Do you want to die?

[Daddy Bear]

They watch us, you know.

 

Those who had no choice--the victims of the Holocaust, of the slavers, of the Inquisition, of disease, famine, fire, flood and of every unspeakable torture, injustice and horror devised by man or nature--they watch us driving around in our shiny cars wearing our nice new clothes and talking on our cellphones, eating our Oreos, corn dogs and croissants, watching "Deal Or No Deal" on our color TVs and resting our unbroken bodies in soft, warm beds every night.

 

Those who had no choice--they hear us complain about our lovers jilting us, about our families not understanding who we are, about the fact that we don't have enough friends or money or sex or fun to make life worth living. They see us cry that these problems are surely endless and unendurable, and that we wish we were dead.

 

What do they think of us? What would they give to be in our shoes?

 

Should we feel ashamed?

[blueangel]

We should feel very ashamed. We need unity now. Not this selfishness among society.

 

Once I had to make up a gym class that I missed because I was absent. The next day, in order to do so, after school, my teacher made me go outside with her and the laccrosse team. I had to run around the track in the cold for hours as the laccrosse team practiced in the middle. It was embarrassing and my face and hands became so numb.

 

At this time, we had just finished reading the book called Night by Elie Wiesel in my English class, a book about a boy surviving the Holocaust. I thought about how they ran in the cold in the concentration camps and the ones who ran the longest would get to say alive longer. It was in the blizzards sometimes they did this. Immediately, I stopped feeling so bad for myself and let the wind and cold go through me. It was my own little tribute to everything horrible that had ever happened in our world. Later, my hands were so numb (my teacher forgot about me) that I couldn't open my gym locker to get my clothes out, I couldn't tie my shoes or zip my pants. But I still knew how good I had it.

 

The sadness I shared in the moment with the spirits made me feel alive and it made me want to cry and work hard during every obstacle.

 

Sometimes, when caught up in life, I let that moment go. But posts like this take me back...

[Lady Bugg]

Good thread SB. I definetely think we should feel ashamed for complaining ....with all we have to be grateful for. Absolutely.

 

Especially with the holidays coming up.....when people are even MORE likely to be down, and /or suicidal...we really really need to stop thinking of ourselves..and think more of others. That is certainly a driving force for me.

[Clementine orange]

I went to auschwitz concentration camp a few years ago while on holiday in Eastern Europe. They (the Poles) have made it into a memorial museum type thing. It was a profoundly moving experience, horrifying and sobering.

That day, I promised myself that I would never again complain of being tired, hungry or cold ever again. Pretty lofty promise but whenever I find myself doing a "poor me" way of thinking I almost always think of that day and those people in the camps.

 

I read "night" as well and also "man's search for meaning" by philosopher Viktor Frankle. I read both those books before going there.

 

The experience of being there was so gut wrenching that ever since I have difficulty watching any movies or reading any books regarding this subject.

 

Whenever I see barbed wire I think of it too.

 

It put many things into sharp perspective for me.

[Spugly Fuglet]

"FIRST DROWNED

Remember me, Captain?

CAPTAIN CAT

You're Dancing Williams!

FIRST DROWNED

I lost my step in Nantucket.

SECOND DROWNED

Do you see me. Captain? the white bone talking? I'm Tom-Fred the donkeyman ... We shared the same girl once ... Her name was Mrs Probert...

WOMAN'S VOICE

Rosie Probert, thirty three Duck Lane. Come on up, boys, I'm dead.

THIRD DROWNED

Hold me. Captain, I'm Jonah Jarvis, come to a bad end, very enjoyable...

FOURTH DROWNED

Alfred Pomeroy Jones, sea-lawyer, born in Mumbles, sung like a linnet, crowned you with a flagon, tattooed with mermaids, thirst like a dredger, died of blisters...

FIRST DROWNED

This skull at your earhole is

FIFTH DROWNED

Curly Bevan. Tell my auntie it was me that pawned the ormolu clock...

CAPTAIN CAT

Aye, aye. Curly.

SECOND DROWNED

Tell my missus no my never

THIRD DROWNED

I never done what she said I never...

FOURTH DROWNED

Yes, they did.

FIFTH DROWNED

And who brings coconuts and shawls and parrots to my Gwen now? How's it above?

SECOND DROWNED

Is there rum and laverbread?

THIRD DROWNED

Bosoms and robins?

FOURTH DROWNED

Concertinas?

FIFTH DROWNED

Ebenezer's bell?

FIRST DROWNED

Fighting and onions?

SECOND DROWNED

And sparrows and daisies?

THIRD DROWNED

Tiddlers in a jamjar?

FOURTH DROWNED

Buttermilk and whippets?

FIFTH DROWNED

Rock-a-bye baby?

FIRST DROWNED

Washing on the line?

SECOND DROWNED

And old girls in the snug?

THIRD DROWNED

How's the tenors in Dowlais?

FOURTH DROWNED

Who milks the cows in Maesgwyn?

FIFTH DROWNED

When she smiles, is there dimples?

FIRST DROWNED

What's the smell of parsley?

CAPTAIN CAT

Oh, my dead dears! "

 

From Under milkwood

by Dylan Tommas

 

 

"When she smiles, is there dimples?"

 

 

very good post SB

[robowarrior]

Its not wise to deny your own life and problems in the light of the holocaust victims, you have your own life to live.

[Daddy Bear]

Its not wise to deny your own life and problems in the light of the holocaust victims, you have your own life to live.

haha, robo... although i can't recall a single time when our philosophies agreed, your posts are always welcome in my threads.

[dogheadma]

Everything is not always what it seems. We are being inundated with cancer causing agents in the veritable plethora of packaged, processed and fast foods being fervently pushed at us daily. Biogenetically engineered frankenfruits and vegetables that have been stripped of thier inherent nutritional value and created to stay "fresh" and in stock on our grocery shelves all year round. Manufactures of papers, plastics, metals, and other mystery susbtances being dumped into our skies, rivers, oceans and bodies. Petroleum driven engines that render our air toxic and lethal. Television sets that sooth our minds and tell us that everything's going to be ok as long as we keep buying. Drug companies that want us to believe that they and only they alone can bestow upon us the power to heal ourselves. A greed driven society that says that the only thing that matters is to work, consume, and procreate, in order to keep the wealthy in the lifestyles that they have grown accustomed to. As long as we obey, everything will be fine. Don't question it and for god sake whatever you do, don't think. Give me convinience or give me death; love is for the worthless and the weak and the losers in life. Greed is what we need. F thy neigbor. Don't fool yourself for one minute that we are not being exploited. We are the slaves. It's their world, we just die in it.

 

That being said, I definitely don't believe this world is all doom and gloom but it has just as much evil in it today as it ever did it's just been sugar coated for our convenience. Love and greatness are out there if you really want them. You just have to be brave enough to be open to it and strong enough to think for yourself. That is the true opportunity that our freedom affords us. At the end of the day there are only two things in this world that no one can ever control or take away from you: your mind and your will. And it is in that fact that we are and always will be blessed.

[AwdreeHpburn]

I sort of agre with robo - I at least get what he's saying. I think - Robo, correct me if I'm wrong...

 

We are where we are, ya know?

 

I mean NOT feeling gulity for feeling bad is not an indication of a society on the brink of disaster - I agree we could stand to be a bit more grateful, by far, but are we supposed to feel guilty and bad our whole lives because some idiot decided he was the supreme race and that he was going to get rid of everyone else?

 

I do feel bad, naturally, but for how long and to what end?

[cecerose]

Those who had no choice--the victims of the Holocaust, of the slavers, of the Inquisition, of disease, famine, fire, flood and of every unspeakable torture, injustice and horror devised by man or nature--they watch us driving around in our shiny cars wearing our nice new clothes and talking on our cellphones, eating our Oreos, corn dogs and croissants, watching "Deal Or No Deal" on our color TVs and resting our unbroken bodies in soft, warm beds every night.

 

As a Jewish person, I find the fact you highlighted both the Holocaust and the Inquisition rather disturbing. Anyone with no background in Jewish history reading what you just wrote would probably think: "Jewish = Victim".

 

What about the Jews in the Warsaw uprising? They didn't go quietly to their deaths. And, as a Jew who is a religious agnostic, I'm not quite sure I believe "they" are watching from the great beyond.

 

To compare our individual and private sufferings (as trivial as they may appear to you) with large complex historical events is really not fair. On the flip side, I can honestly say I didn't choose to be born into a society where I have the "privilege" of eating Oreos, corn dogs, croissants, driving cars that spew pollutants and watching inane game show television. But I am grateful for what I have and mindful of my obligation to help make the world a better place for other people, which is reflected in the Jewish belief in "Tikkum Olam" -- repair the world.

 

And no, I don't want to commit suicide. I hear it's murder on your hair. And the clean up is messy.

[Dako]

A fellow named Stan Metelski once worked for me.

As a child he'd been locked into his home in the Warsaw ghetto all winter with the decaying corpse of his dead mother and his living twin brother.

When the Germans came to evict his mother, he and his brother were taken to live at Buchenwald to wait for the doctor. Dr. Mengele was delayed by other victims, so when the camp was liberated, he and his twin joined the newly allied Italian army and went off to shoot other suffering people under miserable conditions. He was an amazing man and let me read the draft of his heartwrenching autobiography.

 

We all are lucky to know these people, and humility isn't bad medicine.

To see how fortunate we are should lift our mood and inspire us.

 

I often fall way short.

[Daddy Bear]

i understand, Ellie. i've been on the floor myself, and there wasn't much that anyone could say to suddenly snap me out of it, either. let's face it, there IS no magic cure for depression. it takes a lot of time and effort, and usually some help, to get out of such a deep hole. that's why i would recommend therapy to any depressed person with access to it, and looking to friends and family, even church or work or school for help to anyone who doesn't.

 

my aim was not to induce feelings of guilt, and i'm sorry if this thread has that effect on anyone. i just figured that MAYBE, one suicidal person who reads it will put his/her temporary problems in proper perspective and turn his/her thoughts toward surviving instead of ending it all... and that possibility seemed to make posting it worthwhile.

[Spugly Fuglet]

removed by me : off topic

[AntiLove_SuperStar]

No, I don't feel ashamed.

 

I didn't ask to be born into my current situation, with my current state of mind, and it's sentimental to assume that people watch us from beyond the grave.

 

Everyone has the sheer capacity for misery. Knowing my grandmother is in agony with osteoarthritis doesn't detract from my cystitis-realted pain.

 

I agree with the concept that we can consider ourselves fortunate in many ways. But it's largely all these trappings that we have that MAKE us miserable.

[cecerose]

then you're not really my target audience, are ya?

 

ah, a joke trivializing suicide! how marvelously sensitive and caring, and such a superior argument to my own.

 

No, I'm not really your target audience. However, having been hospitalized twice for being suicidal in my 20's, I can tell you quite honestly if I had read your post back then I would have made more guilty and depressed, rather than less.

 

Nothing more helpful than using guilt lightly disguised as "gratitude" platitudes to help a suicidal person deal with their feelings of helplessness, hopelessness and rage.

[cecerose]

Hi cecerose, I read what you have written below, which is all far coment, but then when I come to write my coment on it find I have a fear no matter what I say of seeming anitsimetic, what I would like to know is

 

"where did that fear come from?"

 

i

I was not there, I feel no giult I do feel it was wrong but I will deside in what way and I will not be told how to think.

 

 

"As a Jewish person, I find the fact you highlighted both the Holocaust and the Inquisition rather disturbing. Anyone with no background in Jewish history reading what you just wrote would probably think: "Jewish = Victim""

 

You obviously misread my meaning. I am not afraid. I don't take your comments as anti-semitic. You are free to hold whatever opinions you wish. I have not told you how to think.

[Spugly Fuglet]

Cecerose, Are you sour of that, you read sb post ignord his main point and picked out the one thing you felt you must coment on, that was your persived misrepresentation by him of you culture. In this I do see a kind of fear, fear that you will be paseved becouse of your heritage as a victime, or do you fear a misrepresentation of the persictions of the jawish pepales, which have been meny and evil acts.

[RRB]

Sorry but i didnt read the whole thread. My answer to the original poster is no i dont think people should be ashamed. I personally believe its about a quality of life situation. Everyone has a different quality of life threshold in respect to others. By that i mean (example only)if i was in an accident and lost both my arms and legs then i have no quality of life left so i do not wish to live. Others may have a higher or lower quality of life. Its an individual thing and a hard question to answer

[Anotherday]

Very interesting OP. I've been in clinical depressions before and wanted to die, however, I practice the slow form of suicide, and really need to get a grip on it.

 

When I was 22, I made a deal with myself. If my life wasn't better in one year, I would kill myself. I went on an older antidepressant, moved out of state to a sunnier place, and didn't kill myself after one year. I credit the antidepressant with lifting me out of that place. The second major depession hit me at around 36. I drank myself into a tizzy, pleaded with a Dr. for the same drug I'd had before, and I recovered. This last depression has been there for three years, with only a few days here and there of reprieve. I've now been diagnosed as Bipolar Depressive 1. Yeehaw. The magic drug I found that did change things made my hair fall out. My pdoc suggested I cut the dosage in half, and now I'm a mess again. Hmm, do I want mental health or hair on my head? I went into my first hypomania/mania/mixed state a year ago. This led to my labeling socks in plastic baggies at 3 a.m., spending $10K on Ebay on costume jewelry, and not even sleeping with sheets on my bed for six weeks.

 

I will tell you, that what lifted me out of that state was volunteering at a homeless shelter (and more drugs). Wow, what a reality shift. I am terrified of the upcoming holidays, and will be ending a relationship permanently with someone I care for (that I met at the homeless shelter, he works there), out of fear that being with him will plummet me into another state I won't recover from (he hasn't treated me very well and I've never spent a holiday with him). I share this with you all, to paint the realities of mental illness. My one wish is to have a clean house and a will in order should I check out, although it won't be intentionally. I may be "accidental." I could never hurt my parents that way and they keep living. They've kept me alive for YEARS.

 

I appreciate the horrors of the Holocaust, etc. I know I am blessed. Still, ask me with more $ than I've ever had in my life, if I am not more miserable than ever. Depression is a brain disease. Suicidal people just get tired of fighting and give up. I don't give up because there is always another drug to try, I couldn't hurt my parents, and I have a responsibility to myself and God to stay alive and try to make it.

[RRB]

Anotherday

 

Touching story and it make my problems pale in comparison to yours, credit to you for sticking with it.

[Anotherday]

Anotherday

 

Touching story and it make my problems pale in comparison to yours, credit to you for sticking with it.

 

I appreciate this. I'm hoping maybe someone who is feeling like ending things might read it and maybe they might decide to volunteer, or make a deal like I did at 22, or maybe try a new drug, or a support group, or get therapy, or reach out here and then sleep on it. Maybe things look different the next day.

 

There IS hope out there. One just has to keep fighting the good fight.

[RRB]

make a deal like I did at 22,

 

I agree my problem with my hassles and what people usually say is "it will get better just give it time". I thought damn how much time though, ya know, how long does it take to get better if it actually does. Now it makes sense, set a time scale to let it get better and then take it from there.

 

Thanks

[Anotherday]

I agree my problem with my hassles and what people usually say is "it will get better just give it time". I thought damn how much time though, ya know, how long does it take to get better if it actually does. Now it makes sense, set a time scale to let it get better and then take it from there.

 

Thanks

 

Right, and drugs never hurt, if one if truly affected with more than the blues. Support groups and a good therapist help too. The right drug combo is VERY important though.

 

I'll tell you a funny story. Well, it wasn't funny at the time, but looking back it was the start of the "episode." I flipped out after Hurricane Katrina. It hit me so hard, even though I've never been to NOLA and don't know anyone who lived there. I told my pdoc some of my thoughts and he decided to put me on an anti-psychotic (hence the all night baggie deal). Anyway, something fell in my pool and got out, but I couldn't see the bottom, as I'd shocked it. So, I freak out (my dog had drowned in my pool some time before and I am still not over this) and I called the police. They come out and this police woman says she doesn't see anything in the pool. So, all of a sudden I look and I see these arms reaching out and under the water (as in What Lies Beneath, my one and only hallucination) and I PUSH the policewoman, as I think I am really seeing reality. She says "Ma'am!" Needless to say, I had to show them my meds and they didn't want to leave me alone. I'm lucky they didn't take me to the psych ward or arrest me. I stopped that anti-psychotic after that.

 

I really don't FEEL crazy, although I guess I have the label. It hurts when people minimize mental health issues. When I was 15, I was in a very dark hole, and someone told me to just snap out of it and be grateful for everything I have. I am, but I need extra help.

[Juliana]

I do understand this, to some extent. I read an interview from someone who'd had a terrible experience, and they were saying "I wonder, out of all the people this could have happened to, why me?" And for some reason, this resonated with me, this one person and what had happened to them, and I felt connected to them for a second, and that made a positive difference.

 

But when I was at my worst, when I made the first attempt, it was a simple, almost spontaneous decision. I had exhausted, I thought, all the options for coping with what was unbearable. And so I just went ahead. It wasn't a big decision for me. I didn't dress up or leave a note. I just did it. I survived because of luck. I was not in a place where I could have compared myself to anyone else's situation or experience, and it really would not have made any sense to me.

 

It's hard to say, what makes a difference. I am glad I survived. I've never felt that bad since; it has never been so cut-and-dried and unemotional to try to take my own life. And I am aware; there are so many other options. I found that out when I woke up the next day.

[Anotherday]

So, Juliana, if I am not prying too much, what did you do to never feel that bad again?