*SENSITIVE* AIBU to think some people come across as ignorant nobs about suicide? *TRIGGERS*

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FB (sorry!) friend posted a status update complaining about being late home last night because someone threw themselves under their train. She and one of her FB friends (who I don't know) swapped several comments which included the phrases "selfish", "inconsiderate", "I would quite like to get home and enjoy my life thank you very much" etc.

I posted fairly mildly saying that it must have been frustrating but at least it was a minor inconvenience for her in the scheme of things and it was safe to say the other person, not to mention the driver, had had a far worse day. FB friend then claimed it was "light-hearted" and said they could post what they liked on their own news feed. I said that for some people, there is nothing "light-hearted" about suicide and they couldn't guarantee some of those people wouldn't be using social media; if they chose to post about a sensitive subject they could expect to get pulled up on it.

It wasn't long before I was accused (by FB friend's friend IYSWIM) of being "PC" (oh, how original) and of "attacking" my friend. I reiterated that this was an emotive subject and that maybe they should step back, re-read with an open mind and see that they weren't coming across as very empathic. And then I left it as it was starting to get to me.

AIBU to think that a woman in her 30s should have a bit more compassion about someone in the absolute depths of despair? Or am I being a sanctimonious old trout and "dictating" (that word was used too) what people can and can't say on their FB timeline?

I think if she'd said "sorry, I know I came across as a bit me me me - I was just letting off steam" it wouldn't have bothered me, but to use the word "light-hearted" as self-justification (there was nothing inherently humorous, OTT-for-effect or anything else to suggest light-heartedness about her OP - just a straight rant at have her evening plans disrupted) seemed totally inappropriate.

Sorry X Post.

Dawndonna - I, too, was in that position, and ended up having my stomach pumped, as I mentioned, and being an inpatient in a paediatric psych ward when I was just 14, due to exactly the things you mention, and worse.

But once I was out of that situation, and had DC's? No way could I leave them by committing suicide, no matter how close I came, hundreds (literally) of pills in front of me, because I couldn't put them through what I had had to go through. I sought help instead.

For those who moan about the suicides, perhaps they could donate some money to the Samaritans, who might just prevent one of their trains being delayed.

Excellent post.

I DO think that going through that has made me possibly rather harsh on those with MH issues that DON'T seek treatment - I see even that refusal as such a SELFISH act, because they aren't caring about anyone else but themselves. Which is the dictionary definition of selfish. Ok, it's the MH problems that are the CAUSE of that selfishness, but it's still inexcusable in my eyes, if it is going to affect someone else's life, and they refuse to get help.

I guess that's why I have every sympathy with those with MH issues who accept therapy, and medications, and very little to none for those that won't.

It HAS made me a harsher person in that respect, which doesn't actually tally with the way I am in most other areas of my life, the ability I have in everything else to see both sides of the coin. I just can't see that the suffering of the one that commits suicide is in any way even CLOSE to the ones they leave behind. And I can't see the flip side of not accepting help because of the MH issues, because mine were rather bad (enough to require being admitted onto psych wards 5+ times in my life), yet thinking about how it would affect my DC's stopped me.

It still affects me now, when I look at my DC's to know that if he had just GOT SOME FUCKING HELP, he would have made an amazing granddad for my DC's, yet he will never meet them. (Not religious, no beliefs in afterlife, neither did he...)

For those who moan about the suicides, perhaps they could donate some money to the Samaritans, who might just prevent one of their trains being delayed.

Very true. I also donate to the chaplaincy at Beachy Head, which goes towards having people 'stationed' there to talk people out of jumping. They've saved quite a few lives, I believe.

And that's why the one area of MN I rarely go to is the MH boards - because I doubt that what I feel is going to help anyone. Despite it being the TRUTH for those that are left behind.

I love my Dad, and despise his selfishness at the same time.

Which is actually possible to do in equal measures...

Ok, it's the MH problems that are the CAUSE of that selfishness, but it's still inexcusable in my eyes, if it is going to affect someone else's life, and they refuse to get help

Perhaps they've tried to get help, perhaps treatment has failed. Mental health issues are complex and every case is different and has to be treated as such. I just dont know how you can accuse someone who has a serious mental health issue selfish when that person is not in a sound frame of mind. They cannot help their actions, to them what they are doing is right.

There just isn't enough help and resources out there for people with mental health issues and in my opinion society as a whole is not very tolerant of people with them.

CouthyMow I'm truly sorry to read of your experiences.

All I can say is that mental illness, possibly more than any other medical condition, affects people is such an individual way, bound up as it so often is with inherent personality traits and thought patterns, that the same apparent trigger in two different people can have two very different manifestations or outcomes.

I don't see someone who is unable to access or respond to MH treatment as a worse or weaker person than someone who is. I just see them as unluckier.

CM, I can completely understand why you judge your father harshly. I suspect he probably judged himself harsher still.

To be angry at someone for developing the kind of MH issue that means they feel unable to seek help when others in a similar position can seems pointless, if understandable human nature. It's like being angry at someone for contracting a terminal form of cancer rather than one with a high treatment success rate.

MrsDeVere

I totally agree with you, if James had died as the result of an injury or a physical illness, people would have responded differently. I had colleagues who made pretty insensitve comments after his death because 'he did it to himself'

His mental illness was every bit as real as a physical one but because you couldn't see it on the outside, he isn't worthy of any sympathy and respect?

Couthy, I cannot imagine the pain that you have felt over your father, but that doesn't make every person who commits suicide selfish.

James had medication and was being treated when he died, it was just far too little, far too late. He had engaged with the MH team and didn't feel supported or listened to. He was at the end of a long painful road and that doesn't make him selfish, just tired and beaten down by his illness.

Suicide is selfish if ending your pain is selfish.

The trouble with Psychosis is that they iller you are, the less ill you feel. I often used that explanation with my clients and they could relate to it. Many MI do not allow rational thought.

Unfortunately people lump all mental health problems in the same box but it is like comparing Cancer to MS- both shit but very different.

Not all MH problems involve rational thought and if we are using the MHA Act to justify the removal of people to a place of safety and the system fails them, then by definition they are not in control of their thoughts and actions. People do get help or they are compelled to seek it.

Check out the systematic failures in the MH system before blaming them for failing to get well. The recent scandal of Cancer Treatment failures at Colchester Hospital that the media covered with such outrage? You are JUST AS LIKELY to develop a mental health problem. The failings in the MH system are worse but where is the outrage about that?

People don't care about the mentally ill.

The problem is that most people judge the actions of others by their own standards and experiences. If they felt abandoned and treated selfishly, then by definition they see all people who try and succeed with Suicide as behaving in a selfish manner.

I've been in a position of not being in sound mind, I got myself referred to be an inpatient in a psych ward to get help. If you don't do that, then you're being selfish. It is genuinely how I feel. If they've tried to get treatment and it's not worked, then they need to try something else, and something else, to make EVERY attempt NOT to commit suicide, because to do so is to put your own suffering above that of those you will leave behind. Which IS selfish...

your friend has probably never known anyone who has committed suicide , those peoples first reaction is they are selfish , but that person is in such a deep hole they can see no way out , maybe inbox her and see if you can get through to her, it might help make her a bit more compassionate about things in future.

I couldn't bear to read the entire thread, but I got as far as this post by LauraStora "Suicidal people are in mental agony, and the imperative to end that pain can be just as immediate."

It sums up how I feel. If you can't imagine the degree of mental agony so severe that you can't stand another split second of it, try to imagine some hideous kind of physical torture (skinned alive, burned alive) and how you would wish for death NOW. I completely understand people killing themselves by throwing themselves under a tube train. It's because they need to know it's going to work, that they will not survive. The fear of continuing to live is immense and unbearable. The oain really is excruciating.

Yes, of course, I honestly do have enormous sympathy for the driver, the people who have to clear the track and I don't disregard the inconvenience of the delay to passengers, but I still can't and won't condemn the person who died.

This is a very personal subject to me, so I think I'd better leave the computer for a while and go and do something else, because I'm near to tears.

I've been in a position of not being in sound mind, I got myself referred to be an inpatient in a psych ward to get help. If you don't do that, then you're being selfish.

Some people do not realise they are ill, they are unable to make a decision to seek help. You are generalising about mental illness and basing it on your own experience. Every case is different.

Ending your pain with no thought to the pain it will cause to those around you IS selfish. There is a REASON for that selfishness, in the MH problems, but that doesn't make it any less selfish.

For the same reasons, I wouldn't take my own life if I was diagnosed with an aggressive cancer - I would still seek as many treatments as possible in order to gain the longest time with my DC's. Anything else would be to put my own suffering above how much they would suffer if I gave up on life.

What else would you call that but selfish, putting your own feelings above to feelings of those that love you and care for you?

It's selfishness. There may be a REASON for that selfishness, but it doesn't change what selfishness actually is, or the fact that committing suicide is inherently a selfish act, that you suffer less for than those that you leave behind.

It's the easy way out for those in mental anguish. It's the HARDEST way forward for those left behind. And what of the mental anguish that it causes for those letter behind - you are bestowing the same feelings on THEM. How can that NOT be selfish?

You don't want to feel that pain any more... Yet you are ok for those that care about you to have to try to deal with the SAME pain and mental anguish.

It left me with MH issues - is that not selfish? To make me suffer in the same way he had?!

It even left his mother, my Granny, being an inpatient in a psych ward for a time, having never had any MH issues in the past.

HE did that, put HIS pain on other people.

We have had to carry that forward, and will do till the day we die. WE have to cope with it, and seek help for it, and carry on for those that love us, no matter how much we feel that we can't go on at points...

Couthy

Just because you were lucky enough to receive the right sort of care doesn't mean that it is the same all over the country.

Good quality, effective, inpatient care is not widely available.

James had engaged with the help that was available (such as it was) he was taking medication, he was seeing a psych. It was not enough, he was tired and frightened of his illness. He hated what it was making him become. He knew that it was killing him so he chose to end his suffering.

He told his psych that his love for his brother was what had kept him alive for as long. He knew that leaving his brother was going to destroy Sam, but he had run out of options. He was too ill to see any way out.

Wanting him here now with his illness, that is selfish. He was suffering and I cannot bear the thought of my funny, beautiful, brave boy suffering. I miss him more than I have the words to describe but would I want him alive and like that? No because that would be for us, not him. He gave living his all, but in the end, living was too much.

I know this isn't really the point of the thread but while we're talking about being worthy of sympathy and respect. Something that hugely shocks and upsets me in equal measures is what can happen after a person commits suicide depending on their religion and depending on which country they live.
I don't know what happens in the UK regarding this but my Dp's friend was Polish, he had MH issues and it ended with him taking his own life. Poland is predominantly Catholic as was this guy - I understand that he probably shouldn't have had a full Catholic service as he'd committed suicide but he wasn't even allowed to be buried in the churchyard - his body lies in a forest near to his hometown :( this honestly breaks my heart to think that the guy had enough problems in life and he is now ostracised in death.

Couthy, I don't think we'll ever entirely agree on this. The sense I get from your posts is that because you were able to get help for your illness, then you feel everyone should be able to and anyone who doesn't is actively choosing to be selfish.

I see it as: your manifestation of "not-of-sound-mind" is unlikely to have been the exact same manifestation as it presented in your father, and so it is of limited value to compare how you dealt with your condition to how he dealt with his. My DH often describes his own MH condition as a "block". It forces him to shut himself off from everyone. He can no more overcome that alone than a cancer patient can 'will' their tumour smaller or a person who has suffered an amputation can make their leg grow back. It is how his illness acts upon him, and it is unfair to expect mentally ill patients to be able to somehow 'overcome' the symptoms of the manifestation of their particular illness or to judge that by not being able to do so, they are somehow 'choosing' to stay ill. It does not feel like a choice, not to my DH. It feels like all other options have been taken away from him. I have sat next to him while he lay in bed sobbing and apologising for being so useless and wishing he could feel different. Unfortunately wishing isn't enough.

I guess my definition of "selfish" involves an active choice to deliberately put oneself's needs ahead of anyone else's, and I don't see the actions - or inactions - forced upon people in the grip of often devastating mental illness by the symptoms of that illness as an "active choice". My experience of suicide and suicide attempts has taught me that on the contrary, all too often the individual genuinely believes that suicide is the unselfish option because it removes the useless pathetic burden that they feel they have become from the shoulders of those they love.

Sometimes, I wish we had a like button on here. Select has summed it up much better than I have. If love and want had been enough, James would be here with us now. We couldn't love him better anymore than he could.

Whilst I can see your points of view, and can see that it is ALSO selfish to have wanted my father to be here whilst still suffering (which I DO accept is selfish of ME, I have fully explored this through therapy...) it doesn't change the fact that it is ALSO selfish of him to have committed suicide.

We all have selfishness within us, it's whether we chose to ignore that or not that makes us truly selfish or not.

I can understand how hard it is to get treatments - you don't think it was easy for me to get, or handed to me on a plate, do you? I've broken myself financially in the past to pay for treatment as the NHS wasn't providing anything but pills - the hospital Mignonette mentions happens to have been my local hospital for the last 16 years, and if you think their MH services are any better or different to their cancer services, you'd be wrong - the whole hospital and PCT is run in the same way...

But the fact remains that it is JUST as selfish for him to have committed suicide as it is for me to want him to still be around and suffering...

Doesn't make what he did any less selfish than I am, though...

A lot of people with mh issues don't know they have these issues. I deal with people every day who believe what they are telling me. Stuff that isn't happening, like they have been micro chipped by a neighbour who us putting thoughts into their head. They truly believe it. How can you help someone who believes that? Obviously there are other examples but way too many to go into.