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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To state that suicide is NOT a selfish act ?

466 replies

Coffeenowplease · 10/08/2013 21:14

Really riled by this. People who commit suicide are ill and by the nature of their illness cannot think rationally so therefore cannot be "selfish" and think of the damage it causes to others.

I am so angry by this I had to make a post just to get it out.

Feel free to discuss.

OP posts:
SauceForTheGander · 11/08/2013 00:10

The ramifications of a suicide in a family can affect generations.

My uncle killed himself nearly 50 years ago, well before I was born, but we bear the burden of his decision. I don't see him as selfish but I do think that if he could have possibly known the impact of his actions he might have acted differently.

But that's the dilemma - suicidal people believe themselves to be worthless - but they never are. And their deaths are felt and suffered for decades and decades.

expatinscotland · 11/08/2013 00:11

Absolutely, Boo.

Ever seen a person battle for their lives, even whilst unconscious? Because I have. Many times, not just with my daughter.

It is human nature to cling to live.

Not doing so is something else.

I just can't stand here and judge, when I know those who lost.

BoozyBear · 11/08/2013 00:12

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

SoniaGluck · 11/08/2013 00:13

I would like to contribute more to this thread but I honestly don't know what to say and am finding some of the things being said quite upsetting.

I don't think that serves any purpose whatsoever to turn this in to a fight.

The only thing that I will say before I bow out is that I feel a great deal of compassion for anyone who feels their life is so pointless that they consider putting an end to it. I don't think that people, generally speaking, do that on a whim or for trivial reasons.

Having said that, people will think as they wish whatever the arguments to the contrary.

Anyway, I'm off to bed. Goodnight all.

Turniptwirl · 11/08/2013 00:14

I think most people who kill themselves feel so worthless that they honestly can't imagine the devastating effect on those who love them because they don't believe in that love.

I don't think it's a helpful attitude that suicide is selfish. It makes people who are feeling awful already feel even worse because they're selfish and therefore a bad person.

Bathsheba · 11/08/2013 00:14

Sorry - ultimate Mumsnet crime but I've not read the rest of the thread.

I hate myself. I've been horrifically far all my life and I hate myself. I've only has suicidal thoughts since I've had my children. It's the fact that I have my (amazing) children that I've stopped myself. The thought of never cuddling them again has always pulled me back. That's all. I hate myself.

reallyslummymummy · 11/08/2013 00:16

Dancing - the husband must have been depressed - how does anyone know he wasn't?

Some people are really good at putting a face on. DH did not even guess that when my eldest started school I felt properly depressed and cried everyday for 6 months. I had really bad thoughts - not quite suicidal but maybe not far off (it brought back a particular bad memory).

No one in their right mind would think "today I am going to kill myself just to prove a point".

With some people you just can't tell what their particular struggle is or what is going on inside their soul. Some people, like me and my family are very good at bottling up and that is possibly the most toxic thing to do.

MCos · 11/08/2013 00:16

Lost close family to suicide.
My opinion, it is an act of pure despair.
But it leaves such devastation in its wake.
My heart goes out to the sufferers and their families.

Altinkum · 11/08/2013 00:18

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

LunaticFringe · 11/08/2013 00:18

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

expatinscotland · 11/08/2013 00:19

'but in doing that expat she is riding roughshod over other peoples feelings.

what sympathy is she showing my bereavement? None, because my opinion having gone through it doesn't correlate with hers.'

She's sick, Boozy. Fucking whacked out of her mind! She thinks she is better off removing herself and her lack of sympathy, as it were, and her depression and despair from the entire fucking world because she is that fucking sick.

She is not thinking straight.

Onesleeptillwembley · 11/08/2013 00:19

Suicide is done for all manner of reasons. One that hasn't been mentioned is spite/anger.

LifeOfSigh · 11/08/2013 00:20

I've had to name change for this as it may out me.

My DF committed suicide when I was pregnant with DS2. I've never been able to tell anybody how he did it as it was just so horrendous. My Dsis had been diagnosed with cancer 6 days previously and he didn't know. She fought for 6 years to stay alive and he committed suicide because he was an alcoholic. Did he have MH problems? Of course he did but he self medicated. ( although he did visit his GP the day before and said he was suicidal and the GP wrote him a prescription for AD's and sent him on his way)

My DB committed suicide 4 years ago aged 44. He hung himself. My poor mum has lost two of her children and I have lost both of my siblings and my DF
( they divorced when I was 12, we begged her to)

I want to ask CoffeenowPlease What did you hope to gain by posting this thread? What about the people on here with MH problems and the bereaved? I hope you are just naive and I'm sure it wasn't with any malice, but I hope it's nothing you've experienced yourself or ever will.

When people commit suicide the only thing they do all have in common is that it is tragic, devasting and terribly sad. My DF and DB did it for their own reasons, knowing what my DM went through losing her daughter, then it is hard not to say my brother was selfish, but I don't think the effects on others was going to be on his mind, just as it wasn't on my DF's mind.

I'll never get over it, but I do get on with it. I can't forgive them due to the pain my sister went through when she died at 42. She wanted to live. I loved her with all my heart.

JenniBoo · 11/08/2013 00:20

Bathsheba you sound ill. Please don't hurt yourself. You are a needed and loved person even if that is hard to imagine. Please tell someone in real life - your mum, your best friend, husband, HV - anyone...

Killing yourself would create terrible pain in the life of everyone you love... it doesn't need to be like that - please seek some help... just tell one person. I care about you, and want you to pull through this and be happy xx

expatinscotland · 11/08/2013 00:22

You think she doesn't realise she should be more sympathetic, the better person, the bigger mother, the whatever? She beats herself up about it. All the time. She can't, she just can't, and so she thinks she is a bad, bad person. A person who does not deserve to even live but to die.

I have not met a single parent of a child who committed suicide, and now I have met several, in areas where those whose children are dead, for whatever reason and by whatever means, can go and not be judged, who considers their child's act a selfish one? Because I haven't. I just haven't.

expatinscotland · 11/08/2013 00:23

Thank you, Life, and I am very sorry for your losses.

Bathsheba · 11/08/2013 00:25

I have diagnosed anxiety. My DH has MH problems... We aren't perfect. No one understands or could understand how much I hate my physical body. I'd tell my closest fiends but one of us is about to have a baby any second now, I have a dietician - I'd tell her but I think she I'd just in the zone to say "eat less cakes"

garlicagain · 11/08/2013 00:29

It is staggering to see so many people whine that suicide is selfish! Yes, it causes suffering. Yes, some suicides are aware of this but do it anyway. When they do, they sacrifice their life. Their whole future, any dreams they might have remaining, even down to the ice-creams they'll never eat, the jokes they'll never hear and the shits they'll never take. Something is so massively painful to them, at that time, they will knowingly give up everything and leave others to continue without them.

Selfish? Are you out of your minds?!

BrokenSunglasses · 11/08/2013 00:30

People commit suicide for many different reasons, it's impossible to generalise and to pass comment on all suicides.

Sometimes it's selfish, sometimes it isn't. Sometimes it is selfish, but its understandable and reasonable selfishness.

Either way, it's tragic, and it's pointless trying to second guess what was in someone else's mind.

Altinkum · 11/08/2013 00:31

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

LifeOfSigh · 11/08/2013 00:32

Thank you Expat How very kind of you, give your own loss.

So sorry Flowers

dancingwithmyselfandthecat · 11/08/2013 00:33

reallyslummy none of us will ever know, now. We do know that he was in a situation which was shit (facing potential jail sentence) and we do know that must have been awful for him. But we also know that timing it so his son found him, and writing the note he did, was awful awful awful.

But the main point I am trying to make is that going down the blame route - of the person who killed themselves, other people in their life or of yourself - is totally poisonous. And focusing on the "selfishness" of the act - even if objectively it strongly appears that way (as in the case above) is only going to let that poison in because it is another way of blaming.

Mimishimi · 11/08/2013 00:34

It depends on how they do it too though. Someone who jumps in front of a train or jumps off a building, they're potentially putting other lives at risk and greatly traumatising large numbers of people. On Friday, I was an hour late getting home due to "a fatality on the line at X". The poor train driver :( He will feel like a killer even though none if it is his fault. If someone takes their life in a manner which doesn't put the lives of others at risk or cause others to feel like if's been done by their own hand, it is less selfish although it is still going to have a very sad impact on those who knew/found them.

issey6cats · 11/08/2013 00:35

my dad commited suicide when i was 9 year old and my brother was 8 years old, one day i had a normal loving family with a dad i adored a mom and a brother, by hwta he did i spent probably most of my life thinking my dad did not love me enough as killing himself was his choice not mine, he took away all the life we should have had together as a someone older than 9 years old, no teen conversations, no being able to ask him about his life before i was aware of him as a dad, no walk up the aisle on my dads arm for me, teased at school over it because one child in my class who was a neighbour told everyone, couldnt even do the career i wanted because in the 1970s my mom could not afford to send me to university to become a vet for 7 years, so yes sorry but i personally think he was selfish, wasnt mental illness, was because he owed someone money

GoshAnneGorilla · 11/08/2013 00:39

Surely one of the most tortuous things about suicide is all the unanswered questions for those left behind? We can try to deduce or guess why someone has taken their own life, but will we ever truly know?

I do think it's an important topic to discuss, because it's the only way to dispel many of the myths surrounding it and to ensure people get help - but I don't think it's an AIBU topic.