicide in dealing with his/her own emotions.

As for me: if I do it it'll be either in a hotel room outside of the city where I live or in my own place. I will not subject people who know me to the sight of my deceased body. It is indeed inevitable someone-one else will find it (the same as with a 'natural' death really) and like you I do not care about that. My body would probably not look gruesome and I don't owe society anything given that they'd gladly trample on my rights and dignity if they could.

To me it's a matter of principle that if I die neither my mother nor my father will get one cent from me, not after all that they put me through. Since the inheritance law in my country is clear it's obvious I need to draw up a will in order to prevent them benefitting financially from my death.

I also have a few people I care deeply about: it's important to me to make sure they have closure and know I thought about them while preparing for this. It's an elementary form of respect, at least that's the way I see it.

Of course what is 'reasonable' in this context is something one has to decide for oneself.

 

[been_there]

What @Jean Améry said. Ctb as a considered choice. Cos due consideration. Cos reduce other's burden. Cos minimise pain for both you and those who remain.

Each to their own.

 

[Person]

Obviously it's your choice, if you are not fazed about the effect finding/seeing your corpse may have on others, that is completely your opinion and absolutely valid.

What I can say is, I saw my husbands body. He didn't commit suicide, but it was a completely unexpected death. The police dealt with it at the scene and I went to see him in the mourge. I also saw him after post mortem 3 weeks later.
These were my choices, no one forced me. But I felt compelled to do so because I adore him, and I wanted to take his hand print/lock of hair ect.
Even in the mourge, where he just looked asleep, it was haunting. He was cold, still and hard. I opened his eyes, and saw the twinkling blues were a dull, dead grey.
And I was prepared for this. I can't imagine finding someone unexpectedly.
I cant even describe him after post mortem.
I can't sleep at night because all I can see is his dead face. I can't eat because I constantly feel sick. I struggle to remember good times because all I can think of is clinging to his body and begging him to come back.
So now I am here, contemplating my own suicide, to escape the trauma I've been through and the things I've seen.

I don't know your situation and it is not for me to judge. I just wanted to share my experience on being the one on the receiving end of a loved ones death, and perhaps share some light on why it's so important to some people to try and prevent loved ones seeing/finding them after death, and why loved ones feel the need to see your body.
Im so sorry any of us are here and I hope you find the peace you seek.

 

[not_a_robot]

I could never have done it without at least telling my mom I loved her and it wasn't her fault. She would have wondered, it would have been cruel not to tell her.

Beyond that, I agree. It reminds me of those people who always complain how exhausted they are and how bad they need a vacation but they can't take one because they are just too vitally important to the family/the office, and the entire world would literally end if they failed to micromanage it for even! one! single! day!
I would always ask those people
"What if you were dead? Nobody is that important. If you were dead, I'm sure the world would somehow find a way to function. Just tell the office to pretend you're dead, they'll figure out how to manage for a few days without you."

I was not popular at the office.

Obviously it's your choice, if you are not fazed about the effect finding/seeing your corpse may have on others, that is completely your opinion and absolutely valid.

What I can say is, I saw my husbands body. He didn't commit suicide, but it was a completely unexpected death. The police dealt with it at the scene and I went to see him in the mourge. I also saw him after post mortem 3 weeks later.
These were my choices, no one forced me. But I felt compelled to do so because I adore him, and I wanted to take his hand print/lock of hair ect.
Even in the mourge, where he just looked asleep, it was haunting. He was cold, still and hard. I opened his eyes, and saw the twinkling blues were a dull, dead grey.
And I was prepared for this. I can't imagine finding someone unexpectedly.
I cant even describe him after post mortem.
I can't sleep at night because all I can see is his dead face. I can't eat because I constantly feel sick. I struggle to remember good times because all I can think of is clinging to his body and begging him to come back.
So now I am here, contemplating my own suicide, to escape the trauma I've been through and the things I've seen.

I don't know your situation and it is not for me to judge. I just wanted to share my experience on being the one on the receiving end of a loved ones death, and perhaps share some light on why it's so important to some people to try and prevent loved ones seeing/finding them after death, and why loved ones feel the need to see your body.
Im so sorry any of us are here and I hope you find the peace you seek.

Imagine how weird it must have been in medieval and ancient times before everything was so sanitized. Death and disease literally everywhere. Yikes. Shit, I get traumatized by a hangnail or a broken bone, I was not meant for life on this planet.

 

[restingspot]

It's something personal. Even though I'll be dead, my friends and family will be left to suffer the after-effects until they die too. I know I am loved, and I love them too. I don't want them to cry and think helplessly at night about what they could have done to change or even stop it.

My reason for it? My grandfather chose to die through untreated cancer because of his schizophrenia. My great-grandmother chose to end her life through untreated internal bleeding after him. I respect their choices but the impact left behind hurts a lot of people. My mother doesn't show her emotions a lot but she showed more at his funeral than she did in my entire life. I myself can't even talk about it in depth without crying, and it's been 6 years. It's an impact that sears deeply enough to want me to leave something behind in more than just memories, but explanations and mementos way after I'm gone. Hope that made sense.

• Letters for my family, to let them know it's alright, and that it's not their fault, and to let them into my thoughts and how I felt, so that they know what I was going through and what I had to do, as well as to enforce that nothing they could do would change the urge to die, and that it was bound to happen at the end of it all.
• Cleaning myself up beforehand is to make the leftover clean-up as minimal (physically and mentally) as possible.
• Writing my last wishes so they won't have to concern themselves with a money sink into shit like a funeral, casket, and other bullshit. Just burn me and ship half of my ashes to my best friend.
• This is deeply personal, but I'd also like to do something extra for a best friend, because she holds a special place in my heart. So I'm prepping some stuff for her and planning to do scheduled emails for at least two years, maybe three, with a once a month frequency.

 

[lululoo]

I understand both sides. I was trying to wrap some things up, but as I've sunk lower and lower I don't care as much anymore and will leave some loose ends. LIkewise I cared before about avoiding a certain month because of a friend's birthday; this friend has fucked off and has ignored my last text, so I don't care about that anymore. I also don't care about ruining 4th of july for my family, if I decide to go soon. I'm miserable and angry. But I think someone who has a loving family/friends (and whose life wasn't ruined by family) would feel differently.

• This is deeply personal, but I'd also like to do something extra for a best friend, because she holds a special place in my heart. So I'm prepping some stuff for her and planning to do scheduled emails for at least two years, maybe three, with a once a month frequency.

Sorry to stick my nose in your business, but are you sure about that? It seems that could be pretty painful to get a monthly email from your dead best friend. What will the emails be about?

 

[SinisterKid]

Most of the replies thus far go against the generally held consensus in the medical profession that people who want to die by suicide are selfish and uncaring towards those that are left behind. The first psych I saw in hospital as I came out of my coma called me a selfish bastard. In the context of what he was referring to, he was right. The responses here would indicate that the majority of suicidal people are not the selfish bastards they are portrayed to be by media and medics, which is very interesting to me.

Maybe next time I will do things differently, maybe not. But I cannot reconcile how to minimise the impact of my demise on those I care about and ending my own pain. It appears to me to be a impossible task and therefore, not something I should concern myself with. But replies here are certainly food for thought.

 

[Ruffian]

Most of the replies thus far go against the generally held consensus in the medical profession that people who want to die by suicide are selfish and uncaring towards those that are left behind. The first psych I saw in hospital as I came out of my coma called me a selfish bastard. In the context of what he was referring to, he was right. The responses here would indicate that the majority of suicidal people are not the selfish bastards they are portrayed to be by media and medics, which is very interesting to me.

Maybe next time I will do things differently, maybe not. But I cannot reconcile how to minimise the impact of my demise on those I care about and ending my own pain. It appears to me to be a impossible task and therefore, not something I should concern myself with. But replies here are certainly food for thought.

Hospital psychiatrists are absolute cretins circling the drain in the vast pool of humanity. Especially if you make an attempt and fail, and you already have at least one diagnosis on file. It's like they do everything they can to add on a new label and push you towards extreme behavior. I hate treatment hospitals.

 

[Theon]

Most of the replies thus far go against the generally held consensus in the medical profession that people who want to die by suicide are selfish and uncaring towards those that are left behind. The first psych I saw in hospital as I came out of my coma called me a selfish bastard. In the context of what he was referring to, he was right. The responses here would indicate that the majority of suicidal people are not the selfish bastards they are portrayed to be by media and medics, which is very interesting to me.

Maybe next time I will do things differently, maybe not. But I cannot reconcile how to minimise the impact of my demise on those I care about and ending my own pain. It appears to me to be a impossible task and therefore, not something I should concern myself with. But replies here are certainly food for thought.

It is selfish but we are acting selfishly because we have to. Others aren't experiencing the pain we're in. They're not afflicted with what we're afflicted with. It's funny how we're constantly told put ourselves first except with regards to ctb.

 

[cornflowerblue]

Most of the replies thus far go against the generally held consensus in the medical profession that people who want to die by suicide are selfish and uncaring towards those that are left behind. The first psych I saw in hospital as I came out of my coma called me a selfish bastard. In the context of what he was referring to, he was right. The responses here would indicate that the majority of suicidal people are not the selfish bastards they are portrayed to be by media and medics, which is very interesting to me.

Maybe next time I will do things differently, maybe not. But I cannot reconcile how to minimise the impact of my demise on those I care about and ending my own pain. It appears to me to be a impossible task and therefore, not something I should concern myself with. But replies here are certainly food for thought.

This also comes from the reasons given by people who make non-serious attempts. They wake up and talk about revenge, hoping people felt bad or missed them, hoping that now people will appreciate them, etc. The dead, on the other hand, don't talk.

 

[Theon]

Yeah I'm really not thinking about anyone else. I just want to end my pain.

 

[RM5998]

One of the constants I am finding in threads here is the frequent posters who are trying to be considerate to those who find them once they have CTB. Why? I do not have the answer to that. I was very single minded when I wanted to die and nothing and no one entered my mind apart from the unwavering thought of finding my peace. Is that selfish? I do not have the answer to that either.

I had considered my position for quite some time and each time, I could only see or envisage the same outcome. Some would say that was down to my altered mental state or it was because of my disability. I thought, for the first time in a long time, I was very rational. I obviously had to make some assumptions, which proved to be very wrong, about the overall situation as I saw it. I tried to be objective about the possible outcomes. At no time did I think about anyone who might find my body. I never thought once about how I may look. If I shit myself, I shit myself. If my face was contorted with pain, so be it. What that would do to anyone was not my concern. My sole and only concern was ending my pain and finding some peace.

I came here purely by accident. Searching for ways to die landed me here. But initially, the objective was the same. I have had a very close brush with death and one desperate last cry for help. I am not going to make any mistakes the next time. I aim to learn from what I already know and what I have unearthed here. But my concerns are not for other people. OK, not entirely true. My partner does not talk about the day she found me, dead on the floor. I will not put her through that again. But someone will find me, at some point and I am powerless to do anything about it. I cant just vanish unless I jump into a river/ocean and get swept away. Not my desired way to go. I could burn myself, but again, not going to happen. So I am left with the option that someone will find my remains.

Worrying about how others will feel, writing notes, e mails, putting my affairs in order, its all secondary nonsense, immaterial to what my goal is. Things that happen when I am dead and gone are completely beyond my control, so why concern myself with any of them? Is that reasonable or not? Just something for anyone to think about. And, it is down to personal preference how anyone wants to deal with this stuff, my way is not the only way, far from it.

For better or worse, we don't live in a vacuum. One's decision to CTB might be about oneself, but there are people who will live on afterwards whose welfare can be an important consideration. For you, one such consideration is not putting your partner through the ordeal of finding you dead. For some people, there are other considerations as well - such as providing closure.

Yes, the decision to CTB is, to a large extent, a selfish one, but it doesn't mean that it needs to be entirely selfish. We can be both selfish and considerate at the same time if we want to. I think it serves as a way of coming to terms with the idea of one's death and helps to be more comfortable with it if there are relationships that the person who is CTBing values and feels guilty about severing by their death. Of course, you are free to be selfish, and no one can judge you for that (hell, that's what I'm planning to be, once I can find my spine).

 

[Soul]

People want different things from our deaths, plainly. Some want it to be troubling and some hope it could look as innocuous as seeing someone who's fallen asleep. There are reasons for both and it's not up to me to judge.

 

[not_a_robot]

Most of the replies thus far go against the generally held consensus in the medical profession that people who want to die by suicide are selfish and uncaring towards those that are left behind. The first psych I saw in hospital as I came out of my coma called me a selfish bastard. In the context of what he was referring to, he was right. The responses here would indicate that the majority of suicidal people are not the selfish bastards they are portrayed to be by media and medics, which is very interesting to me.

Maybe next time I will do things differently, maybe not. But I cannot reconcile how to minimise the impact of my demise on those I care about and ending my own pain. It appears to me to be a impossible task and therefore, not something I should concern myself with. But replies here are certainly food for thought.

Portraying anything honestly is not the media's job, nor that of the medical profession. You know this.

 

[restingspot]

I understand both sides. I was trying to wrap some things up, but as I've sunk lower and lower I don't care as much anymore and will leave some loose ends. LIkewise I cared before about avoiding a certain month because of a friend's birthday; this friend has fucked off and has ignored my last text, so I don't care about that anymore. I also don't care about ruining 4th of july for my family, if I decide to go soon. I'm miserable and angry. But I think someone who has a loving family/friends (and whose life wasn't ruined by family) would feel differently.


Sorry to stick my nose in your business, but are you sure about that? It seems that could be pretty painful to get a monthly email from your dead best friend. What will the emails be about?

Ah, they'll be drawings. Of what, I can't tell you. It wouldn't make sense if I did. And for us, me and her? I think it'd be appropriate. She always screams at me to let her see my drawings and I do, but I think just to leave her with nothing one day, and all of a sudden, would be pretty awful. It's gonna hurt regardless, but with the drawings at least there's some mitigation.

 

[Ruffian]

This also comes from the reasons given by people who make non-serious attempts. They wake up and talk about revenge, hoping people felt bad or missed them, hoping that now people will appreciate them, etc. The dead, on the other hand, don't talk.

This is why I couldn't make it through 13 Reasons Why. It really promoted the revenge theme and glorified the whole process. Plus I just couldn't empathize with the characters. And it had nothing to do with teenagers being the target audience, because I have no problem getting on board with the kids in Stranger Things. I just didn't think some of the scenarios in 13 Reason Why were believable. And definitely that her actual suicide would have most likely been a gesture.

 

[cornflowerblue]

This is why I couldn't make it through 13 Reasons Why. It really promoted the revenge theme and glorified the whole process. Plus I just couldn't empathize with the characters. And it had nothing to do with teenagers being the target audience, because I have no problem getting on board with the kids in Stranger Things. I just didn't think some of the scenarios in 13 Reason Why were believable. And definitely that her actual suicide would have most likely been a gesture.

I also hated that! The whole point was she killed herself to make others feel bad, and to take her seriously? That's not why most people CTB, and that kind of stuff is what gives the stereotype that CTB is emotional irrational and impulsive