Suicide

DenMan

It is a very high number alright, especially when you look at the appalling lack of help available to the general public. There is a lot of advertising alright but a serious and woefully inept service to deal with genuine cases. I hope this improves drastically.

REPSOC1916

I've never considered it even though Ive had some awful bouts of depression. The rate in many First World countries is strangely high. At the moment in Japan there is a national crisis regarding suicide. There simply isn't enough help besides the Samaritans (who are doing a first rate job in my opinion).

Dave!

Anyone know what the rate of suicide is in say, some of the poorer countries in Africa? I'd be curious to know if it is as prevalent

Dudess

Interestingly, suicide rates appear to drop during wartime. This is considered to be due to people rallying around each other.

hunter164

Well wouldn't a lot of males go into war though?And so it would drop.

kowloon

Dudess wrote: »

Interestingly, suicide rates appear to drop during wartime. This is considered to be due to people rallying around each other.

By over 60% in WW2, same goes for divorce.

helimachoptor

I think everyone has at some stage thought about ending it, sometimes things arent going great.

The person could go onto the web and research ways of doing it, usually involving pills etc. As said above they could be driving along and thing if i kept going instead of taking this upcomign bend it'd all be over..

I think we had access to guns over here suicide would be a lot higher.

Personally I've half thought about it not in a serious way. I mean if i killed myself now, how long would people think about me etc.

My own view is its not a cowardly thing to do. I mean ENDING your own life takes a person with stiff resolution. I couldnt do it.

For example autocide, you could end up paralysed instead of dead.
Shooting/pills/bloodloss you could end up a vegetable I couldnt end up like that.

I've known a couple of people over my lifetime that have done it, thankfully no one too close. 2 guys and both over girls when I was younger.

Views on this subject will always conflict and there will be tension. At the end of the day there are always people left to pick up the pieces likes Mairts wife or the family of the JC girl.

my 2cents

kowloon

helimachoptor wrote: »

I think we had access to guns over here suicide would be a lot higher.

We do, 250,000 of them, not including all the unlicensed ones, of which there are many. Gun suicide is very rare here.

beautiation

Dudess wrote: »

Interestingly, suicide rates appear to drop during wartime. This is considered to be due to people rallying around each other.

That is interesting. I wonder if it's because depressed people keep themselves going by thinking "once this war is over, everything's gonna be better". One of the main things that drive peeps to suicide is the feeling that nothing will ever change.

kowloon

beautiation wrote: »

That is interesting. I wonder if it's because depressed people keep themselves going by thinking "once this war is over, everything's gonna be better". One of the main things that drive peeps to suicide is the feeling that nothing will ever change.

Nothing like a crisis or an enemy to keep us going. I always enjoyed having a nemesis, don't at the moment, the position's open.

Reku

beautiation wrote: »

That is interesting. I wonder if it's because depressed people keep themselves going by thinking "once this war is over, everything's gonna be better". One of the main things that drive peeps to suicide is the feeling that nothing will ever change.

Or perhaps simply they enlist, afterall you die getting shot by someone else it's not a sin, kill yourself and you're f*cked for all eternity is pretty central to most religions. Casualties of war, regardless of whether they just ran out in to the open screaming "shoot me, shoot me!" would not be listed as suicides.

Something people also need to keep in mind regarding the statistics on suicide are that:
1. there will be the attention seekers who fake a suicide attempt pushing up the figures for suicide attempts.

2. unless they actually need medical assistance as a result of it I don't imagine most people who attempt to kill themselves would seek any afterwards, and those who do undoubtedly lie about how it happened so as to avoid the stigma that is attached to being someone who attempted suicide.
I tried many times and methods but there is absolutely no record of it on any medical form or anything as I did not need any medical assistance.

3. In non-first world countries there is probably not the money to pay people to seek the true cause of death in every instance, as such many suicides are probably not listed as such.

As such the figures collected in these studies of suicide rates are very much just approximate ballpark figures.

RubyXI

beautiation wrote: »

That is interesting. I wonder if it's because depressed people keep themselves going by thinking "once this war is over, everything's gonna be better". One of the main things that drive peeps to suicide is the feeling that nothing will ever change.

Very true. It's very hard to accept that your life won't get better. Speaking from experience.

omb0wyn5ehpij9

I'm suprised by the poll results.....a lot more people have tried it or comtemplated it than i thought would have

Call Me Jimmy

Dudess wrote: »

Interestingly, suicide rates appear to drop during wartime. This is considered to be due to people rallying around each other.

That's a bit crazy, I was just thinking about this recently. How even though I would do nothing else, if our nation's back was against the wall and we had to go fight a war I'm pretty sure I would do it with enthusiasm. Strange... I'm pretty sure I know why though, personally.

Piste

Heh I was going to write a long-ish reply to Mairt but I think a few ppeople have already said what I was going to. I stand by what I said when I said that throwing yourself in front of a DART or Train is selfish, you're forcing innocent people who have nothing to do with you to witness a violent death- yopu could scar people for life.

I only did my Junior Cert two years ago and will be doing my Leaving Cert next year so I am fully aware of the stresses exam students go through, I would have to say that the girl who killed herself last year is definitely the exception, very few JC students experience anywhere near that level of stress.

I also disagree that a 15 year old has no idea what they're doing when they throw themselves under a train/DART, they're fully aware that the trian or DART will be full of people, if they have no regard for those people then it is just plain selfishness.

There are many ways of killing yourself, why choose the one that hurts the most people?

Call Me Jimmy

I would say some people can't necessarily think of a way to kill themselves that will ensure death AND is something they can bring themselves to do. You could say hang themselves, but they mightn't have any idea how to do it right. Jump off a cliff (have to deal with the act of falling first) etc. So something sudden and definate like a train could be appealing to people who are suicidal. If they feel like it's the only way they can do it then I'm not sure I would say it's selfish.

gavrilo princip

I was gonna give it a go on saturday night, but changed my mind.

It's quite interesting thinking back about the thoughts that go through your head at the time.

Trev M

TerrorFirmer wrote: »

Where's the need to get so rude and thick? Junior Cert students are not small children. They are young adults - perfectly capable of knowing the consequences of any actions they might take. I fully agree with Piste - it's a terrible thing to consider taking your own life but doing it in a manner that affects and scars far more innocent people then is necessary is selfish. We were all Junior Cert students at some stage, and 99% of us pass it without looking back. Sure, people have killed themselves over the most trivial of things - but it doesn't mean that the things they killed themselves over are inherently to blame in any way. A young girl who takes her own life over not getting the best grades possible is totally deviant; trying to imply Piste has no idea of the stress students are under over her comment is plain ignorance.

Have to agree with the last reply there.

My own personal opinion is that its not acceptable to "normalise" junior cert stress as a reason for suicide.

Think about it - a kid loses her life because her junior cert results werent "good enough" ? WTF is that?

Its not ok to say "the poor kids are sooo stressed out" .... life is bigger than the f*ckin junior cert..

I must add of course what a terrible tragedy it is for the family, and of course I sympathize

helimachoptor

kowloon wrote: »

We do, 250,000 of them, not including all the unlicensed ones, of which there are many. Gun suicide is very rare here.

So 1 in 16 people has a gun.. I'm honestly shocked...

kowloon

helimachoptor wrote: »

So 1 in 16 people has a gun.. I'm honestly shocked...

Well there are quite a few people with more than one gun, a lot of sports shooters compete in more than one discipline. Skews the figures somewhat.
I wouldn't get worried about the legally held ones anyway, they just get all the attention because the authorities are too inept to do anything about the guns coming in with the drugs and the likes.
Anyway, my point is; the fact that gun suicides don't form a significant proportion of total suicides is not down to lack of availability.

Mr Benevolent

I have a single suggestion which helped me a lot.

Have a listen to this stuff.

http://www.richardbandler.tv/freeplay.php?soundid=8989uiuytq

There's a lot of videos etc that he's done, they're great too. Helped me over some low times. Five minutes of listening makes a big difference.

As another poster mentioned, suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem.

Dudess

Piste wrote: »

throwing yourself in front of a DART or Train is selfish, you're forcing innocent people who have nothing to do with you to witness a violent death- yopu could scar people for life.

And worse again, you're shifting responsibility for your death on to the driver.

There are many ways of killing yourself, why choose the one that hurts the most people?

And possibly putting another person in a psychiatric ward and at risk of killing themselves...

benzogirl

What's the big deal aout suicide anyway? We will all die anyway. I lost my sister to suicide last year, she was 25. It was a huge shock when i heard the news, but I don't think it was selfish. everyone has the right to die. if you dont like living what the heck are you supposed to do? live another 50-60 years just to spare someone else's feelings? the people that expect someone to stay here and suffer just for them are the selfish ones.

Suicide is not chosen, suicide occurs when you become deprived of your coping mechanisms.

Bob the Builder

benzogirl wrote: »

What's the big deal aout suicide anyway? We will all die anyway. I lost my sister to suicide last year, she was 25. It was a huge shock when i heard the news, but I don't think it was selfish. everyone has the right to die. if you dont like living what the heck are you supposed to do? live another 50-60 years just to spare someone else's feelings? the people that expect someone to stay here and suffer just for them are the selfish ones.

personally, i agree with you on the right to die thing, but i lost two good friends(both aged 15) to suicide within one week of each other last february, and i think society should never allow it to happen that people find that this is the only way out...

moe_sizlak

i suffer from depression since 1998 , there was a cataclysmic event that yr which triggered my downfall and i believe that everyone who encounters depression in there life does so due to experiencing an event that is the straw that breaks the camels back , i dont believe you just wake up one day and its there

i grew up in a very dysfunctional family due to the fact that one of my parents was a weak parent and one of my sibblings is seriously disturbed due to an accident when they were young ,the weak parent often blamed me for my sibblings behaviour as they were too inadequate to deal with it themselves , i fought this dysfunctionality and refused to let it grind me down and was able to stay possitive for the most part throughout my teens
i decided to leave home and head overseas when i hit 20 , unfortunatly i had an experience overseas at the hands of someone that was more traumatic than any i had experienced in my family life , i returned home not long afterwards a failure and that was when everything came crashing down around me and i never saw the world in the same LIGHT again , much as i tried i have never been able to get over the depression , it has changed me , so much so that i often genuinly think about trackng down the person who caused my downfall, i think about them every day even though i havent met them in 10 yrs and know they have forgotten me ,i often think about tracking them down even though i dont know where they are now but then i come to my senses and i realise that even i did track them down , i could never exact revenge upon them enough so as to redress what they have done to me
i think its important that people tread carefully and take care as to not to walk on others , some people due to certain life experiences are very fragile and can easily be broken, you dont want to be the one who broke the camels back

jackbutler

i used to think about it a lot when i had mental issues.

not really anymore, i'm not one of those people who keeps saying " i love my life" but i don't have a reason to be suicidal at the moment, its all good :]

moe_sizlak

moe_sizlak wrote: »

i suffer from depression since 1998 , there was a cataclysmic event that yr which triggered my downfall and i believe that everyone who encounters depression in there life does so due to experiencing an event that is the straw that breaks the camels back , i dont believe you just wake up one day and its there

i grew up in a very dysfunctional family due to the fact that one of my parents was a weak parent and one of my sibblings is seriously disturbed due to an accident when they were young ,the weak parent often blamed me for my sibblings behaviour as they were too inadequate to deal with it themselves , i fought this dysfunctionality and refused to let it grind me down and was able to stay possitive for the most part throughout my teens
i decided to leave home and head overseas when i hit 20 , unfortunatly i had an experience overseas at the hands of someone that was more traumatic than any i had experienced in my family life , i returned home not long afterwards a failure and that was when everything came crashing down around me and i never saw the world in the same LIGHT again , much as i tried i have never been able to get over the depression , it has changed me , so much so that i often genuinly think about trackng down the person who caused my downfall, i think about them every day even though i havent met them in 10 yrs and know they have forgotten me ,i often think about tracking them down even though i dont know where they are now but then i come to my senses and i realise that even i did track them down , i could never exact revenge upon them enough so as to redress what they have done to me
i think its important that people tread carefully and take care as to not to walk on others , some people due to certain life experiences are very fragile and can easily be broken, you dont want to be the one who broke the camels back

I can relate to a lot of what you said. It was the end of 1999 for me and yes it was also a certain event which triggered it.

Saint Patrick

Moe, I am so sorry to hear of your situation and I hope you are getting some kind of help. Please don't read this and say "i've heard it all before, i don't need help". If you didn't why would you write what you did to total strangers. I carry the guilt of a friend's suicide in that i feel i could have done so much more to prevent it. But then i HAVE to think, but so many others could have helped as well and are they carrying the same guilt?? Take care of yourself and let go of this issue with getting revenge on someone who now, after ten years, is a stranger to you! Talk to someone!

Wagon

If im diagnosed with terminal illness, then off i go. No point ****ing sitting on your hole waiting for it to happen :pac: Keep the adventure going!

midlandsmissus

Susannahmia wrote: »

No way life has it's up's and downs. It might really suck for a period but with time ones circumstances could be completly different. One of the most selfish acts imaginable imo, could never do that to my loved ones.

It is selfish, in that you are thinking of yourself, but it is not selfish in that your own suffering is so horrific and unbearable it literally overrides the thought of anyone else's suffering. You cant think straight and All you want is the unending torment to stop.

You are not thinking of anyone else, you can't think of anyone else your pain is so great. You're not thinking straight and you are basically very sick, so it is sad really and not selfish.

I attempted suicide twice last year after being viciously assaulted. I woke up every single day thinking 'I don't want to live this life, I never wanted to live a life where Ive been raped' , every second of the day I had flashbacks, was terrified of everything and couldn't escape my 'dirty' body. I had no second of joy in any second of any day, it was horrible and exhausting and I didnt want to live this life.

Thankfully I am finally getting better, and seeing a bit of happiness in life again, but as I didn't tell lot of people what happened to me, imagine how many young people this might have happened to who couldn't talk about it and ended up killing themselves?

Rape and sexual assault is the worst thing that can ever happen to anyone - it is mental torture.

So it is not selfish. You never know what people are going through.

donegal_road

Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training (ASSIST) is a two-day interactive workshop in suicide first-aid. It is suitable for all kinds of caregivers - health workers, teachers, community workers, Gardai, youth workers, volunteers, people responding to family, friends and co-workers.

I know several people who have done this course and tel me it is great. Im am planning on doing it myself soon.

El Weirdo

Okay, I'm locking this thread as people are replying to posts made 3/4 years ago. If you want a more recent thread on the subject, then there is DeV's thread on depression here.

neilr4 - Please don't drag up old threads to spam the same message over and over. I understand that your intentions are good but it would be preferred if you picked the most recent relevant thread and posted there.

I am going to move your post into DeV's thread and delete the others.