Suicide As A Coping Technique?

[Tinyflame]

I've heard it said on here before, make a golf swing card with names or a saying or reason to live on it.
Or directions what to do when you feel that way.
Or photographs, if you have family.

 

[Hashi]

Sorry, this is going to take the post off-topic a bit, but I just wanted to respond to this and then respond to your original post, Niall.

My safety plan that has kept me alive to date is - when the needing to end it gets really bad, I get really drunk, as quickly as possible. Not the best plan but it's very hard to do something technical when you're seeing double and too drunk to stand.

I would recomend that everyone feeling even a little suicidal gets together a basic safety plan - preferably one that's better than mine ;)

Lightanddarkness, I do relate to what you're saying and I admire the fact that you're recognising what's causing the urges, and you're working on them. I completely agree with having a safety plan. I just have to say a couple of cautions about your strategy. I know you've said yourself it isn't the best but I think - and I hope you'll take this as being meant with sympathy and concern - it's one to change as soon as you possibly can.

As someone with an alcohol problem who started out thinking I was giving myself a break then progressed to justifying drinking as a better alternative to more drastic measures... well, I'm still here and now I have even more to deal with a result of the alcoholic "coping" I did in the past. If you can then please, for the sake of your future self, see if you can find another strategy.

The other thing is that alcohol lowers inhibitions so although you may be incapacitating yourself there's a risk that you'll incapacitate your judgement/survival instinct but not your ability to act. Certainly not your ability to have an accident.

I'm not going to say the thing about alcohol making you more depressed because that was always a completely pointless argument to me when it was giving me oblivion for a short time. What I would say is that at my worst I was far beyond finding comfort and encouragement in anything. Incapacitating myself was the only answer, but before I started drinking I used to do that by having a strategy of getting into bed, staying there and making my mind as blank as I could. (And by not having anything in the house that related to my method of choice.)

 

[Hashi]

Niall, I think I know what you mean but I would say it's a coping technique only if releases you from the need to do it. I know that sounds like a paradox, but suicidal ideation comes when our pain exceeds our ability to cope. If feeling more in control of something makes us feel more able to cope, then it does kind of make sense.

 

[nimkekaa]

The difference is that asking someone who is depressed if they are thinking of suicide is not a specific enough question. Thinking about suicide does not mean you ARE going to do it or are planning on doing it, it just means you have thought about the concept. Even people who have no ptsd or diagnosed depression have thought about suicide at some point, if they say they haven't they are lying. Just the fact they know what suicide is, proves that point.

I think that suicidal thinking is very misunderstood like self harm has been. I myself thought people who self harmed where trying to kill themself or had to be pretty crazy to do that. How can causing pain be something you want to do. That was when I thought cutting was the only form of self harm. I too self harm and it is definately to reduce pain. But it reduces emotional pain. I don't know how to stop my emotional pain but I can stop phyisical pain very easily. Therefore I self harm and then disociate the physical pain and volia. All is better.

Now I don't really mean all is better. I understand it is a very bad coping strategy and I try very hard not to and have been winning that war thank goodness. But what I am saying is that I think we need to realize that we can't understand suicidal thinking unless we have been there. Like self harm it is not always done for the end results that you may think.

I have had many suicidal thoughts and even some attempts when I was a teenager but I never really wanted to die. I just wanted the pain to stop and at times believed that others would be better off without me.

Wow this is a very intersting thread.

 

[Rob_Dog19]

I was just thinking about this earlier...I do often have suicidal thoughts and sometimes go so far as to plan it out very thoroughly even though I have no intent on actually following through unless there weren't any other options. I know it's not exactly "normal" behavior yet it works for me as a coping mechanism. I wouldn't dare tell my therapist because of my history of being hospitalized for suicide attempts

 

[lighteningdarkness]

I appreciate your post, Hashi, and completely take it in the spirit it was meant. I agree with all that you've said. Alcohol is a long standing (early teens) coping mechanism so it's going to take some shifting. On the positive side the urge to drink has dropped a lot since starting the EMDR a few weeks ago. Onward and upward.

I agree with the posts which indicate that suicidal thoughts are as much to do (more?) with stopping the pain, being unable to live with that degree of emotion, than not wanting to be alive anymore. I also think that it is difficult for people who haven't been there to understand - it seems to be this differentiation which escapes them.

I recently went to a party where the ex-partner of one of the guests had recently hung himself. It was tough to hear what people were saying. Their views on it.

 

[dbacs]

Someone I know cuts themselves. Personally I think it has something to do with the endorphin's released when cutting. I also believe the same is true for the suicidal thoughts.

Once the idea starts the endorphin's rev up because of the stress response, by the time you go through the thought process, the end is all about feeling better. So i believe that once you start to believe you can feel better, by ending it, then the endorphins are released and you actually end up feeling better by not ending it.

That's my two cents on the chemical side of things. I've got 3 3/4 years of a psych degree to base it on. :)

So along those same lines, exercise will increase endorphin's. Maybe its something other people can try when they find themselves thinking of suicide. Instead of drinking (which increases endorphins) do some kind of physical exercise?

 

[Rainbow_Habitué]

I find when I'm overwhelmed I have two strategies, 'run' and think of as many ways to 'go' as possible. I usually end up exhausting myself pretty quick. Sometimes I hurl abusive long-term-semi-suicide ideas (like living on the streets and what might happen to me) at myself almost as if I were trying to beat myself up, but it helps me get through the pain faster. Even when I'm doing this I know I'm trying to activate some self-protective response and it works. Suddenly I'll feel the panic slip off me (after forty-five minutes or so) and though I'll still be crying I know my brain isn't processing anymore and I'll get a hold on myself.

However this is both counter-intuitive and, I'm sure, maladaptive.