What are the many causes of suicidal thoughts?
- Thread starter just me
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Any state effect which consciousness interprets to be an indicator of a suicide option.
Basically your brain gets set up so that it has a propensity to trigger a feeling - something very distinct from an actual thought - and the conscious apparatus makes the subjective conclusion that this feeling indicates a desire for suicide.
This is why a medication for example can trigger suicidal ideation (and damit, Chrome, 'ideation' IS a word!) - ideation being a process of creating thoughts.
Basically your brain gets set up so that it has a propensity to trigger a feeling - something very distinct from an actual thought - and the conscious apparatus makes the subjective conclusion that this feeling indicates a desire for suicide.
This is why a medication for example can trigger suicidal ideation (and damit, Chrome, 'ideation' IS a word!) - ideation being a process of creating thoughts.
Senseless Suffering.
Desperation.
Hopelessness.
A perceived situation of Checkmate.
"About as much chance of escape as a log that is being drawn slowly toward a buzz saw" describes the feeling best.
The dire need for a break, some rest, peaceful stillness and oblivion. A desperate need for liberation.
The decision to take one's own life does not happen overnight. Usually, there is a series of events that take place and render the decision plausible. It creeps in, overcomes our instinct of survival, and showcases itself as the only possible option to end one's suffering.
Suicide is a delusive promise.
Desperation.
Hopelessness.
A perceived situation of Checkmate.
"About as much chance of escape as a log that is being drawn slowly toward a buzz saw" describes the feeling best.
The dire need for a break, some rest, peaceful stillness and oblivion. A desperate need for liberation.
The decision to take one's own life does not happen overnight. Usually, there is a series of events that take place and render the decision plausible. It creeps in, overcomes our instinct of survival, and showcases itself as the only possible option to end one's suffering.
Suicide is a delusive promise.
Being unable to let go of things which one has unrealistically hoodwinked oneself into thinking of as the key to happiness.
Depression of course...
Psychopathy
Impulsivity (such as someone who is drunk or on drugs...although one could also be in a manic phase of bi-polar disorder)
It is a cry for help....this is often looked upon as somehow being chicken-shit...as in, you couldn’t even kill yourself properly....most choose a way they don’t think will actually kill them but often they can be successful in their naivety.
Accidental means....like huffing, ODing, doing some kind of risky act.
And my personal favorite - A philosophical desire to die...many mental health professionals would argue that these suicides are the sanest of the group, like a terminal cancer patient who meticulously plans it out and carries through with it in order to spare themselves the suffering that their illness will undoubtedly bring. They have taken control of their own destiny and decided to alleviate their own suffering.
Personally, looking back I think I was somewhere in-between depression, impulsivity, and a philosophical desire. I don’t think any are mutually exclusive.
I was definitely depressed, I was very manic that evening...although, I wouldn’t call myself a manic-depressive by any means...and I honestly had a desire to no longer participate with life and believed that I was sparing myself from future pain and disappointment...(and I can’t say I was 100% wrong....not even 50% actually) I think they all actually kind of supported one another...perhaps if you took one out of the equation then the results would have been different in my case.
Psychopathy
Impulsivity (such as someone who is drunk or on drugs...although one could also be in a manic phase of bi-polar disorder)
It is a cry for help....this is often looked upon as somehow being chicken-shit...as in, you couldn’t even kill yourself properly....most choose a way they don’t think will actually kill them but often they can be successful in their naivety.
Accidental means....like huffing, ODing, doing some kind of risky act.
And my personal favorite - A philosophical desire to die...many mental health professionals would argue that these suicides are the sanest of the group, like a terminal cancer patient who meticulously plans it out and carries through with it in order to spare themselves the suffering that their illness will undoubtedly bring. They have taken control of their own destiny and decided to alleviate their own suffering.
Personally, looking back I think I was somewhere in-between depression, impulsivity, and a philosophical desire. I don’t think any are mutually exclusive.
I was definitely depressed, I was very manic that evening...although, I wouldn’t call myself a manic-depressive by any means...and I honestly had a desire to no longer participate with life and believed that I was sparing myself from future pain and disappointment...(and I can’t say I was 100% wrong....not even 50% actually) I think they all actually kind of supported one another...perhaps if you took one out of the equation then the results would have been different in my case.
At one point in my life, I went relatively far with those thoughts.
For me, it was all about existential angst. I saw no meaning, no purpose and felt at odds with any impulse within myself (emotional or otherwise) because I couldn't find a proper context for it in the ultimate futility of the universe. Like, "why should I exert effort towards X, when I'm just going to die and the universe will eventually collapse into nothingness? Why do anything? Why get out of bed? Why be good to others? Why NOT kill myself?"
Bertrand Russell said it better than I ever could:
"That man is the product of causes which had no prevision of the end they were achieving; that his origin, his growth, his hopes and fears, his loves and his beliefs, are but the outcome of accidental collocations of atoms; that no fire, no heroism, no intensity of thought and feeling, can preserve an individual life beyond the grave; that all the labors of the ages, all the devotion, all the inspiration, all the noonday brightness of human genius, are destined to extinction in the vast death of the solar system, and that the whole temple of Man’s achievement must inevitably be buried beneath the debris of a universe in ruins — all these things, if not quite beyond dispute, are yet so nearly certain, that no philosophy which rejects them can hope to stand."
For me, it was all about existential angst. I saw no meaning, no purpose and felt at odds with any impulse within myself (emotional or otherwise) because I couldn't find a proper context for it in the ultimate futility of the universe. Like, "why should I exert effort towards X, when I'm just going to die and the universe will eventually collapse into nothingness? Why do anything? Why get out of bed? Why be good to others? Why NOT kill myself?"
Bertrand Russell said it better than I ever could:
"That man is the product of causes which had no prevision of the end they were achieving; that his origin, his growth, his hopes and fears, his loves and his beliefs, are but the outcome of accidental collocations of atoms; that no fire, no heroism, no intensity of thought and feeling, can preserve an individual life beyond the grave; that all the labors of the ages, all the devotion, all the inspiration, all the noonday brightness of human genius, are destined to extinction in the vast death of the solar system, and that the whole temple of Man’s achievement must inevitably be buried beneath the debris of a universe in ruins — all these things, if not quite beyond dispute, are yet so nearly certain, that no philosophy which rejects them can hope to stand."
I can empathize....I won’t go into the same old story everyone here has already heard about the night of my attempted suicide....but I can say I felt all those things.
I will go into how I felt though...it was actually on Thanksgiving....we went to my Uncle’s home down in LA and when we got back I had the thought in my mind to just be done with it all.
I drove around in my car for a while....I was definitely manic...I had no ultimate destination save to die....I was actually very calm, I had been crying off and on for a couple of hours....but when that moment came to commit the act, it was a relief in so many ways....knowing that I wouldn’t have to continue a painful, futile life.
Not that it was easy to do it...it goes against something deep inside your mind that screams for self-preservation. Physically doing that act was the easy part....it was the watching of the blood spurt out of yourself and knowing that oblivion awaits you that can both be difficult, exciting, and relieving all at once.
I actually do not remember passing out, probably since I just closed my eyes and waited for it to happen. I do admit that several times I almost attempted to get help or drive to the hospital...I think I even turned on the car once just to turn it off again.
I knew I would hurt my family by what I was doing...my Mother would be especially devastated as I believe she herself is a highly sensitive person. But the thought of continuing on in a world where the good is so incredibly outweighed by the bad....the thought of working 9-5 in the rat race....and for what, to eventually die alone in some nursing home should you make it that far....knowing that no matter what you do in this life it is ultimately worth nothing existentially, only personally, which has subjective value. And I think, as I was 19 at the time....that I really fully realized that life is suffering with fleeting moments of happiness thrown in almost just to fuck with you.
I didn’t think I had the brute force needed in me to do that....I guess I still have my days where I still wonder that. What is the purpose of it all? I do have a wonderful family...I have a job in a career that I excel in and thoroughly enjoy...Sensiko couldn’t be more of an angel...and my son Constantine is a beautiful, intelligent, and talented child. I focus on all those positive aspects of my life, but the underlying current is still there...that the bad will always outweigh the good and eventually when out sun finally explodes in several million years, everything man has done and accomplished....the art, music, philosophy created will mean nothing. (Unless of course we are space travelers by that time...which is something else I have a hard time believing....I don’t know that the human creature can last another 200 years without destroying itself)
I wouldn’t say that I am depressed, because honestly I am not...but perhaps a deep seated pessimism/realistic viewpoint has always been the underlying thought.
I don’t tell myself that everything is roses because that would just be lying to yourself....I know some people can do that...I often wonder if they are able to convince themselves somehow, or if they are just reveling in blissful ignorance? My only ray of light seems to be the thought that when we die we can leave the bullshit behind...there is either an “afterlife” or we just blink out, either one would be preferable to what we constantly endure in our lifetime. Before I cut the arteries in my arms, I had a long soul-searching one-sided discussion with “God” if he should exist....and whether me killing myself would send me to some kind of “Hell” (part of the reason I still don’t believe in Hell to this day), and the logical and emotional conclusion I came to was absolutely not. What I felt at the time was such great emotional pain that it physically hurt in an unrelenting manner....and I knew that if God was said to be even half of what his attributes are said to be that he would know what I felt, would know what was in my heart and my soul, and would never fault me for what I was about to do.
Suicide is selfish, that claim I will not deny...but a person reaches a point of internal pain, that the hurt you will cause your loved ones becomes secondary...you just want it to stop...I wrote before that it is like stepping off a ledge into the deep end of a pool and not knowing how to swim...without some sort of outside help you have gone past the point of no return...it’s a frightening step...and most of the time we are shoved...lol.
IDK...I still kind of take things day to day even now...still maybe hoping that one day there will be some great realization....some explanation that will make it all make sense. I have made the conscious decision not to kill myself, even if it makes sense to save some future absolute of hurt....I am in it for the long run...I think more out of curiosity now than anything else. Will there be a great revelation in this life as to it’s purpose....will there be after death....or will we just blink out?
Guess we will see.
I've had suicidal thoughts due to very difficult life circumstances, hormones (badly screwed up) and severe sleep deprivation or simply sheer exhaustion and overstimulation. Just me, what are your thoughts/feelings about it, and why do you ask?
P.S. And I have to add, all that "existential" stuff makes no sense whatsoever to me; I'm here, I exist, I have every right to be here, and so do you, and why does there have to be a reason? I love life, I will keep drinking it in until it's done with me. Curiousity (what really happens, anyway?) or practical reasons (i.e. I have alzheimer's and want to spare people the expense and trouble of a prolonged illness) or grief beyond what has ever happened to me, would be the only reasons I would seriously consider it.
p.p.s Actually, scratch curiousity. I'm not that impatient.
p.p.p.s (This is pathetic.) Also, I HATED being a teenager -- see "life circumstances" so it is important to note, there is an expiration date on that shit. Things really do get better, or at least they change dramatically and frequently.
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So true. For me it was clinging to beliefs about human nature that were more compatible with fantasy than real life. I couldn't live in the world anymore until I let those beliefs go. Now I am for the first time in a long time happy (and by happy I mean not suicidal). I am still an emotional basket case. But content with my emotional basket casiosity.
Real life is such a rich source of ironic humour.
Fantasies are so sterile by comparison.
I ask to amuse myself? No. Most people do not talk about it. Trying to establish a link with it and other things, really. Why do people take the lives of others when they kill themselves? Are all thoughts causal? There may be only a very small percentage of people that have suicidal thoughts that lead to tendencies; tendencies leading to actions. Reasons for the thoughts have not been touched on enough in science, medicine. Really, though: why on earth would anyone ask such a question?
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I can only speak for myself. I get depressed when I stop caring about whatever it is I'm supposed to be caring about, whether it be a relationship, work or even a hobby i'd invested in. If there isn't any silver lining to the situation, or if the future looks like it'll compound my difficulties, that depression can easily give way to suicidal thoughts. Personally I've experienced this cycle of hope -> hopelessness -> neutrality -> hope so many times that I can kind of see it coming now, so I'm better able to cope, but sometimes it still overwhelms me.
Absence of rest/sleep over several days creates a lasting challenge that can become somewhat cynical. Ever go without sleep for over three nights and days? The fourth day can become almost unbearable. Trying to stop meds one has been taking for many years for other reasons can and will complicate this situation. I actually was at the doctor today discussing this situation, so back on the meds I went. Guess what? Still cannot sleep. He seems to think when circumstances get better this may all go away. Asked me to call if I have suicidal thoughts. No tendencies, but the thoughts come and go. That is just the curious, analytical side of me, though. You can bet your sweet butt I won't, so why the worry? Why are thoughts always tangled into the nest of tendencies and actions?................................................................I've thought about walking on water before. Does that make me a nut? Never tried it................................I'd have to say human weaknesses cause the thoughts of suicide. Mental incapabilities may very well be the cause of tendencies. Giving up may be the leading cause of suicide, though I know of at least one who did it for happiness. [MENTION=1579]Odyne[/MENTION], the use of the word delusional: is that so? [MENTION=5045]Skarekrow[/MENTION], is it a cry for help or a cry from the helpless? [MENTION=1926]TinyBubbles[/MENTION], when we stop caring we are indeed in trouble. However, how can one stop caring when life has so much to offer? ..................Time to stare at the ceiling more...
Pattern thinking. When you start to feel like people are all the same, like they fit into basic equations. Or if then clauses. Fear of the future. When you don't have goals because you don't see the point in having them. Lack of change. Lack of companionship. A feeling of embarrassment. Greed, being too unthankful for what you have. Fear/laziness, fear because you might not be willing to risk changing your life, laziness because you might not be willing to put in the work to change it.
It's important to point out that laziness is mostly a symptom and not the problem itself. Often times fear causes laziness, like the fear of failure.
Then you have the meds that occasionally lead to suicide. Those things are loopy.
It's important to point out that laziness is mostly a symptom and not the problem itself. Often times fear causes laziness, like the fear of failure.
Then you have the meds that occasionally lead to suicide. Those things are loopy.