Discussion will constantly attempting eliminate survival instinct eventually

[bigballsniqqa]

i realized that the more i attempt to ctb, the less scary it becomes. Will i eventually go through with everything if i continue attempting?

 

[1993]

After my first attempt it felt like I crossed a line that made it easier to do it again. My body has developed a physical panic reaction that I can't control tho. That's the survival instinct

 

[frayed]

Only you can know that for yourself. Some people do become desensitized to the whole thing

 

[HumanoidMonster]

I failed one/two attempts before and I really don't think constantly going for it is going to be helpful. Each failure has a toll on your psyche. Maybe the toll can get so bad you go insane and just CTB without even thinking twice, but something tells me it'd take a lot of attempts to reach that point, meaning you'd be feeling increasing pain.
Now, this is not a global thing, since no minds are alike, but it's a risk that can't be ignored.
I guess I can't really speak from experience since both my attempts weren't failed because of the survival instinct, but still felt like giving my two cents about it.

 

[Dqope]

There was a time that my heart was just fucking with me. One day it was so bad that I thought I was really going to die and at that point I was just fed up and actually wanted it to happen. Ever since then I wasn't the same. Its like something flipped a switch that shouldn't be switched. That was when I was 12. When it fist happened I was scared but the longer it went on I just accepted it. After that it had stopped but came back a year later. Then I took a knife and was a few seconds away from plunging it into my heart but I stopped because I guess I was a pussy and I though what about my family. Now a few years down the line I changed my mind. They will understand eventually that its all my choice, just as it was their choice to bring me into this world. It was fun, we had some good time, they saw me and were with me my whole childhood and teenage years and I think that's enough for me. I got into philosophy, earned quite good money from selling programs online but as of recently (past year) I don't know what is the point in life anymore. Now when I will go though for good I am not scared and are quite looking forward to it. It will be a nice day. Nothing different than any other day. I will just go to sleep and thats it. I wont be coming back but I will just take a nap and I will not be here anymore.

 

[Forveleth]

As others have said, it really depends on the person. For myself, my first attempt showed me I can do it and now I am confident I can pull it off when the time comes. I have seen threads from others, however, that say their attempts left them quite shaken and afraid to try again. There is no way to predict which person you will be.

 

[TheVanishingPoint]

To suppress what culture has called the "instinct for survival," one must first recognize that it is not a sacred impulse, but rather a set of learned behaviors, conditioned reflexes to fear, and bodily preservation, mediated by brain structures like the amygdala, hypothalamus, and prefrontal cortex. This so-called instinct is not unbreakable: it can be deactivated, desensitized, rewritten. The first path is the experience of chronic pain, prolonged despair, recurrent suicidal thoughts: every time an individual contemplates their own death without fleeing from it, every time they approach it, the fear circuit erodes, and with it erodes the automatic reflex that binds flesh to its own heartbeat. Repeated suicide attempts are not merely a symptom: they are a deep restructuring of the brain, a gradual erasure of the panic response. The second method is pharmacological: with medium-high doses of benzodiazepines, for example 10 mg of lorazepam, one achieves such profound sedation that the limbic response is anesthetized, rendering the idea of death neutral, acceptable, without emotional recoil. The mind does not entirely shut down, but it stops defending itself. Where once the body would have panicked, hands shaken, breath quickened, now there is calm, emptiness, a kind of conscious passivity. Another path is extreme dissociation, achieved through dissociative substances or repeated trauma: consciousness detaches from the body and observes from a distance, and in that disconnection the bond between "me" and "survive" vanishes. Finally, there is the total loss of meaning, existential annihilation: when life no longer has any symbolic, social, relational, or spiritual justification, then self-preservation becomes a biological whim that can be canceled like an empty contract. The instinct is not a deity, it is a habit. And every habit can be broken, rewritten, dissolved into nothing. But it must also be said that each psychic organism responds in its own way: what deactivates the survival response in some, amplifies or distorts it in others. Some find in ketamine that dissociative window where reality loses all grip and death appears as a floating option, neither feared nor pursued, but simply available. Others find this suppression of instinct in opioid derivatives, where the sense of pain and time is anesthetized to the point that all attachment dissolves. For some, alcohol creates that free zone in which consciousness no longer resists and the act can occur in the lucid blindness of advanced intoxication. For others still, psychostimulants are necessary, altering the thresholds of inhibitory control and accelerating the move toward the act without passing through hesitation. But there are also those who require no substance at all: in borderline, bipolar, or schizoid disorders, the suppression mechanism can arise from within, from a personality structure that does not perceive danger as absolute or final, but reshapes it into a form that may be attractive, desirable, or indifferent. In borderline disorder, the emotion is so intense that one acts just to make it stop; in bipolar, it is euphoria or manic void that overshadows the fear of death; in the schizoid, it is the radical detachment from emotional reality that blocks any defensive reaction. In all these cases, what fails is not reason, but the connection between reason and impulse. The brain reinterprets survival not as a necessity but as a secondary, superfluous, or even hostile option. No protocol applies to all, because each mind builds its own filters, its own thresholds, its own silences. What extinguishes fear in one may only amplify it in another. The suppression of instinct is an intimate work, not always voluntary, sometimes chemical, sometimes psychic, sometimes ritual. But always, in the end, lucid—like a resignation that has stopped believing in the fairytale of breath.

 

[Romanticize]

it's an instinct - you are not going to eliminate it. You can lower it by attempting many times, but I strongly advise you against.

Each attempt can leave you brain dead, you can end up a vegetable for the rest of your life, you won't get any other attempt chance.

So, my views are that - if someone is suicidal, his first attempt should be his last.

 

[TheVanishingPoint]

it's an instinct - you are not going to eliminate it. You can lower it by attempting many times, but I strongly advise you against.

Each attempt can leave you brain dead, you can end up a vegetable for the rest of your life, you won't get any other attempt chance.

So, my views are that - if someone is suicidal, his first attempt should be his last.

In my opinion, it's wrong to claim that one must attempt suicide multiple times in order to desensitize the so-called instinct for survival. First of all, that's not the only way to do it. And secondly, it's not accurate to say that repeated attempts always lead to neurological or physical damage or disability — it depends on the kind of attempt. Not all attempts are extreme or harmful. Take for example someone who tries to hang themselves using a rope tied to an unstable window frame, without a real fixed anchor point, performing only a partial suspension: as soon as they feel pain or a sense of choking, they back out. In such cases, absolutely nothing happens medically. The same goes for someone who performs a full suspension just a centimeter above the ground, ready to put their feet down at the slightest discomfort. Or someone who tries carbon monoxide poisoning, but keeps the car windows open. Or someone who stands on a balcony intending to jump, but never actually does, just stands there looking into the void. These aren't rare occurrences — many users on this very forum have shared similar experiences. And even someone who placed a gun in their mouth without pulling the trigger still falls under the definition of a suicide attempt. Yet no physical or neurological damage occurs. So to claim that attempts always result in trauma is a misleading oversimplification, because not every act has consequences, and many are simply borderline explorations, silent rehearsals, interrupted rituals.

 

[Romanticize]

In my opinion, it's wrong to claim that one must attempt suicide multiple times in order to desensitize the so-called instinct for survival. First of all, that's not the only way to do it. And secondly, it's not accurate to say that repeated attempts always lead to neurological or physical damage or disability — it depends on the kind of attempt. Not all attempts are extreme or harmful. Take for example someone who tries to hang themselves using a rope tied to an unstable window frame, without a real fixed anchor point, performing only a partial suspension: as soon as they feel pain or a sense of choking, they back out. In such cases, absolutely nothing happens medically. The same goes for someone who performs a full suspension just a centimeter above the ground, ready to put their feet down at the slightest discomfort. Or someone who tries carbon monoxide poisoning, but keeps the car windows open. Or someone who stands on a balcony intending to jump, but never actually does, just stands there looking into the void. These aren't rare occurrences — many users on this very forum have shared similar experiences. And even someone who placed a gun in their mouth without pulling the trigger still falls under the definition of a suicide attempt. Yet no physical or neurological damage occurs. So to claim that attempts always result in trauma is a misleading oversimplification, because not every act has consequences, and many are simply borderline explorations, silent rehearsals, interrupted rituals.

Yes I agree with what you said. I just simplified things by saying one sentence (and I think you can agree) that "on average", suicide attempts are dangerous, and you shouldn't be attempting it. There were accidents where people fallen from the balcony, or hanged themselves while not intending to (like in autoerotic asphyxia cases).
Of course it depends on which method, and the definition of attempt. I thought of attempting like actually doing something, and being rescued by 911 or family member, not placing a gun to one's head (btw. it's interesting how some kids do it "for fun" - and they aren't suicidal, just their cause-effect reasoning is not fully developed I guess).