To think that people who moan on facebook about being delayed after someone has committed suicide under a train are insensitive twats?

My friend missed getting to her father's deathbed in time to say goodbye because of train delays caused by someone jumping.

I don't think suicide is selfish, but I don't think people who have been delayed are saying that all suicide is selfish, just the method. Someone very close to me once said she considered suicide by tube but couldn't do that to the driver/passangers/delayed people. She committed suicide by a different method a week later

Epiphany makes an important point. When you commute every day, I'm afraid you hear about people under trains so often you can't possibly have the time or emotional space to think about the personal torment of each one. It's too common - if you thought deeply about each one, you'd go mad.

Tonight I heard announcements on the underground about one person under a train (not my line) and then when I got to my main line station, the trains were delayed because of another one. Horrible for their families but...

My Dad once saw someone jump from a train - he was walking through, in the days when they had corridors and slam doors, and when he came into the empty (not open) buffet car, there was a girl sitting on the floor of the train with the door open, her legs outside. He hesitated, not knowing whether he should try to grab her, or talk to her, or whether it would startle her into falling - she looked round at him and jumped. Took him a long time to get over that one.

the people effected by this can go on the seek help, something this poor person didn't have.

i have suffered from PND depression and it was hell on earth. i can't even imagine how it must feel to be that low

I can understand why people whose trains are delayed are annoyed but if thwy had actually been on the train that was involved in the incident they would probably feel very differently.

The next bit is a bit graphic - sorry

I was on a train to Paddington one afternoon. Just outside Southall the carriage started to judder and sway and there was a clattering noise. It felt for several seconds as though the train was going to derail.

I was very frightened.

The driver put the brakes on hard and the train came to a very abrupt stop. I thought there had been some sort of mechanical / track problem.

We had come to a halt over a bridge crossing the main road. Within minutes Police and Ambulances staerted to be seen blue-lighting aling the road beneath us. A short time later we started to see emergency services people walking down the side of the train.

The guard confirmed that we had hit someone and we would be delayed until the Police gave us the OK to proceed. That came about an hour later.

No one on the train complained. I think we were in shock - I was definitely shocked. We all just sat in silence.

Finally arrived very late into Paddington and the train stopped in an area that was away from the main platforms. Presumably so it could be examined for whatever.

The delay meant I missed my meeting but that didn't bother me at all. I just took the next train back home. The entire GWR network was disrupted that day by that incident.

It took a long time to get the horror of it out of my mind. I wanted to know who it was. It was 17yr old Asian girl. I cannot imagine the despair that she must have felt to feel compelled to do what she did.

These people are in such depths of despair that rational thought is not a feature. They are not selfish. They have lost the ability to think through the consequences of their actions. They are just ensuring that a course of action they are hell bent upon (i.e. dying) is effectively executed.

I still think of her every time I take the train.

Just read this as I have a professional interest (I am a train guard). Unfortunately, suicide on the railway is all too common. I have been delayed getting home to my children countless times but have never once thought the person to be selfish. I recall a few years ago, a 17 year old girl took her life, trains were severly delayed and as I was standing on the platform at a London mainline station, a business man approached me and asked why his train was late, I told him that a person had been struck by a train. (we never assume suicide as accidents happen too and we rarely give details unless asked as it can upset some). He launched into a rant about the selfish bastards that do this, I asked if he would like the 17 year olds mothers phone number to rant at her instead, he looked less ashamed than he should and stormed off.
Suicide costs the railway companies thousands of pounds but its nothing compared to the cost to the family.

Sorry for your losses, zeno. You're right, there's really no difference between cancer and depression in some ways.

Thank you for the symapthy. I appreciate it.

I think the point I want to make is that each of my three loved ones had what turned out to be a terminal medical condition. When I talk to my younger daughter about them, in each case we say that the person became very ill and that the doctors were not able to fix them. The differences are in the type of illness and the timescales.

I remember when I first started commuting into London I was horrified to hear an announcement of delays due to a 'person under a train'. It didn't even occur to me to be annoyed about the delay, it was just so awful to think of that poor person. But you do become 'immune' to it after a while, sadly it's something that happens so often.

I would never make a comment like the one mentioned in the OP, but if I'm honest I have to admit that my main feeling now is irritation. Not nice, but it's true for many of us, I think.

When I think about it though, it's a pretty terrible situation we're in where it's so common for people to be ending their lives like this. I would never have dreamed it was such a frequent occurrence.

I am sorry zeno, so so sorry,

I always feel sad when I hear the "person under a train" (horrible expression) announcements on the tube.

Suicide is not "selfish", you can't view it in those simplistic terms.

porcamiseria yes you're right. Sad and terrible.

yup, its very common that rather than de they just end up disabled. but whatever happens, its sad and terrible

just that if my time comes, I will NOT be jumping under a train, for sure

porcamiseria losing their limbs? Do you mean if the train jumping fails? (Just clarifying) well yes, that is true.

You are right though, it's tragic that people get to that point in their lives.

There's no need for anyone to vilify them further

@ zeno

dont agree, loads of people just end up losing their limbs and are frankly even more depressed, christ alive....

Its a horrible thing and I agree with OP, but I do think its a particularly cruel way to do it, fuck knows they are all cruel

My sister killed herself. My daughter died suddenly in the night. My Mum died of cancer.

Of the three, I'd say my mother behaved most selfishly in her conduct, my sister's death was the hardest to understand, and my daughter's death was the most traumatic.

To those of you labelling suicide a selfish act, I hope you have the good fortune never to have to reassess that view in the light of someone you love killing themselves. In the meantime, please keep your offensive and ignorant comments to yourselves.

I said earlier, the train method is so final that it is used by people who absolutely do not want any chance of surviving.

Porcamiseria because sometimes ODs don't work.

Sometimes people come home earlier than you expected them to and find you.

Sometimes people don't understand enough about their medication and don't take enough to kill them.

Sometimes people just end up with severe brain damage and end up trapped in their bodies for the rest of their natural lives. Which has got to be the worst outcome of all for the individual tbh.

I went to school with a girl whose mum got up in the middle of the night and drove several miles to the middle of Cannock Chase and tried to do it with a hose from the exhaust pipe and a bottle of wine.

She was found by an early morning dog walker and lived. What were the chances of that?! They moved from the area shortly after but the desire to end it all didn't leave her...

YANBU, BUT

I think its a very very selfish way to committ suicide, as Its so fucking awful for the train drivers and the poor fuckers that have to clean them off the line

cant they take an overdose???? if really want to die

Patti I imagine if someone chooses to suffer from drepression... Oh that's right they don't!

samstown incidentally my grandad (mother's father) suffered from alzheimers for many years before he died (just to clarify, his death was the natural progression of the disease and his age, not "assisted" in any way). However, it has made me think very hard about where I stand regarding assisted suicide and my feelings are that it should be legal but I can't even begin to think how it would be monitored to stop people abusing it if it were ever to become legal.

I am afraid that my experience with my mum has made me very bitter. I was 15 when she first actually went through with an overdose (she overdoses on medication she needs to live so we can't keep her away from it) and it was a week before my first GCSE exam. For about 10 years previous to this she had repeatedly threatened to overdose which would lead to me sitting up all night making sure she didn't go through with it. Ever since she first plucked up the "courage" to do actually do it, it was like she couldn't stop and now all it takes is for someone to disagree with her before she does it again.

She has been warned that one more time could make her permanently brain damanged/comatose/dead...that was 2 overdoses ago. My sister and I no longer go with her to the hospital, we call the ambulance and leave her to it. The emotional blackmail is too much now.

Anyway back to the point, I can't feel sympathy because she has no sympathy for us. Her own children who she claims to love more than life have been forced to live with this burden and the knowledge that mum doesn't love us enough to want to live. I know that my mum has her (unreasonable) reasons and problems but it was not fair of her to put that pressure and stress and abuse on her children. I also know that my judgement is clouded by my own experiences and that my feelings may be very childish but unfortunately I can't help that.

Accidents happen all the time, resulting in fatalities, or serious injury and delays to commuters. Do people rant about those in the same way? No, they don't.

faerie - I should imagine because if someone accidentally breaks an arm, they aren't causing hundreds of other people trauma and massive inconvenience which is what jumping in front of a train does.

I am very sympathetic for the person who has decided that their life isn't worth living - that's utterly tragic. But I also have a huge amount of sympathy for those people - the train drivers, the passengers, the witnesses, whose lives may be forever altered by one person's decision to kill themself.

It doesn't make someone a heartless unfeeling bastard to complain about the inconvenience, the fact that they were late to their childminder and weren't able to call because they were underground, the fact that had to pay a late fee which they could ill afford, and were hugely stressed by the whole experience. It makes them human.

I used to think that people who committed suicide were selfish but I dont' think that now. How can I, when people are in abject despair to the point where nothing in their lives means enough for them to stay. To be so alone and so desperate and feeling that you're completely alone in your misery must be hell on earth. I can't feel anything but absolute sadness for them and their families.

Agree with Faeriefruitcake, broken people - and that's what they are - broken human beings who feel they have come to a point that they cannot go on - they deserve compassion and so do their families, not feeling the stigma from emotionally bankrupt people who will hopefully never come close to that level of sorrow.