Suicidal Ideation- What Is It?

[Maggiemay]

I guess so. I'm a self harmer, currently to active. I guess what I've learnt since I 1st started harming myself 8years ago is that I'll never be free from it - even after going 6 yearsnot doing it til recently again. I always think about - it's always there as an option, one which I fight to resist most of the time.

It's interesting on the depression questionnaire thing - that therapists and drs use - sucidal thoughts and thoughts of harming yourself both come under the same category. Each time I fill one in I feel the need to elaborate and clarify that I am not suicidal and that I struggle with self harm.

I view as very very distinct from suicidal behaviours - in fact, in the past I've self harmmed to stay alive. Strange. But, I guess as professionals have told me, and tried to scare me, every time I self harm I'm playing with fire. It's all too easy to loose control and something that appeared contained lead to something more sinister. I kinda guess they have a point after I've ended up in hospital 3 times after self harming...

 

[HëllaBubz]

ideation is the thoughts, but not wanting to act upon them, but control them and seek help for them.

Without full control of self, one suddenly and very uncomfortably flirts with the option - because suddenly it very much seems an option to simply end pain

Very scary place to be.
I go for several weeks without it, and then when something (in my warped perception) catastrophic occurs, the thoughts suddenly pop up.

Although that being said, I've never ever been the sort of person who sits in a dark corner listening to Evanescence and trying to slit my wrists with a blunt toothbrush because 'that's what sad people do'.
And truth be told, I've always thought those sorts of people to be ones who proudly enjoy their self inflicted misery, and it disgusts me.

I have not harmed myself in a very long time, although earlier this year I was struggling with coping to the point where all I could think about was trying to 'cut the pain out', not so much wanting to die, but wanting another way of lessening the anguish inside.

I agree with Maggiemay, thoughts or actions of self harm are not suicidal, but rather a person reaching the end of their tether and not knowing where to go.

Reaching out is not about, as one of my clueless acquaintances put it, 'making the sad person feel happy and normal', it is about finding more or better ways to deal with pain inflicted on us.

Truth was never spoken like the old adage, "two heads are better than one."

 

[Hashi]

I also don't see it as being like self-harm ideation. I think the reason for the questions being grouped together on a depression questionnaire is maybe because they are high-risk thoughts/urges that a therapist needs to know about and monitor. Also, self harm can unintentionally be a threat to life.

I can't help feeling that if you find it hard to get the concept of suicidal ideation, you don't have it.

 

[HëllaBubz]

I can't help feeling that if you find it hard to get the concept of suicidal ideation, you don't have it.

People in general or me?

 

[pumpkinpie]

It's interesting on the depression questionnaire thing - that therapists and drs use - sucidal thoughts and thoughts of harming yourself both come under the same category. Each time I fill one in I feel the need to elaborate and clarify that I am not suicidal and that I struggle with self harm....

I think you are right, but since I don't KNOW, I would never want to assume anything and risk having been wrong at a critical time for someone.

I haven't done any physical self harm, but I know that there have been times when I was too close to the thought of suicide. I found it maddening to have twice been assessed by "professionals" who had never met me before, and had them refuse to believe me - either way.

Once I was told that I had to be suicidal - but I wasn't, and I was perfectly desirous of being honest with myself and this one psychiatrist. Years later, I was obsessed with the thought of driving my car off this roadway beside a huge rocky cliff. I have never attempted suicide, but those thoughts were unshakeable, and they scared me. I signed myself in to the hospital, and unbelievably, another psychiatrist said it didn't sound lethal. Aggh! I know that since I was sexually abused, he wanted to diagnose me with borderline personality disorder, but it's REALLY dangerous to pigeonhole someone, especially the first time you see them, when that kind of mistake could be fatal.

I was so upset that I was thinking like that already, and it was hard to tell someone. Since that time, though, rather than being ashamed of myself, I will view suicidal ideation as a symptom. A symptom of really serious depression, rather than a weak character.

 

[Hashi]

People in general or me?

Emma13. Based on first post:

My former counselor tried to explain it to me a couple of years ago, but I still don't understand what it means.

and later discussion.

And in general.

 

[HëllaBubz]

Aha. Just thought I'd clarify.

Cheers :)