Posted by mair on January 25, 2007, at 16:55:40
In reply to what keeps you going? **suicide trigger, posted by wishingstar on January 25, 2007, at 12:58:44
A couple of things.
First I've always thought that if I ever killed myself it would be with a gun because that seemed the surest way. The prospect of trying to kill myself and ending up a quadrapalegic or in some vegetative state is worse. I don't own a gun. Over time, I started to view this as my very own built-in safety net. As long as I tell myself that it has to be a gun, and as long as I don't buy one, I'm safe, sort of.
Also my family. As depressed as I've gotten, I've never actually thought they would be better off with me dead. Occasionally I've thought that maybe they'd be better off without having me around, but I don't have to kill myself to get out of their lives. Sometimes, to tap into how much it might hurt them, I make myself imagine how my suicide would affect them. It's never a pretty picture.
The last thing and maybe now the strongest deterrent, is that I've now been in and out of enough moments of seemingly bottomless darkness to know that no matter how permanent these states may seem, they are not. The permanency can be so persuasive, that I literally have to tell myself over and over that it's been bad in the past and it's gotten better. I don't need to convince myself that I'll get to a place that feels wonderful, (that would be too much of a hard sell). I only need to tell myself that I'll get to a place where it doesn't seem as essential that I kill myself.
Someone on this Board said something once about how suicide is absolutely the most important decision someone could ever make. If it's so important, you should make sure it's right. I go through periods when I really obsess about suicide and just thinking about it gets to be oppressive. But the urge to kill myself always feels impulsive.
Mair
poster:mair
thread:726366
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/psycho/20070119/msgs/726449.html