You didn't offend me in any way. I don't see anything wrong with what I said. I am obviously against suicide for ANY reason.

And believe me I know what I'm talking about because 8 years go I was on the phone speaking with a rep on a suicide hotline trying to get someone, ANYBODY to my son's apartment (in another state) because he kept saying he wanted to kill himself. He was 20. He was depressed. (or so I thought)

I finally convinced someone on the other end to send a crisis team to his apartment only to find him perfectly fine, laughing and over whatever mood he was in.

I know what's it like to hear your son say "I am going to kill myself", then to be up at 3 a.m. trying to convince someone at the other end of the phone to take me seriously. One suicide hotline volunteer actually had the audacity to tell me "we don't who you are, you could be a hitman or something".

My son did this 5 night in a row. I remember moving furniture around because I thought I would have family members over the next day to mourn my son.

Five nights in a row, I did the suicide hotline thing because I had to take him seriously, didn't I??? Five nights they found him fine. They flagged him in their system as a malingerer.

He thought it was funny. I do not, have not, and never will find this funny at all.

It practically destroyed me and my husband. My son cried suicide in 26 cities, getting off buses, calling 911 and saying he would kill himself, just so a crisis team would pick him up and give him a place to stay. He always got picked up. He told me "hey, whatever works"

Went through this for a long time.

I no longer go through this. I will not.

I just came on this forum to give support, to engage in serious discussion and really, if I offended anyone with my analogy, it was not my intent.

I think you know this.

Melody

Hello, Melody: "Soylent Green" -- I saw it 30 years ago or so, and never, never, never forgot the scene you refer to: the beautiful movie of landscapes and seascapes and classical music. You don't know what the Robinson character is going to do -- just go to a movie? If I remember correctly, he is the only one in the place; all the other seats are empty -- which makes his isolation all the more, well, isolated. Someday that option will exist for people: you mentioned "other countries." In Switzerland there are several groups working on it (Dignitas and Exit), but they are in the preliminary stages. Dignitas is very controversial for letting foreigners in, as well as people who are not suffering from incurable diseases.

Anyway, Robinson makes a POWERFUL portrayal, the kind that exists only in art (not rational exposes like mine), the kind I hope Dave and others will work up into the ultimate drama of what a suicidal person thinks and feels -- "To be or not to be: that is the question." Yes, it is THE question, especially for those who deny it. I, too, by the way, had rough treatment in a hospital and by people around me after my attempt: the best line to give such people may be: "Who are you talking to? Me or you?"

There must be some way...
 

Hello, David: Thanks for yours. Your new avatar looks raring to go. Where, will that's the question. They're saying now that climate change killed off the mamouths. If so, then, it was one degree at a time over thousands of years.

I don't think anybody here advocates suicide. Please note in the neurotalk instructions that illegal acts are not to be encouraged -- and suicide is illegal. Indeed, I rigorously oppose it for that young person just out of college, who is in good health but unemployed and can't find a job, whose parents divorce, etc. (Exactly my circumstances, by the way). Yes, if that person willingly kills himself, he commits suicide. Again, though, not everybody who kills himself or herself commits suicide, such as the people who jumped to their deaths from the burning Twin Towers. What are we to say to or about such people? Don't do it? Don't jump?

I also agree with you that ANY self-imposed death is a tragedy. I worked in a large county hospital as a college student, and saw some amazing cases. It was there that I started thinking that someone who physically suffers and has no chance (as far as anybody knows) of getting better, who "takes his own life," who "lets go," has not committed some sort of sin or should be legally punished. I will never forget going to the men's room, washing my hands, looking down and seeing ... a pool of blood flow from someone in a locked stall. A patient was cutting his wrists with a razor blade. I remember thinking, My God -- THERE MUST BE SOME WAY TO STOP THIS SORT OF THING!!!! A human being, reduced to that... i still have that same thought today, over 40 years later.

LOL! Well I never saw that before Tom but I won't "bore" you with how so many people here sent me frogs...thinking that I collected them...I didn't but guess I do now because I can't throw them out...*grin

That really is darling...http://www.youtube.com/watch#!v=I45u...eature=related

*whisper...old wallpaper backing off..tomorrow will begin the new! :grouphug:

Perspective on Hope
 

So Tom, et al-

Once physically wrecked, career in ruins, money running out our doors, pain overwhelming with no end in sight, I actually did ponder whether I could end things in January 2007. January 2007. Oh, God, how I hurt so much. Pain, a neverending sorrow pit, where self pity seemed to drive me to consider whether family, friends, and others would welcome an end to my version of grief. The Hell in which I knew existence.

I had purchased a shotgun some many years ago. Never fired. The wreck prevented my return to the range, where among my skills expert marksmanship was a reality. I pondered.... wondered.... do you suppose? Would my finger reach if I, well, you know, did the mouth thing? I was alone. Everyone else for whom I cared was away, blessedly for them, because my agony was so severe. I managed to make it to the gun safe [one must keep such elements of harm safe, you know?]. Pulled out this item. Placed all body parts in order, JUST to see, could I reach.... after all, the barrel was and is part of a stock long action. Oh, and I am remiss... in failing to mention this weapon was and is an automatic.

Assuming the position, not looking over my shoulder for God, because I did not want His input at that moment, and this was only a test after all, I placed mouth to oiled barrel, finger to the guard and reached to see would it touch. It did. Click.

I, despite being so expert, and distraught at my plight, had failed the safety check to determine was the weapon truly unloaded [none loaded are kept in home even in a safe]. Click. That was the loudest and yet among softest sounds my ears had ever registered. Click. Just once. Had a shell been in chamber, that would have been "all she wrote." Click. Frightened out of my wits, I returned the now proven empty weapon to the safe and locked all away and out of sight.

Then I cried. I had not really wanted to end things. Sure, I had contemplated, but not PLANNED. Click. So glad God was watching over my shoulder that night.... that lonely night. Then I prayed.

Writing and reaching out to others became the thrust and emphasis of my being from that moment forward. I was put here for purpose, and not my own destruction, but to help others in seeing Hope swells out of the deep and out of the dark.

Click.

Thus, I plan for the talk I will deliver on Wednesday, day after tomorrow. Among the thoughts I will share are two poems which I believe God to have laid on my heart inspirationally. They follow, for you and for whomever else may be in any nearness to contemplation of an end of life scenario. A little thought never hurt anyone did it?!

Perspective
MRidder 20090712

Truly I have wondered
and prayed….
God would leave me ill..….
For in this, through this,
He may teach me to depend on Him,
depend on Him alone.

Now this piece comes two and a half years after my lonely appointment with an empty automatic shotgun. I actually found I was contemplating, Lord, how about you do not make me whole again so I might find the strength through you to be fully dependent and through this to help others. Next a piece I wrote only weeks ago and it dwells on hope...... that means to reach to another with spark in the eye and share that there is a mission perhaps not yet accomplished by them on this plane.

Out of Darkness, Hope
M Ridder
20100801

In the deep of my heart
a place filled with pain
a place, oh, so lonely,
may I reach out again?
To languish alone there
the light very dim
it seemed all steps forward
were aching and grim.
So easy the choice
could have been to remain
awash in self pity
alone still again.
Yet God in His great love
remained by my side.
He captured the sense
of this innermost plight.
The touch of His hand
burning clear to my soul;
redemption, salvation
shone light in this hole.
His fingers He wrapped
firmly ‘round pain filled heart
and cradled me near Him,
His sacrifice hard,
yet given His love,
price He paid there for me,
through darkness He reached
and with Hope set me free.

Thus, Tom, you see I have been deep in the throes of darkness where life seemed all but a flame awaiting extinguishment, no really just an ember at the end of the wick, for hope was missing, and the flame already mere memory, a wisp of smoke gone the way of fire no more. God was there in my hopelessness of darkness and brought me so far back from the edge of the precipice so far into the light that I could not fail to live that hope for tomorrow, the hope through which I have been set free.

Sorry you cannot make it to Golden, Colorado on Wednesday at 1:00 Tom, for I would gladly share myself in whatever way might be meaningful to help you catch a glimpse of hope.

Wanna shake your hand anyway, my friend; in this plane and not waiting until the next.:hug:
Mark56:)

P.S. while I might be willing to explore discourse with you whether Christ on the cross was a surrender to something very much for the saving grace of others as opposed to mere end of life scenario, I am unwilling to do that in cyber land. Should you desire to pursue it, we gotta meet face to face. No exceptions.

Dear Mark

you really do write beautifully. i wonder if you have ever considered writing a book - it would be a good one. anyway, thank you for sharing yourself and your gift here. :hug:

Dear Tom

sending hugs :hug::hug::hug:

~ waves ~

Dear Tom

thank you for this. i have seen the cartoon before (recognized it as soon as it opened up) but had not realized it was Alffe's frog!!! anyway, watching that again made me smile. thank you for that. :)

regarding the suicide v.s. taking your own life dilemma, and the one is right and one is wrong, forgive me if i sound harsh, but it sounds to me no different than any of the other rationalizations one makes when suicidal. semantics are ready tools to twist logic into a shape that suits our purpose. in these cases, the whole 'purpose' is primarily that of dying sooner rather than later.

when i was planning i had figured out a way by which i was not going to hell... mind you, this isn't about religious credences or spiritual consequences, this is just about logical processes and rationalizations.

my logic, as to how i was not going to hell, worked similarly to your theory that choosing to take your life is not always suicide, and specifically, that it would not be suicide in your case. i would suggest to you that the only reason you "need" this theory, is that you "need" to make a distinction. because you don't believe suicide is ok, and yet you feel the lure to it. if you can find a way to construe suicide as not-suicide, then, you've made it ok. but have you really? because you wouldn't be going through these mental gymnastics at all, if you REALLY felt what you were doing were ok.

purpose, something everyone else on this thread has talked about. and indeed the point. is your purpose to die, now? that's it? what purpose is there in that, other than to end suffering? surely a different purpose can be found - a living purpose.

i can tell you, i have not found a purpose for myself yet. i am not in the dire circumstances you are, but i have at other times gone through extensive planning... to expire. i now just keep going, waiting for things to change. i see too that, even if they do not change, my life touches that of others in small ways. and i realize, that sometimes, those small ways might be big or might turn out much bigger than i'll ever know.

my purpose is to live and to try, even in small ways, consistent with my situation and abilities, to make the world better than it would be without me. better for others and for myself as well. it's more about the process, than the result. but i've seen that others who try often have good results, even if they are not the results they set out for.

i want to suggest to you that this is everyone's purpose... yours too.

you have a beautiful mind Tom, i can see that quite clearly. i don't believe its purpose is to die just yet.

~ waves ~

correct, this discussion doesn't belong in Alffe's thread... but i wanted to reply just briefly to what you said, and doing so in the same thread as your post seemed logical... but yes, not appropriate to continue conversation there. (so, i've placed this response in your thread, i hope that is ok.)

and yes, i did mis-state your take on anger... its part in the equation. good that you acknowledge anger, my point was more about how you interpreted Alffe's post, and that your anger, perhaps incompletely acknowledged influenced your interpretation.

basically, i felt it was not Alffe to be sensing projected or (more the case of experiencing someone else's emotions) introjected anger at all. i felt, in your confusing Alffe's post, that you could be projecting your own anger onto Michael's act... onto Alffe's account of the events.

and of course this is a psychological digression, as was yours. you did wonder if it was revealing, and my notions on your own anger came to my mind as soon as i read that, before even reading your interpretation on Alffe. i am sorry if you found my post offensive. it was not intended to be. it is just an observation... a possibility. perhaps food for thought?

i am truly sorry if i overstepped bounds.

~ waves ~

Hello, Mark: we may have more in common that either of us ever expected. I, too, was an expert marksman (in the NRA). I haven't owned a gun since I was 16. After I had my share of 50s (no "cheater" needed), my eyes changed; had to wear glasses; well, so much for my blue ribbon phase. I can't go hunting; even after all these years, poor beast ain't got a prayer, so where's the "sport" in that? I don't need food that badly.

Even back then, I gazed down the barrel, wondering what was down there... What would happen if... You say you had contemplated but hadn't planned. Maybe in my case, my desire was in one place, my INTEREST in another.

Love the way your poem ends, with hope from God setting you free. In Pandora's box, the only thing that was left was hope; everything else flew out once the box was opened. So, hope from God is literally making the best of a bad situation. Jew-Jitsu, at its very best.

You live in a beautiful part of the world (my brother lived in Ft. Collins, I've been to Colorado many times). Don't move, Marc. None of ya, Golden folks: don't move.

Let us know how your talk went. Even though, I think, we already know...

Tom

Hello, Mark: Waves has picked up on your writing ability. Now, if we can just get you and David together...

Don't fight it out: write it out!

Tom

Hello, Waves: I want to thank you for your insightful and challenging note.

Ah, yes, the question of rationalization... Is that all I am doing? I doubt everything I write and think; I doubt even my own doubt about everything I write and think -- even these words right now.

You cut to the chase: isn't all this really a matter of getting it over with sooner rather than later? I just got back from the post office and the bank and the grocery store, an hour or so in all; through it all, I found myself on the verge of being out of breath, having to rest, feeling pains, rigid, my muscles being "boarded up" for what? An approaching hurricane? When does this end? When? I just wrote in my calendar: "I want to end the end, before the end ends me." If that is what I am rationalizing, then so be it. I look out onto the horizon: I see myself incapacitated, unable to enjoy life's simplest pleasures like going for a walk in the woods. Every task, every move (getting out of bed), is more and more a burden -- which makes me a burden to everybody else. Such is the objective reality I believe I am facing. And so...

Regarding suicide versus "taking one's own life" -- the problem is, the latter can never be entirely free of the former. Even Jesus -- the maximum case of a non-suicide, take (in his case "give")-your-own-life death -- cried out on the cross: maybe, just maybe, God had foresaken him. Anger? Despair? Sounds to me like he doubted everything, even his suffering; maybe literally, in the end, for a split second, he just wanted to die sooner rather than later.

Looking into this further: I suspect that the seed of suicide is planted very early, certainly in childhood if not infancy. It is the child's way to strike back at the parents; what other weapon does the child have other than to say I'll show you; you'll regret it when I'm dead. So, maybe suicide is a sort of self-defense mechanism; after all, in every other way the adults are physically so much stronger, the child doesn't stand a chance against them. Anyway, from there the seed develops in many different ways, but the original trappings are never entirely lost. And so, as we look at the elderly people in the 4corners tape who desire to end their own lives, all very rational and calm and understandable, STILL there is that grain of anger, of childish anger. I think it's there inside me; I just don't want it to control things.

Where we MAY differ, I'm not sure: I don't think when we die there is anything "back there." I am not religious in that sense. Heaven, hell, limbo: I'm not convinced they exist. Ergo, I don't need to justify taking my life in order to go to one place and not the other. In any event, nobody can convince me the 200 people who jumped to their deaths in the burning World Trade Center committed suicide, committed some sort of sin. And what of somebody who is burning to death from an incurable disease? Or, what if the burn is tolerable, only barely so? Lots of degradations in there.

Finally, waves, you note you look for a purpose -- helping others -- your "life touches others." Indeed, there is no taking that back. They say there are no absolutes; however, it is absolutely true that a given moment cannot be relived. If you help someone, you help that person; that fact can NEVER be taken away. It is there, and absolutely so. And so...I see no recourse but to try to make the most of our moments while we can. Unfortunately, I don't see how being a physical burden to other people fits into that plan. Maybe it does; I don't see how. Not yet, at any rate.

Keep making waves, Waves.

Hugs to you, too. Oceans of 'em.

Tom

Hello, Waves: no bounds were overstepped, no offense anywhere in sight -- and then some.

You raise a valid point, that's all: when do we, in trying to help others, project onto them our own traits (usually negative, but not always), thereby muddling up the picture even further? The unconscious is such a tricky thing; in fact, Jung notes, one of its archetypes is the trickster figure, the guy inside you that makes you say something stupid or hurtful that you didn't really "mean," that makes you lose your carkeys, that makes you make stupid typos in important manuscripts -- the list, apparently, never ends.

Bestest to you, waves. You're forming some beautiful beaches.

Hot off the press -- of Wikipedia, that is. This is their article on "Rational Suicide."

"Rational suicide is the reason-guided decision to end one's life, specifically, when these reasons are the result of an indifferent or temperate weighing of pros and cons. It has been argued that a suicide can be rational and still nonetheless be a mistake.[1] Rational suicide is sometimes viewed as a subjective concept; Jerome Motto writes, "What may be an inconvenience, a source of discomfort, or an embarrassment to one person represents unbearable agony, excruciating pain, or intolerable humiliation to another."[2] One study of mental health counselors found that 80% of respondents were moderately supportive of the idea that people can make well-reasoned decisions that death is their best option.[3] It is believed that in coming years clinicians will increasingly be confronted by patients declaring their intention to exercise their right-to-suicide or to commit what they describe as a rational suicide.[4] The “received orthodoxy” of mental health professionals for more than a century views all suicides as irrational and holds that suicidal persons should always be prevented from ending their own lives.[5]"

My immediate reaction: "indifferent or temperate weighing of pros and cons." Sorry, I don't see how when your life is at stake, you can be "indifferent." As for "temperate," maybe that's in the eye of the beholder: someone may SOUND termperate (including me) and maybe truly think they are, when in reality it is their unconscious that is running the show, and all their quaint rationalization is so much window-dressing.

I think there is, as Waves point out, a semantic problem. What is "suicide," anyway? Merriam Webster Dictionary: "The act or an instance of taking one's own life voluntarily and intentionally especially by a person of years of discretion and of sound mind." Sorry, that sounds counter-intuitive to me: a 20-something who is depressed and unemployed, gets drunk and shoots himself, commits suicide. Of course the word "especially" creates a fudge-factor, so I don't know what that definition is saying in the end, if anything.

Here's another definition, from the Medical Dictionary: "The act of causing one's own death." Simple, no? In fact, too simple. Sorry, but the 200 people who leaped from the burning Twin Towers thereby caused their own deaths; however, they did not commit suicide. The latter is the official government ruling, by the way. I can see how the insurance companies would love the Medical Dictionary's hopelessly broad definition; usually, they don't have to pay out if a death is officially ruled a "suicide."

Well, I suspect much of the problem is there -- what is "suicide" in the first place? All the existing definitions I have seen are inadequate in one way or another. Note carefully: serious economic concerns, notably insurance companies, and megabucks are in play in forming such definitions ("organic" and "poverty" are two others), so watch out!

Trying to look at the question on a "pure" level: my gut hunch tells me that Websters has it upside down -- that "rational suicide" is an oxymoron, i.e., somebody who takes their life rationally does NOT commit suicide. "Intention," "voluntary," well, such words keep popping up. There's something to them, but they haven't come together to form a coherent definition -- not yet. Until they do, we literally "don't know what we are talking about."

I suspect we're looking at a "syndrome," literally a group of things "running together." Not all of them need to be present to have a "suicide."

A lack of Perceived choice is all that's required

Or maybe a clouded perception of the choices

may be its fee will after all.....in all of its frailties....

free will has no age barrier.............


Suicide, Euthanasia, Ending personal life what ever you call it, the later being a word used to dress up the former, to make it appear warranted or acceptable

Tom the 200 that jumped off the world trade centre..were murdered........kamikaze pilots were murders.....suicide bombers...murderers.....

The point is suicide is an act of independently taking of one life.... your own.....

Was the guy at WAKO Texas a spiritual leader or did he advocate mass murder [forcing his congregation to kill themselves]

Euthanasia.........is there already...........just stop taking meds, help, care......have a DNR card.....even a nil by mouth card.......join the Jehovah's witness and Carry no blood card.................its already out there


Clinics helping euthanasia........are they good bad...evil....helpers or just those who assist in death therefore is it assisted suicide or assisted murder............

David

just debating and nothing else

The Twin Towers

maybe i am just ignorant... maybe there is someone who survived to tell the tale and the thought processes of the 200 people who jumped out of the burning, crumbling twin towers? but since i have not read any such account, i am left to speculate. i think that is what others are doing also, but if that is not the case, and someone has a more direct account, i'd like to hear it.

so, my "impression" of what happened is this:

building on fire. things crashing burning all over the place. fight or flight response. you can't fight what is happening. flight takes over:

furthermore, i doubt that the folks who jumped sat there to contemplate their odds. i do not think they "preferred" to "shorten their lives" by a few minutes, over accepting an agonizing death being burned fumigated or crushed.

i believe they simply, instinctively, RAN AWAYYYY from death!!! nothing more. and the windows were the only place they could run, period.

inside = fire heat smoke and falling ceilings walls flying rubble metal glass etc.

outside = clear, clean air

WHICH SEEMS MORE LIFE-PROMOTING????

and if anyone did have the time/presence of mind to stop and think... they'd have to think, if i stay here i die. if i jump, i have a small chance of surviving possibly as a paraplegic or whatever but SURVIVING. and who knows a truck carrying bales of hay might drive by at just the right time....

i believe those people intended to LIVE to the best of their ability, and FLED FROM DEATH, no more no less. and as such, no! of course they did not commit suicide!!!!

-------------------

Suicide, definition, connotation, culture, "ok-ness"

i believe the medical dictionary is accurate, missing only the word "intention" - suicide is intentionally causing one's own death. FOR WHATEVER REASON. Harakiri is Japanese ritual suicide... it is considered noble in that culture... it is still considered suicide. our notion of honor does not involve killing oneself.

Tom if you feel killing yourself is reasonable, then what does it matter if it is called suicide or taking your own life? my previous comments, about rationalization, had nothing to do with religious concerns - sorry if that threw you off. i only made a case example that happened to involved concerns with the afterlife but it makes no difference. even a staunch atheist can have strong feelings against suicide. it is only natural.

what is clear to me, is you have some serious "concerns" with suicide. you seem to be driven to prove that taking your own life isn't suicide. and wanting to dissociate self-killing that "makes sense" from suicide. i interpret this drive as being founded on a basic belief of the contrary: that deep down you abhor the idea of suicide... and you need to call what you want to do something else... so you won't be doing something you abhor. but the words won't save you. the act is the same. yes, your reasons for desiring to end life are more concrete than those of a 20-year old in the throes of depression. that doesn't mean it should be "called" something else.

the fact that you can't deal with the word - i think that needs to give you a big clue that there is a hefty and i daresay HEALTHY resistance to causing-death, in you... your survival instinct manifesting itself.

~ waves ~

so well put, David, thank you.

Great conversations between you three...and I don't hear any doors (minds) slamming shut! :D

Hello, David:
Is euthanasia murder? I've looked up numerous definitions of "murder." The thing they all have in common is that murder is an ILLEGAL act. In Switzerland, there is no law against euthanasia; therefore, it is not murder. We cannot apply our legal perspective to them and say "You're wrong! What you're doing is murder!" -- or vice-versa. Similarly, in the vast majority of U.S. states, euthanasia is illegal; therefore, in those states, euthanasia is murder. (I'm not sure about Oregon, hence my wording). So, "murder" is a socially-defined act; there is no "murder" outside of legal definitions.

In brief, what is "murder" in one place is not "murder" in another. That's the way it is.

Suicide is a more complicated matter. It has dimensions outside of any known legal framework.

You bring up a vital element: choice. "Lack of a perceived choice." Or, "a clouded perception of the choices." I'd argue the 200 people who leaped from the burning Twin Towers had no choice -- not a real one (burning to death or jumping to your death: what kind of REAL choice is that?). Those people, as you say, did not commit suicide; they were murdered. NO CHOICE = nonsuicide.

O.K., what about the person in pain suffering from an incurable disease? Sure, the "fire" surrounding that person is different that that of the Twin Towers -- but it's still a fire. Again, what are we to say to such people? Don't do anything drastic -- wait? (By the way, that's what the people in the Twin Towers were told). I think the 20-something depressed guy has choices not available to the 80-year-old dying of cancer. The fact that the former doesn't see any of the REAL choices available to him, means that if he kills himself, he commits suicide; he has a "clouded perception of the choices."

In short, the person who commits suicide has choices/options/alternatives (even if he cannot see them); the 80-year-old with a crippling disease, who decides not to eat food or drink water, "takes his own life." I mention the latter case because a good friend of my family did exactly that.

Just a few thought clouds ... as in the comic books ... nothing more.

Back to you.

Tom

http://neurotalk.psychcentral.com/sh...sisted+suicide...

and then there is this..http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontl...etourist/view/

Tom

Strapping semtex to your body and sitting on a tube train killing others is deemed an honourable act in some parts of the world.......does it make it right. They still call it suicide..[bomber].......

Euthanasia definition:
The practice of killing a human being or animal for humane reasons, especially one suffering greatly or experiencing poor quality of life; An easy death, or the means to bring about such a death
en.wiktionary.org/wiki/euthanasia





Suicide has consistently been the most common cause of premature death in schizophrenia. A large 5-year World Health Organization study consisting of the follow-up of 1056 patients exhibiting psychotic symptoms found the most common cause of death in those with schizophrenia was suicide (Sartorius et al, 1986). In their review of the subject Caldwell and Gottesman (1990) found that 9-13% of patients with schizophrenia eventually commit suicide. At least 20-40% make suicide attempts (Meltzer & Fatemi, 1995) and 1-2% go on to complete in their attempt within the next 12 months (Meltzer & Okayli 1995). Therefore, suicide in schizophrenia has long been a major area of concern and research efforts.
In Denmark, Mortensen and Juel (1993) used the national case register to retrospectively examine mortality in a sample of 9156 patients following their first admission with schizophrenia, and reported 50% of males and 35% of females went on to commit suicide during the 17-year study period, with the relative risk of suicide increasing by 56% over this time. This suggests that the current level of risk is not stable, and is certainly not improving. The devastation that suicide brings for relatives, as well as the immense personal suffering the victim endures, must surely make this one of the most pressing issues for psychiatry to address. Carers and professionals are often left with feelings of profound ineffectualness and guilt in the face of suicide, and so it is vital for clinicians to feel confident in their understanding of risk assessment and management in this particularly vulnerable group.
Results from the recent UK National Confidential Inquiry into Suicide and Homicide by People with Mental Illness (Appleby et al, 1999a) revealed that 20% of suicide victims during the period 1996-1998 had a diagnosis of schizophrenia. Fifty per cent of all cases had had contact with psychiatric services within the previous 7 days, yet 85% were thought to be low risk. It is therefore obvious that despite our best efforts, recognition of those most at risk remains extremely difficult. What is unclear is what risk factors specific to this diagnostic group have been reliably reported in well-controlled studies, how best to incorporate these into current assessment procedures, and whether when applied to empirical clinical practice, such procedures can reduce suicide rates. This paper reviews the research findings to data, and discusses possible areas for future investigation.
Vanessa Raymont, Clinical Researcher and Honorary Specialist Registrar

I wonder if the above group have choices................I know some ....if not all have voices ..........


These voices often instruct the individual that their life is meaningless, and that death is the answer ...........often tinged with religious salvation that awaits [so my Brothers, Brother in Law states in his deep manic phases]


Paul whom I supported about 6 years ago.....was articulate and very knowledgeable ..... yet this crippling disease ended his life prematurely at the age of 31.................

.his mother said that..........’death to Paul by hanging was the only cure for the persistent voices calling him to his grave’.


In his rational states of mind Suicide was his backup plan..........for what he called his ‘dark days’
SUICIDE is taking one’s life by any method.......is it still suicide........[said it on his death certificate]

Tom I do not condemn Euthanasia...........AT ALL
I believe in free Will...........

My beef is when people pigeon hole the act of suicide......any death .......
leaves grief in its wake


Schizophrenia is a fire in the mind of the sufferer, therefore is it suicide or what.........if a person is not in control of their mind, how can the death certificate read suicide...implying intentional,

Definition of Suicide
http://www.medterms.com/script/main/...ticlekey=24337

Suicide: The act of causing one’s own death. Suicide may be positive or negative and it may be direct or indirect. Suicide is a positive act when one takes one’s own life.
Suicide is a negative act when one does not do what is necessary to escape death such as leaving a burning building.
Suicide is direct when one has the intention of causing one’s own death, whether as an end to be attained, or as a means to another end, as when a man kills himself to escape condemnation, disgrace, ruin, etc.
Suicide is indirect (and not usually called suicide) when one does not desire it as an end or a means, but when one nevertheless commits an act which courts death, as in tending someone with SARS knowing that they may well succumb to the same illness.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx




Tom I do not see those poor souls who leapt to their deaths as committing the act of suicide.....they fled from terror. FULL STOP


Equally I do see the ‘20-something depressed guy’, as committing suicide but because he also fled from his vision of inner terror......

I also see the terminaly ill who choose to terminate their life ..........but only justify this act if you accept ............you want to end inner suffering...........like others who committ the word suicide.............


its just words at the end of the day..........and interpretation of these words.....

and you to Tom have a choice.......... life or death............

David

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X5eIC...eature=related

David:hug:

The Long Way Home
 

Hello, Waves: Thanks for your comments, penetrating as always -- waves are that, to say the least.

Regarding the burning towers: If I understand you correctly, your basic position is that suicide "is intentionally causing one's own death. FOR WHATEVER REASON." Now, the objective fact is that the 200 people who leaped, caused their own death from impact. If I accept your position, the REASON they did so doesn't make a bit of difference; that they thought they "might" land on a haytruck, etc., then, is irrelvant. FOR WHATEVER REASON... That includes running away from death, etc. Something follows: those people, in causing their own death for whatever reason, committed suicide. I disagree.

I think there are occasions when circumstances trump intentions. Of those 200, I am sure that at least one previously thought about opening the window and jumping. Let's say one of them arrived at work on 9/11 with the INTENTION of leaping to his death. He actually goes to the window, unlocks it when ... the airplane hits. The fire builds; co-workers are leaping to their deaths. The person then thinks: ah yes, now I can go through with it, and nobody will ever know that I committed suicide. He then opens the window, leaps.

Question: did that man commit suicide? He certainly had the INTENTION of doing so, which none (presumably) of the other 200 had.

If you believe that the 200 committed suicide, then the answer is simple: yes, he committed suicide. However, if you think they did NOT commit suicide, that they were murdered, then what is the status of that man? He performed the same act as the others; however, his intention was different.

I would suggest that the circumstances were so overwhelming, that his intention DOESN'T MATTER. He, too -- even if he broadcast his wish to commit suicide seconds before he leaped -- did not commit suicide. This point is of course fiercely debatable. And even if somebody agrees with me, what is meant by "overwhelming"? Where are the dividing lines?

So, I agree with you that under certain conditions, REASONS and INTENTIONS don't count. However, I score it the other way, i.e., certain circumstances exist which are the overriding factor so as to exclude suicide. Question: is an incurable, debilitating disease one of those circumstances? Once more, where are the lines to be drawn?

You are right, Waves, I abhor suicide. As I wrote elsewhere, to think that ANYBODY is driven to that point, well, I regard that as atrocious. That thought, by the way, entered my head a year ago when I was walking back and forth to the woods near my house, making plans, making sure I had enough pills and water, making sure nobody was watching, and so forth. "I can think of no more degrading act": such was my thought seconds before I performed it. So, then, why do it?

Now comes the "however." I was watchng my health deteriorate without any hope of curing it; I figured that soon I would not be in a condition even to exercise my "last right" (what words: look at them again) of getting it over with. Such was the situation of my mother in a nursing home; she hated every minute of it, for almost 4 years. Well, I'm still here, a year later, so my timing was off; however, I see no cure and I can now no longer even take that 20 minute walk to the woods.

The long and short of it: if I "take the long way home" as the song says -- it will not be voluntary, LET ME ASSURE YOU. Every step will weigh 2,000 pounds. In fact, I love life, which is what -- as you correctly perceived -- makes "suicide," "taking your own life," whatever you or I want to call it -- so extraordinarily difficult. At this point, the burden of life -- and everything now, even the smallest act, feels like a burden (which makes me a burden to others) -- is just too much. I, who put in thousands of hours in a gym over a 13-year period to avoid this condition, well, here I am.

You ask, why does it matter if what I'm contemplating is called "suicide" or "taking my own life"? Most of my concern over what is and is not suicide came from the following incident: my elderly aunt, who was in good health, was in a car wreck with her husband. My brother and I flew out to see them. They were in need of an assisted living arrangement until they got better. We went to see them in the morning to tell them we were going to find a place for them. I will never forget the angelic look on my aunt's face: she kept asking us, "Are you O.K.? Is everything all right?" We went to make the rounds when, a few hours later, we got the call that she had died from a heart attack. That happened in 1990; well, I set for myself the goal of having that SUPREMELY contented look on my face when my times comes. If you commit suicide, I don't see how you can have it. I certainly didn't when I took two glasses of wine and a box of Stilnox. If you do something else other than suicide, well, maybe it's possible. I'm not sure.

Waves, may your tide always be high, as are your thoughts, your attitude.

Tom

a giant

NO

i think i even said that in my post. i was explicit. those people were running AWAY from death, not towards it. they did NOT commit suicide. they did not choose their own death. they did not jump onto a pavement. i don't believe they contemplated that. i believe they jumped OUT OF a burning building. they moved AWAY FROM death. if any intention at all was present, it was NOT to die... the OPPOSITE of suicide!!!! and i already said so!!!

instinct... i think that PANIC and panic-induced-adrenalined best explains their behavior.... panic that results from the instinct of life-preservation, not escape from PAIN, but escape from DEATH!!!!

i said, IFFF,, hello???? IFFFFF. and my premise before that was

my words have been (inadvertently?) misconstrued.

:(

~ waves ~

Tom, it sounds to me like you have just told us that you do not want to commit suicide.

Again, i will say it till i turn blue in the face (NOOOO pun intended... oh dear, arghhh! :o:rolleyes:), the fact that you are trying to separate "taking your own life" from "suicide" using semantics is not something we can tackle. oh, we can try, for the sake of all the depressed readers on this forum who may be seduced by the the thought that they can just slap another label on asphyxiating themselves in a garage and make it "ok" ...

but we can't convince you. the point is... why are you trying to convince others? do you want to to give others permission to kill themselves too?

do you want our permission to kill yourself? we will never give it...

do you want your own permission... ahhh, now i think this is more likely. i think this is about your own permission....... you need to argue it, every argument we make against your "auto-euthanasiac" theory, you can counter with some better-or-worse constructed reasoning.... and you are building a house of cards... you are making a costume.

you are dressing up suicide... paving your psychological landscape to feel OK with committing suicide... because you will have justified calling it something OTHER than the label you so abhor.

Tom please treasure the life in you.

please treasure that life, even in pain, even in suffering.... IS. it IS, it CONTINUES, it DOES, it ACTS, it BECOMES, whereas death ... isn't, doesn't, can't.

i have met people on these forums, one in particular comes to mind, who live in daily, constant, excruciating pain... a beautiful beautiful person... her writings bring light to my days. she could easily, easily, apply the reasoning you are... i so pray she does not... she is a gift to the world... she may never know it... but she is... as are you.

~ waves ~

Hello, Waves: Thanks for your comment. Sorry if your basic conclusion was misconstrued on my part. You did state specifically that you didn't think the 200 committed suicide.

However, I think I located the source of my confusion...

First, I will note here again the medical dictionary definition of "suicide": "The act of causing one's own death." No doubt about it: the act of falling from the height of those Twin Towers windows caused deaths, and if autopsies were performed, that was surely the conclusion. Therefore, if somebody strickly holds to the dictionary definition, the 200 people who leaped out windows committed suicide. Again, such is not your argument (mine either).

Waves, you note, "i believe the medical dictionary is accurate, missing only the word 'intention' - suicide is intentionally causing one's own death. FOR WHATEVER REASON." Intention and reason: these are often the same thing; there's the source of confusion.

You make a needed nuance: the 200 people, when they jumped, did not intend to cause their own death; in fact, you say, they were trying to avoid death (by fire). Therefore, they did not commit suicide. I'm not convinced you are right about a clearcut intention to escape death; I suspect that you would probably find 200 different intentions/mixtures of them if you could interview those people. Some of them, in a panic, did want to escape death -- you are no doubt right about that --, but others intended to die instantaneously rather than suffocate slowly.

My point is that in such an extreme case, CIRCUMSTANCES TRUMP INTENTIONS -- it doesn't matter what the intentions were. Even if one of those people was overjoyed with the fire because it gave him the excuse to commit suicide and not shame his family -- it doesn't matter; the circumstances overwhelmed everything else. EVEN GIVEN HIS INTENTION to cause his own death that fateful day, that person, in my opinion, in jumping, did not commit suicide.

With 9/11 we're looking at an extreme case. What about the 90-year-old woman dying of cancer, debilitated and in pain? Are those circumstances overwhelming? Moreover, what if she is religious and believes she will go to heaven after she dies? She then intentionally, voluntarily, decides to take a lethal dose, then dies. Question: did she commit suicide? Her intention is NOT to die but to live on in the afterlife. She escapes life in order to live: life after life -- such is her perspective, her intention. Again, did she commit suicide? We're in a complex area.

As a side note, apparently the suicide bombers don't think they will die --- not really; they expect to live in the afterlife. Despite their intention to live in paradise, I got a feeling they commit suicide -- that they are appropriately named. Maybe, I am culture-bound in that regard.

Waves, I like your distinction between intention and reason when it comes to suicide. I have the feeling it is a fruitful area to investigate further. I hope we can do it together.

Again, I am sorry for any confusion or misunderstanding I created.

Waves, keep rollin', rollin', rollin' on the river. And elsewhere.

Tom

Hello, Waves: Thanks for your latest contribution.

What I'm trying to do here is create a legacy that is NOT destructive to my nieces and nephews and brother. "Why?" "What if?" I'd like to answer those questions if I can for them, as well as for anybody else facing certain dilemmas.

No, I am not seeking your permission. It would be completely against the spirit of this string, "Survivors of suicide," for you or any other member to grant such a permission (It may be illegal to do so, by the way, I'm not sure). Nor do I seek anybody else's permission, for that matter, other than -- as you correctly note -- myself. Which may be the most difficult person to get it from.

No, I am not encouraging depressed people to dress up their desire to kill themselves with frosty logic, detailed arguments, etc. "It's O.K. to kill yourself; just don't forget to call it something else" -- well, such is not my position. I am hoping that somebody desiring to take their life will read my words, your words, everybody's words, think and talk about what they are considering, then think about it some more. My basic point to them, if I could talk to them: this whole suicide thing is not as simple and clearcut as it first appears. In taking your own life, what would you be doing -- really?

What is suicide? 9/11 forced me to reconsider what should be a fairly straightforward question. I'm trying to work through it, in all its dimensions. It started me thinking that the medical dictionary definition -- which seems to be the conventionally excepted one -- is flawed. There's something that doesn'r ring true about it.

Finally, you state eloquently, "please treasure that life, even in pain, even in suffering.... IS. it IS, it CONTINUES, it DOES, it ACTS, it BECOMES, whereas death ... isn't, doesn't, can't." In life, there is definitely "something there." In death, MAYBE there is, maybe there isn't, something there. (I suspect there isn't, but that's another subject).

Until the next wave, Waves:

Tom

may i humbly suggest to you that whether you call it

suicide - euthanasia - self-mercy - gobbledygook

the legacy it will leave them will have the same bitter taste...

a rose by any other name...

likewise, suicide, by any other name....

i have stated my impressions of the 9/11 tragedy. we agree that those folks didn't commit suicide. we don't seem to agree on why, that is alright.

i shan't further contemplate cases of 90 year old terminally ill women or folks trapped in a building or other hypothetical cases as a means to drawing lines through suicide to make it more acceptable in this case or that.

the person in consideration here, Tom, is you. your case. it is not comparable to other cases. and i will not parttake, by distinction or by simile in furthering your attempts to label taking your own life as something more palatable than suicide.

call me a stick in the mud, but i am stuck on the idea that you are clamouring to convince yourself that killing yourself is "ok" ... the label applied to it being the chosen means to making it ok, no more, no less, and not just for your survivors, but for yourself.

yes. and please consider the spirit of this string in a broader sense too in your quest to make what you are wanting to do "ok."

some of us here have survived the suicide of ones we loved.

some of us here are struggling to survive the very recent suicide of ones we loved.

some of us have survived our own suicidal lure... never sure if it might not lurk again in future....

some of us are currently, actively, moment after aching moment, trying to survive the suicidal lure.

the suicidal lure begs, pleads, for rationalizations.... and will latch on to any logic that is convenient...........................

it is difficult to survive the suicidal lure.

rationalizations are just as or more seductive for 20 year old kids with a pistol in the closet, as they are for 90 year old women with terminal illnesses .... neither of whom deserves to die just because the have numbers and statistics of a certain kind, both of whom have intrinsic value. ....as do you, Tom, i shall say again.

you have an incredible intellect.... i am sad to see its current bent in justifying an untimely demise.

~ waves ~

I can totally relate to where you're at. For 12 years I have been plagued with chronic back pain and it just keeps getting worse. Unable to obtain a clear diagnostic picture and hence treatment, I am fighting off suicidal thoughts all of the time. I will be 50 in December. I feel like giving up. I have a great wife and 20 year old twins. They are the only thing keeping me from going through with it. At least I now found this forum where I can talk to others who are capable of genuine empathy. So, you are in good company here I think...

Dear Tom

Your recent and progressive struggle with a debilitating and incurable condition
is heartfelt, saddening, distressing, and soul destroying to you....and also to those who heard your message via cyberspace....

You are a special person Tom...in so that you have made me reveal more about myself in 5 days or so than anyone else....and i have been floating around here four about 3 years

I have tried...to convey my belief that suicide is an act of desperation....a means, to end of pain and physical and/or emotional torment.... at times it it is a cry for help, at times a 'F***' you to the world....at times a 'I told you i was ill',
at times its enduring everlasting pain. Suicide knows no boundaries.....it manifests itself....when all the ingredients are in the pot......what ever the ingredients might be......

it shows no regard for age, gender, colour, religion, sexuality, intelligence, social economic status. The lure of suicide needs only circumstances to arise that tip an individual over the edge....where death is preferable to life.............

TRUTH TIME..........[SUCKING UP AIR HERE]

My Father was born in 1922....he died in 1996 aged 74.

He was born in Londonderry Northern Ireland......he forged his aged in 1939...so as to join the British Army [although a Catholic] to escape poverty..He was the eldest of 14 children.

He joined the Medical Corps. [17] In 1940 he was assigned to the Dunkirk evacuation....as his first combat mission

He landed on 6 June 1944 he landed at Sword beach....and was now classed a Mortuarer [dealing with the deceased]

His subsequent journey took him through Cannes [France Major battle] Nijmegen bridge [Holland..the not so famous bridge, but fierce battle] and Bergan-Belsen Concentration Camp.........[Germany]

The latter expedition was greeted by 60,000 dead and dying human beings.
[My father carried a tooth with him in his wallet for 50+years ..that of a man who snapped it out of his jaw in thanks for liberation..........more of a F*** you to the Nazis who extracted Gold teeth from their captives.]

My Father continued in the Army until 1950...........he was dishonorably discharged as medically unfit for duty.....because he questioned his posting to Korea.....because he had by then 4 young children,,,[and Army housing only counted if you were in England....therefore my Mother and siblings would have no home]..........his insubordination's was treated with contempt....they were marched out of barrack housing in 4 hours from discharge....utter humiliation.

Upon civilian life my father was a Singer a Coal Miner...a Security Guard......
He was an Alcoholic......and for all my childhood years i recall nightly screaming from his room [he slept alone] from night terrors..............

I am the youngest of 9 children ....................my second eldest a sister.........told me whilst on leave from the Royal Navy 1981 [aged 17] that my FATHER raped her and my eldest sister............................................ .............................


I held that in my head until 1992.....................then upon the knowing i was to become a Father i exploded.............and asked my parents for the truth.................................

it was all denied...............even by the elder sister........

the sister who told me..................has been in a secure residential home since 1998 when her third husband [a wife beater] died of Cancer....she believed she had killed him......her true diagnosis is Alcohol induced schizophrenia....90% of the time she is in a catatonic state............with fleeting moments of her past........no present...at all .................dimentia..........at 60 years old:(


I can only accept in what my parents and elder siblings say to be the truth..........and i struggle for the truth daily...........i loved my Father......and my Sister .........greatly......[the two who always really cared about me........]

My Father like i said died of Stomach Cancer...............in 1996...........he was brought up in destitution and absolute poverty...........his schooling was governed by Catholic Priests..........who taught hell....and brimstone.....wrath and damnation..........


He had a 5inch scar above hi right eye where a priest.......hit him with a wooden cane.....................for not wearing shoes to mass [his father had pawned them for food]


He feared death from an early age..........the horrors of war that tormented...fifty years of sleep.......that he only discussed in 1995 with British Army Doctors.........who only then acknowledged he was suffering WAR STRESS //+ PTSD.............SIGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

On his Birthday 12/4/96 he was diagnosed with stomach Cancer and told he had three months to live............

I remember being in my parents house when a priest came to visit from the hospice.........My dad spent 2 hours telling jokes............

The priest upon leaving.....stated to me ..my Father was coping very well..........

I went ballistic..........................I asked the priest if he had ever spoken to my Father about his debilitating fear of death.......and fear.........of hell..as proclaimed by his teachers in 1932...........

He looked shocked...........when i told him talk to my father and resolve his peace on this earth.........or never come to this house again.............

thankfully after i returned home this priest came to my parents home..........and cast aside the jokes..and dragged out my fathers fears.....giving him some peace of mind................

he died 21/6/1996/////////////the longest day.............[and always will be]

I will never know if my FATHER was not the hero i remember.........i can only accept his , my mothers and siblings denial of untoward..............

But if any man had a reason to take his life.....my father had one.[maybe several] .maybe fear of the assumed afterlife prevented.........his personal intervention on the timing of his death.............................and he allowed creation to decide ..................................



MY FATHER WAS THE ONLY PERSON TO CONTACT ME AFTER MY ATTEMPTED SUICIDE .............HE JUST SAID .........................' SON LEARN TO LIVE LIFE'.................NO CHASTISEMENT...ONLY ...........................LOVE...................
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qWuBS...eature=related


PLAYED AT HIS FUNERAL...............WHERE NO ONE WAS ALLOWED TO SAY EULOGY?????????????????????????????????????????


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwCPAo5e_F8

and my fears................continue..................... ...............


David:hug:

With 9/11 right around the corner......
 

.....the details of that day will no doubt be a focal discussion across our country....and since it has been brought up repeatedly in this very heavy, yet respectable debate regarding those 200 who jumped......

I can't help myself and felt compelled to post.......(believe me, it took a lot of balls to do this, as I am usually afraid to show up on this very sensitive forum - for fear of coming across as insensitive ..... with my 'silly' avatar, and the fact that I enjoy spreading humor and 'stupidity' around the other forums in trying to spread a bit of joy...of which I don't feel appropriate for the SOS forum...) .....

But my heart is pounding and so I'm going to go out on a limb here.....

I tried to put myself in the shoes of those people on that horrific day at the towers. Waves has repeatedly said exactly what I want to say and Tom continues to have a counter-intuitive retort to this scenerio, even to going to extent of painting a scenerio of 'that ONE man' who may have been suicidal, ready to jump out a window and used that as his 'perfect opportunity' to carry out his plan.....

When i did the best i could at my attempt to 'put myself at that scene'....and try to actually 'smell' those aero-jet toxic fumes in the thro's of incineration that would FAR excede any 'regular' building on fire......probably zero visibility at that point, choking for every last breath that could be had.......they certainly would not have had the capacity to actually contemplate 'hmmm, let me assess my situation here......I'm going to die......which choice would be the most logical of the two that I am faced with here........should i sit here and die in these flames and smoke......or should I jump out the window and land on the concrete......'
Think about it. There WAS no time to rationalize. Panic was rampant.
Those people were probably taking their last final gasps at that horrible smoke inhalated moment of DEATH.......I would strongly venture to say, in considering the scenerio.......the ONLY choice they had at that moment, the ONLY last ditch effort they had - was to know that they could gasp at ONE LAST breath of air to save themselves from choking on the smoke and flames.....they took that leap out of desperation to LIVE and attempt to breath in that air that was outside those windows.
And I can't even begin to try and speculate what could possibly have been going thru their minds on the way down as they fell to the ground. Perhaps their eyes were blinded by the smoke and if they even were capable of rationalizing anything, perhaps in their blind leap, they hoped that the firefighters were waiting below with those huge round things that look like trampolines..... ?...... i doubt they had any clue that they were the victims of the worst terrorist attack on American ground.......and am certain they had NO clue that hundreds of firefighters were dying at that moment in time as well.

Ok, I'll butt out now......this is a very interesting and intellectual discussion by the way.......aLOT of people are reading this I'm sure.
....perhaps a family member or two of those 200 people will come across this thread....?....
I feel very strongly that the word 'suicide' and those 200 people should not even be in the same sentence.

Do carry on......
....hopefully without continually centering in on those 200.

Tom, you are a very colourful man. It's a pleasure having you share
Glad you're here
Rae
:hug:

David!!!!:hug::hug::hug:

Melody

Rrae:

You wrote a beautiful post and I thank you. I thank you on behalf of my friend who lost her son on the roof of the World Trade Center. He was only 25 and was on the job for only one week as a painter on the roof. He was doing some work that horrible day. Every year since, on 9/11, she goes there and remembers (along with the relatives and friends of the others who were lost to us that day.

Anyway, great post and thanks again.

Melody

Hard to look at taking of life as less than murder
 

You see, I happen also to be related through the marriage of one of my family to one affected by a most horrific and gruesome murder to have happened on the soils of that land of Kansas wrought upon a young lady who, being 19, had some of the worst acts one human might ply upon another at the hands of a monster. Now, hers was not an act of the taking of her own life; rather, she perished because someone else decided she was not worth the living. All who live have life worth living. None is the better for it because they take upon themself the decision to bring end by their hand. I would not have been had I ever succeeded before. Certainly, my end would have been in deprivation of those words of encouragement I now share with others.

To me, I feel premature eradication of human life is not possibly divine intervention whether by self or another. Those who perished on 9/11 had lives cut short at the hands of monsters who came from a land far from here who sought to make a point, legitimate to themselves, but a point purportedly driven by some errant mockery concern for the rights of others. I cannot and will not embrace a thought that any one of those who jumped from a high wall that day, failed to wrest control of an aircraft from monsters for fear of a knife and its effect on their body were, after a fashion submitting to suicide. Murder was worked on their bodies for the sake of the philosophy of another. Philosophy. Taking of life not yet wound down to its natural conclusion.

Too hard to reach such a conclusion. I am with Rae on her thoughts. DMack, I appreciate your thoughts as well, surely I do. Your father taught well, so well, and we are the better for it.

I wish my cousin's sister-in-law had been allowed the opportunity to reach life's end in a manner other than they discovered after recovering her in that sad sad state.

Maybe your lot in life is to reach out and touch the life of another in beneficence than to know an end which is by choice of time, place, manner and method. Maybe your lot through this thread is to reach into the hearts of others and help them to see a way to benefit those round about them.

How well I remember Jodi's murder. Same month as I thought touching the trigger of a shotgun was a good idea....... interesting, don't you think?

Mark56:hug:

Dear Rae and Mark,

thank you both so much for your articulate comments, in particular with regards to the 9/11 tragedy, whose anniversary we observe just day after tomorrow.

those who died that day are precisely victims of mass murder, no less than if they had been lined up and shot by a firing squad.

suggesting otherwise is akin to saying that someone who instinctively ducks to dodge bullets would actually be choosing his own death by altering where the bullet will hit him. :rolleyes:

i join you in sending my deepest sympathies to all those who lost someone dear in the attack.

~ waves ~

Hello, David: another excellent post on your part.

You start with "honor." Waves mentioned hari kari, and how it is honor-related in Japan. In the West we use the word honor less frequently than another word, which one finds all other the place in discussions about suicide: dignity. People want to die with dignity.

I certainly agree with the contributors to this string that suicide, "taking your own life," whatever you want to call it, involves killing yourself. That fact rests; I don't see any way around it. The little old lady with cancer and with Nebutal ... she killed herself.

Now, can somebody kill themselves with honor/dignity in our society? That is the question. Honor, in my mind, is more socially-oriented -- something others accord to a person. So, if a society views certain forms of suicide as honorable, so be it. You raise an extremely important point: in the Middle East blowing oneself up can be an honorable act; that same act is also viewed as suicide (incidentally, I'd love to see a poll of Middle Eastern people on this subject. I don't know how many of them think it is honorable -- do you?). Dignity, on the other hand, for me is more of an individual question -- subjective, internal, if you like, to a person. In our society, does "dignity" play the same role as "honor" plays in others? What is the relationship between dignity and honor? That expression I saw on my elderly aunt's face hours before she died of a heart attack ... if that didn't express dignity, what does? In fact, I think I saw the face of dignity itself...

You mention "inner terror" which presumably could assume the proportions of a 9/11 fire in the mind of a mentally ill person. If that person kills himself, then, is he not comparable to the 9/11 victims who leaped to their death, but did NOT commit suicide? Of course, in the latter case there was a murderer involved, the group of 19 terrorists. In the former, the mentally ill person, well ... is it possible to have a murder without a murderer? I don't think so: again, "murder" is a legal condition; there is nothing illegal about cancer. So, I'd call cancer something else ... I'm just not sure what right now.

You wrote, "commit the word suicide." As noted on another post (Alfee?) which I can't find right now!!!, there are numerous expressions for the act of killing oneself. Perhaps the word "commit" is throwing us off: it smacks of crime, of "committing a crime." A negative connotation... Should "commit" be dropped?

Finally, you note there is a choice between life or death. The problem becomes, for certain people, that life more and more resembles death -- death in life. Is this what at least some people do: they love life so much that rather then see it slip away inch by incle, they kill themselves? Is that is what is behind the call for "death with dignity"?

Tom you said

"is it possible to have a murder without a murderer? I don't think so:

yes............

[2752.people]..........died in 9/11 attack

....their 19 murderers......died before the 2752.........had met their death....

A question for you Tom..........

What about the 343 brave firemen..did they enter a burning building knowing that the death was hanging in the balance...........they are the complete reverse of the 200 who fled terror...........these individuals out of a sense of duty walked into the terror.


Cancer is a disease...........at present in most cases uncurable.......like many other conditions .............but are treated with various forms of treatment to minimise suffering and pain..and prolong life.......that is dignity...........in a sense..........[do an apinion poll on those dying of cancer and ask would you like 1 year 10 years more.???? the majority may choose longer..IMO

David

Tom:

Talking about HONOR. We all know about Suicide Bombers. Right now, there are camps in the middle east where suicide bombers are taught as little children that it's acceptable to do a horrible thing in order to kill the infidels and then they will go to heaven. They are brainwashed from birth it seems to do an HONORABLE THING. I remember seeing a video up online of a mother of a FEMALE suicide bomber and she was smiling and she said "I'm proud of my daughter".

I guess it depends on the culture where one is raised. If one is raised to believe that if one does this, well, it's completely righteous and IT'S THEIR BELIEF SYSTEM. We are supposed to respect this belief system?. I think these people are ALL mentally ill. But can SO MANY PEOPLE who share this belief system, well can they ALL BE MENTALLY ILL?? Oh my god, it's so scary.

And don't get me started on honor killing. That is the most heinous thing I have ever heard of. That people (and this includes moms dads, brothers and sisters), who, when they discover their daughter has been seen kissing (or even talking to) a man who she is not married to, well, they think it's perfect fine for her to be stoned to death. And the mother will lead her right to it.

Our world continues to go mad with all these belief systems in place. To ever think it's okay to murder someone or blow your self up in the name of a fanatical belief system, well I will never understand this way of thinking.

And what can we, as residents of a different country, what can we do to prevent these things?

I don't think we can do anything.

Mel

Dear Tom

i am relieved to see a post from you today. i was worried you felt hurt by our remarks.

i just want to point out that Islam condemns suicide EXPLICITLY.
http://www.inter-islam.org/Prohibiti...istian%20parts

Dying for holy war, is considered a religious sacrifice, not suicide, but it must be done with precise modality. the purpose there, is not escape from life, nor pain, nor self-destruction. the Qu'ran promises a sort of "express pathway" to Heaven for those who make this religious sacrifice.

http://www.letusreason.org/islam12.htm

While we may not make moral judgements or discriminate based on religion or politics, we do need, in all these forums which are US-based, to observe US-based legal considerations. And the acts of killing unfaithfuls (and in so doing accepting one's own death) committed (yes, COMMITTED) in the name of Jihad, in the US, are viewed as TERRORISM, and it is 200% illegal. Beyond that, please bear in mind that very very vulnerable people - including teenagers - might read these forums and not respond. We must post responsibly.

Furthermore, the purpose of this particular forum is to promote survival, and to reduce the stigma of suicide victims... to reduce the stigma of talking about suicide also, to make suicide something that can be approached and grown from.... with the objective of REDUCING the number of suicides... bringing people out of the darkness BEFORE they kill themselves.

I do see it as dangerous to other readers, for us to post general endorsements about taking of ones life under given conditions, regardless of the word used. (Here, we use the word 'suicide' for that.)

And yes, i too just recently read that post by Alffe, about how "commiting" suicide has negative connotations... this makes it difficult for survivors to share their grief. I am going to make a conscious effort to use alternative vocabulary for those who are hurt by the use of the word "commit."

Tom i hope you will stick around, and share more about yourself, and allow us maybe to let some light in.... :hug:

This theoretical debate is interesting, but i worry about others, vulnerable others, who might be reading.

~ waves ~

D-Day Came And Went
 

Hello, Surfer: 12 years of chronic pain? Without a clear dx and treatment? No wonder you struggle against suicidal thoughts "all of the time." But you have your family to sustain you. They are the key; don't lose it or minimize it. This forum, as well.

I don't mind saying that a few months ago, I arbitrarily set today, Sept. 9, as D-Day. I could not see myself going past today; well, here I am, but just barely. We went to the market this a.m. for 2 hours; I felt like I would faint, very weak, the sun was too much, tired, tired, tired. However, I didn't fall on my face or get in a wreck coming home. I'm approaching a major threshold, I sense.

Would I have gone through with my plan had I not contacted Neurotalk? I'll never know for sure. However, I do know that it certainly would have been more likely.

Surfer, Waves... we'll have to get you two together.

Tom

Hello, David: Yours is truly a remarkable story. I hope you will continue to share it. So much despair and anxiety, and truth. Justice, too, maybe...

Yes, I know about Yentl. Another remarkable story. For Streisand fans, here's another one: http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x2f...ere-1985_music

David, keep doing what you're doing -- and living.

Tom