People ending their lives?

[girlfriend44]

Are more and more people giving up on life? Heard another suicide today and its going to be debated in Parliament tomorrow?

Is it because mental health services are poor, have they always been poor?
Is life just getting harder for people?
Or has it always been hard?

I can remember when suicide was rare now you hear it so much sadly.

I know when I was actively suicidal I genuinely believed that I would be doing it for my family. To set them free from the burden of me. I believed they'd be happy and their lives would be so much better once they didn't have to suffer me!

Your thinking is so very different. People can look at you and say you're selfish but it's just not true. You truly think that you are acting in the best interests of those around you and that they'll be relieved.

Or at least I did. I was genuinely shocked when my husband said he would have been devastated. I tried to explain to him all the ways in which he and our children would have better lives and I remember being completely confused why he couldn't see it because it made perfect sense to me.

I don’t. ( you’ll be pleased to know - how rude!)

I don’t actually have the job anymore. But essentially it was my job to review. I based my post on ACTUAL findings. Everything I said there was true.

How can you post be based on "ACTUAL findings" when it is mostly opinion, @Youcannotbeseriousreally? What "findings"? Presumably not the findings of the many inquests that find serious failures in care, staffing, leadership and safeguarding in MH provision contributing to deaths by suicide?

(Your "how rude!" comment further reveals your attitude.)

Suicide was illegal 50 years ago and treated as a mortal sin by the church https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-14374296

Clearly we have mega problems with access to MH care. unfortunately, I don’t think any “reviews” of the system will help because we also have similar problems with access to physical health care. People die before they can get to see doctors all the time. Waiting lists are ridiculous, often over a year to see a consultant. Treatment is rationed and there is a whole generation of doctors who seem to have been trained to tell people to go away instead of treating a problem. My mil begged for help for years, batted between GP and consultants. Way too late by the time they actually found the cancer.

I don’t know the answer

Suicide and mental health need to be talked about.

Especially as the government has thrown a monumental wrecking ball at mental health, in the shape of three prolonged and extremely damaging lockdowns, exacerbated by an inhumane campaign of fear, pure cruelty to children during their formative years, and a prime minister who laughed at us while deliberately breaking the rules that he set, and desperately tried to play the idiot's defence when he was caught red-handed.

Are they going to do anything to put this right, such as increasing the mental health budget for those whose mental heath was shattered by their cruel lockdowns? Are they even going to admit that prolonged lockdowns, school closures and relentless fearmongering caused massive damage to mental health? Can pigs fly?

I am still extremely angry about this. The way the government treated the public (especially children) was absolutely CRIMINAL. I will never forgive or forget this for the rest of my life.

I concur with thinking it is a genuine benefit for your family. In my case my family will actually SAY it even when they aren’t cross (why don’t you kill yourself properly, if you really wanted to you would have done it years ago).

I thought it decreased from the 1980s because more people have access to proper pain management and mental Healthcare.

The title says quite enough for people to make their own decisions.

It is selfish in that the impact on others is devastating yet it’s not as the person believes they have no other option. Very complicated situation

And please don’t try to police others saying commit suicide. People are entitled to use whatever terms they like. I will always use the term that my brother in law committed suicide after murdering my sister. He was mentally ill.I loved them both. M and T xxxxx

It isn't more common, its just talked about more.

Methods of suicide recognised now such as crashing into a power pole or tree or drowning oneself were not previously recognises, they were assumed to be accidents.

I think it is a popular understanding that a lot of single-vehicle road accidents "lost control, drove into concrete overpass abutment" are written up that way so the surviving partner can claim the life insurance.

Depressing to see comments that simply aging would cause posters to end their lives. Not the point of the thread but: We have an aging problem in this country. Too often it’s seen as a ticket to decay and poor care rather than wisdom and love from caregivers. Services are awful and I can see the point of posts saying they would rather end it than be infirm at the mercy of the state. It’s within our power to end this though. If we think about the services we are likely to need as an aging population and work towards improving them both financially and our weird attitude to aging on then old age might not seem so bad or sad.

It’s impossible to describe to someone who hasn’t experienced it, the sheer agony suicidal people are in - it’s not really about the ‘people left behind’ most often they don’t have the capacity to care about that in the least. The level of pain is often unbearable and a living nightmare.
I don’t think we can take away that choice. It’s their life. We can offer as much support and care as we can, and many people hit the rock bottom and bounce up, and some people don’t.

For the people left behind, it is extremely hard but that is something they need help with, but you can’t expect a person in dire straits to consider that in their darkest hour. Often the only thing you can do is offer love, comfort and support to that person - not judgement and shame.

Absolutely nobody chooses to be in that position, and unreserved dignity, non judgment and respect is required.

Yeah I fecking hate the outpouring of "it's so selfish" etc. Because being mentally ill is selfish? C'mon

Why? The clue is in the title!!

You wouldn’t blame someone with heart failure - there is no difference. It’s not a ‘choice’ for some/ most people.

It really doesn’t…..🙄

Young males committing suicide seems to be very prevalent where I'm from (working class, deprived area). In this area, the culture this generation of men were very much brought up to 'be men' and 'don't cry like a girl'. I think it led to a whole host of now adult males who don't know how to share feelings and being shamed for doing so. Just my observation but really sad.

I'm raising two boys and feel this has impacted a little how I am with them. We talk a lot, are really open with them, it's ok to have feelings and to be upset...

I agree with this for the most part.

One of my closest friends killed themselves. It was decades ago now, but they never, ever gave any hint that they were feeling low, had ideation, there was no interaction or history with mental health services, nothing at all that could have even so much as hinted at what they were planning to do. It obviously devastated their family, and I've seen how it has changed and affected them as people due to staying in touch with them down the years. I can relate in some way to them because it seriously affected me for a long time before I was really able to process it. I've also lost a close family member to accident who was around the same age as my friend, and in truth the effect on their family is much the same.

You can say "well there was no need for friend to take their own life", and that is true, but there was also no need for my family member to be doing the activity they were that caused the accident that killed them.

I've had periods of really poor mental health in my life where suicidal ideation was a constant theme, and to be perfectly honest, even given what I know about how death affected both families, the thought of how mine would react if I had acted on the ideation never, ever entered my mind. It simply isn't a consideration, and I don't see why it should be given that my life is not theirs to decide what to do with.

I work in mental health, I am trained in mental health first-aid, part of which means dealing appropriately with people who are clearly in crisis and may be at the point where they are either planning, or in the act of attempting suicide. While I would always do everything I could to discourage, protect, and help them, I'm of a mind that if someone is so genuinely bereft of any desire to live that they want to die, then nobody has any right to judge them for acting on that. I think that if my friend was so desperately unhappy that they felt the need to do what they did, then I'm happy for them that the suffering ended for them as soon as they went through with the act.

Of course I wonder if they may have felt differently later in their life had they lived, and perhaps at some future point they'd have been glad to have not gone through with their plan, but it's also possible that may never have been the case, which is why I've never been able to feel any anger towards them, or felt it in any away appropriate to judge them for what they did.

If I had severe pain, limited options and very little enjoyment in life then no-one would take away my right to finish it.

Agreed!

I think given the title is very clearly about suicide, if you find that subject upsetting you can ignore the thread entirely.

Already posted about this

I’m sorry about the people you’ve lost.

Probably not a popular view, but I think MH services are only accountable if someone dies whilst in their care... and by that I mean inpatient. Suicides in hospitals should never be allowed to happen.

Sadly and unforgivably this happens way too often.