Will Some Of Us Always Battle Suicidal Thoughts?

[Panda Bear]

This may be in the wrong spot....

But I'm looking for a discussion on the constant struggle with suicidal thoughts. As I get through bigger hurdles in my healing, one lingering thought process that I can't always fend off, is that inner desire to just die.

Now, I know it's seasonal for me. It's anniversary related, it'll pass. But I often wonder, will this always be a part of me that I'll have to fight for the rest of my life?

Has anyone been able to combat this thought process with out great stuggle and been able to move past it? I.e...you had this struggle, but don't anymore.

Just curious....

 

[The Albatross]

I don't have almost any suicidal thoughts anymore, but occasionally I have the thoughts that if something really bad happened I wouldn't fight to live very hard. :unsure: I do sometimes get the initial thought but immediately next thought, is "Naaawwww, nope, no way" and then "Wow where did that come from?"

 

[Panda Bear]

Thank you @The Albatross.

Really, this makes me feel better. It'll get better, as long as it gets better.

 

[BuckarooBanzai]

Has anyone been able to Combat this thought process with out great stuggle and been able to move past it? I.e...you had this struggle, but don't anymore.

YES!

I struggled with severe suicidal ideation for something like thirty years but then 'got over it'.

Medication and therapy really didn't help me. What did? Making sure to spend time every single day DOING WHAT I LOVE TO DO and CONTINUALLY making plans to do these things.

When I ruminate on the bad stuff that happened, I get depressed - so I no longer do it. The past is in the past, and I am happy to leave it there where it can no longer hurt me.

Good things are always right around the corner, so now I focus on the good stuff to come.

I highly recommend any of Martin Seligman's books on learned optimism.

 

[Knak]

This may be in the wrong spot....

But I'm looking for a discussion on the constant struggle with su...

I started "wishing I was dead" at age ten, crying in my room every day and embarrassed to come to dinner with a red puffy face, which nobody acknowledged.

I had the hope that when I left for college I would finally be free of the depression but no. However since I was attractive and shy many boys payed attention. I lived off that until I was used up, then went into a near psychotic major depression for 12 years before I found hope through a caring person.

I got involved with great people at a church for ten years. I married someone I met there who knew many friends. They knew him, his ex-wife, and kids for 20 years. They thought highly of him and he was always chosen to lead by the staff.

After the wedding I went into a major depression due to his treatment. He despised me and tried to make me feel worthless.

Two things prevented me from suicide or divorce. My mom grew up in a Catholic school where she learned and then taught us early on that you go to hell if you do either. Now I know it's not true but it's so ingrained in me I believe it prevents me from doing either.

I have a lot of painfully deep lows. Other times I can act happy and active. I am afraid of people in general. The lows come from stress of living with my husband. He triggers the rejection, neglect and manipulation by lies. Then I wish I was dead again.

I can't watch the news because so negative and so are movies and TV for the most part. Instead I throw myself into projects and stay away from my husband. I try to be aware when someone is using me and avoid it. I try to learn more about the brain and behavior and mental illnesses, which helps me not to blame myself.

I am 67 and I believe I will never be free of the desire to die because the emotional damage done in the past changed my brain to make me overly sensitive to the triggers that caused the pain in the first place.

It is only because I have since met people who are healthy and who show true care and concern, that I was able to realize that the input into my life was not nurturing, but it was destructive, and much of it was not true. Loving people are few and far between, at least those who understand what caused my depression. Meeting them gave me a foundation of a different reality.

Anti-depressants don't work, nor did talk therapy. Only EMDR therapy helped me grow out of some of my trapped thinking. I depend on Baclofen, a muscle relaxant for migraines that also reduces the high fear response in my hippocampus, and anti-anxiety meds.

Seeking to be with people who are compassionate and don't give unrequested, unhelpful advice is a goal that keeps me from always wanting to die.

 

[Heather]

I struggle with this too. When things get really stressful.. I immediately wish I'd get hit by a bus or imagine myself running screaming into traffic.

I think its an old pattern...when all I see is despair but if I allow myself some time..that feeling eventually subsides.

I feel for your struggle

 

[angel2write]

I'd be interested in the answer to this question, too.

 

[Jody]

Hello I am so sorry for all the hurt & pain you had endured. I was wondering how emdr helped you in ways/changed the way you think? I'm having a difficult time with emdr and sort of fear the experience during therapy and feel extremely tired after. In brings on panic attacks crying etc. my body acts out but my mind won't remember just curious if this was something for you the longer you did it the easier it got ?

 

[moomin]

I have them a lot. And now I can ask for and get help and support it upsets me as I have something to compare it to.

Distraction, self care and DBT have helped me...

 

[whiteraven]

I've dealt with suicidal feelings on-and-off for 40+ years. Now, I still have them, but I am more consistently thinking about the fact that life lacks any sort of purpose and I *could* die any moment (from anything) and what is the point? No amount of logical reasoning helps this - I mean, I'm Buddhist, and I am perfectly aware of the impermanence of everything. I've studied mindfulness and, in fact, it is the only thing that ever helped my depression. But I seem to be stuck in this place that will not allow me to move forward and has me terrified of the moment I am in.

 

[recoveringfromptsd]

I would have to say for some of us the answer unfortunately is yes. But what does change is we get better at asking for help. And we get better at dealing with it, and the stressors that lead to it.

I don't think I can remember a day that I did not feel I would be happy with being dead. But thinks are not that simple. I just get thru the days trying to improve but I would not complain if circumstance made me dead if I saw it coming.

Some here might jump and say that's suicidal ideation, go get help. Well my T knows how I feel, and she understands for me its get better or be dead. So we focus on the getting better. When I had hit a road block like getting into SP she never hesitated to call the sheriff on me because she knows how I feel.

She is a very good therapist, she is direct about things, and the boundaries are always clear, I always know where I stand with her. This is the first time in my life I have been moving forward. So that is what I focus on, if that fails well its no secret how i feel and what might happen. But I don't think that's going to happen. I am getting the right care where I am.

 

[Knak]

Hello I am so sorry for all the hurt & pain you had endured. I was wondering how emdr helped you in ways/c...

Finding the right person is the most important factor I believe. They need to really understand EMDR and keep up to date and really put the client first. I was very fortunate to find a therapist I trusted because she had similar values, experiences, and was the same age, and was not judgemental for the most part.

I also think it's helpful if the therapist has undergone trauma and gotten through it to a healthy resolution, so they know innately what is happening to your body or brain. You shouldn't leave a session without feeling you reached a peaceful point. That's not easy. Time goes fast.

She used the tappers to ingrain a safe word related to a time when I felt peace, and taught self tapping techniques. She told me to call whenever I needed to but I never did.

She used alternating hand held buzzers so I could close my eyes and she didn't keep waving a pencil or tapping me herself, just listened and wrote notes and gave direction or insight. I worked on one incident at a time. Every time I reached the end of the thought nerve path we went back to the original problem and started again, because other things were attached to the original problem. We did it over and over until there was nothing left that bothered me or came to mind when I thought of the original incident.

She would stop me every few seconds (or I could stop) to say what I was thinking right then and if it was not healthy she'd put me on the right path using reason or incite.

She used a fairly simple problem to train me with the technique. Then did one on my mom, and then one on my dad, then my husband. It was a huge impact when I got past thoughts that distorted my perception and I could grow emotionally. That took about 2-3 years?

After that, the rest of the problems I brought up never got far because I think she was treading on unfamiliar territory and my brain is too complex because I've never had a break from abuse and neglect and still live in a dangerous relationship.

I had to quit after 7 years because I started getting worse. She either wanted me to talk or kept changing the topics of the EMDR and then things weren't resolved so I'd go into a trance and had accidents driving home.

I still use it on myself, tapping each side with arms crossed, but It's harder to stay on task.

I am reading a lot about how the brain changes with trauma because I am stuck married to a narcissist and can't get out. I am reading about mind control techniques which destroy ability to recognize reality. It can be passed on generationally.