Wednesday 13 November 2013

Suicide

While I am feeling partially coherent for now I thought I would take the opportunity to quickly tackle one of the subjects I wanted to talk about before I end up incapacitated by dizziness again.

Suicide. An ugly and taboo word to most, a saving grace for some and an escape for others. I will be talking about my own experiences with attempted suicide, the motivations and feelings.
I have in the past attempted to take my own life but contrary to popular belief I haven't actually planned out my suicide. I do however fantasize about my death, I often imagine hanging myself from a tree in an isolated and quiet area. I don't want or need an audience. These are just fantasies however and they seem to help calm me when I feel anxious or on the edge of panic. I don't know why thoughts of my own death calm me but they do. I haven't ever written a suicide note, set a place or time to take my own life or anything else people imagine to be the standard for taking ones own life. My motivations for suicide and the shape it takes are quite different. When faced with something I can't cope with, which invariably is caused by other people, be it something small or large doesn't matter. My reaction of panic and an overwhelming desire to escape take control. Your not able to think when in this state, your only desire being to get away from whatever is causing you to panic. It could be a person, a sound, a general overwhelmingness of sensory bombardment. You just want everything to stop so you can breathe. Almost like a form of Claustrophobia but for many variable situations rather than just the one of enclosed spaces. You have to get out, you can't breathe, you want time to stop but none of that happens so the closest thing? Death.
I remember one time particularly when a boss at one of my previous workplaces ordered me to work in an area I didn't like working in. A small, tiny thing that could have been sorted by conversation.... maybe. You'd have to have known the person who was my boss at the time. Not a pleasant man.
This small incident sent me into the familiar course of panic, flee and seeking of escape. I just walked straight out of my work place and headed for the nearest tall place that was sure to take my life should I fall from it. I wasn't thinking, I couldn't think. It was impossible to. All that repeated in my mind was that I had to get away. What I was actually about to do never seemed to me at the time like a permanent solution to a temporary problem. For hours I would stand fighting with myself upon such high places ready to take my own life for the ironic desire to breathe.
After years of many such incident, through which I obviously survived, I spent a lot of time thinking about why I did this. How I could stop it or at least lessen it's effect.
I found that people were my trigger and a powerful one at that. Ever since I have isolated myself at home and so long as I continue to take my medication I am reasonably ok.
Yet every time I have attempted to go out that familiar sense of panic and desire to escape rises up.
I can never lead a standard life without the high risk of spontaneous suicide.
These feelings only become stronger as I get older. Eventually I will die by my own hand I am certain of that rather than of natural causes. It could be tomorrow or decades from now. It's only a matter of time.
I am comfortable with the idea of my own death but I don't want to live in constant panic and anxiety. I want to live in peace, quiet and isolation.

This is actually a much deeper subject than just my own experiences however so I will end this post here and think about what sub-topic I can write about next on the same issue.

Thank you for reading.

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