Suicide is the result of illness. It's not selfishness.
To clarify my opinion, I can see that some people might commit suicide out of selfishness. However, I think the overwhelming majority do it because they are mentally ill.
Suicide is not the ultimate badge of remorse in any way shape or form.
I agree with this. I don't think that suicide has anything to do with remorse (yes or no). I can see a remorseful spouse committing suicide and I can see a unremorseful spouse committing suicide. I think that they are totally independent.
Many people with issues with me struggle with suicidal ideation, sometimes on a daily basis for literally years at a time. It's a brain malfunction and it is not fun to live with.
Yep. I would say that it is difficult to imagine what it is like. I say this because I had depression for 25+ years, undiagnosed.
Let me put it this way: In my experience, depression is worse than infidelity. Even prior to D-day, I was going down... I was suicidal before D-day and I had other symptoms that were worsening. In some ways, my wife's affair saved my life because her affair had me in therapy and my therapist recognized my symptoms (eventually) as depression and she was the one who encouraged me to see a psychiatrist.
This thread is exactly why I harp so much on what abuse is and what to do about it. I've seen a close family friend kill the AP and destroy their family in one fell swoop. I've buried a seventeen year old family member who was murdered in a domestic violence murder by her boyfriend, again two lives just over, one dead, one in prison for most of their life.....
This is no joke. This pushes people over the edge daily. Never underestimate your own ability to temporarily lose your mind and do something you will regret for the rest of your life. If you are abusing your spouse, LEAVE immediately. If you are being abused, there are resources out there to help you get away safely.
This is A+, 100% correct commentary here. All of it.
I agree that suicide is rarely a selfish venture for the person who commits it - although it sure as heck feels that way for everyone who was left behind.
I agree with this.
People who go so far to kill themselves - something that is so opposed to our biological and psychological make up - those people are sick. Their mental processes are so damaged, they truly believe the world is better with them gone. Its an illness. They can't see the reality of their situation...they think being dead is best - can you imagine what it takes to believe that so deeply - you actually carry it out??
Again: This is A+, 100% correct commentary here. All of it.
To phrase it differently, I still think that the world would have been better off without the depressed version of me. My wife has reported that my kids were becoming afraid of me and avoiding me. See the above comment about abuse... why would I want to do that to my children? I would literally die for my kids, which makes suicide very easy to justify when *I* am the thing ruining their lives.
People who die by suicide suffer from an illness as real as cancer and diabetes.
Again: This is A+, 100% correct commentary here. All of it.
And there is a huge distinction between someone who is depressed and dies by suicide and someone who threatens suicide as a way to manipulate.
This is absolutely true.
I'm a child of Suicide and I know what it's like as a kid to be left with that.
I'm very sorry that you have to bear this burden. In many ways, it is a form of abuse.
My FWS was googling ways to kill herself a couple of years back and I felt all of a sudden I had no outlet for my pain in case it tipped her over the edge. She had already abandoned me 3 times before that, and I saw it as the ultimate abandonment. It was all about her pain and fuck me. Unforgivable.
Your FWS is a sick person. I hope that you can understand that and perhaps find your way to forgive her. Even if you can't forgive her, please encourage her to get medical help (a psychiatrist, not merely a therapist).
One of my mom's good friends shot herself after finding out that her H had cheated on her....again. That is a tragedy. I didn't understand it at the time. Now I do.
Sometimes I wonder if he feels guilty?
Probably. But that guilt would have been inappropriate/inaccurate.
I am sure that my wife would have felt very guilty if I had jumped off that bridge. She would have thought that it was her fault when it wasn't.
In my case, at least, my wife's infidelity would have simply been the "straw that broke the camel's back." I was headed towards suicide even if she hadn't had an affair.
Around 5 months after D-Day, when my WW was refusing to tell me anything about her A, I was becoming suicidal. Believe me, in those moments I was not thinking about my kids, about my wife or my parents. I just wanted the pain to end. I was thinking only about myself. I was completely selfish. I didn't do it because moments later I started thinking about my kids. And that they will be left with that woman.
Yes, of course, I was probably starting to get mentally ill. It doesn't make it less selfish.
I think this might be a good example of how a normal, non-mentally ill person thinks. DarkHoleHeart was experiencing what I would call "healthy pain" -- it was definitely severe pain, but normal/healthy nonetheless. In cases like this, it is even normal/common (but not healthy) to have suicidal ideations. And yes, this was selfish (sort of)... and a rationale/healthy person can see that. So, I disagree with the part "I was probably starting to get mentally ill." Nope. You sound healthy to my non-expert eyes.
In contrast, I was suicidal for no reason (prior to D-day; after D-day, I had a reason). I had pain as severe as DarkHoleHeart describes every day for years. There was not a single part of my life that I enjoyed anymore.
If you hear somebody talking about WH who committed suicide that BS is to blame, call that bullshit.
Correct.
Explain to them that he has been selfish to the very end.
Incorrect. Explain to them that they probably had an illness as real as cancer or diabetes (if they didn't have some for of mental illness, then yeah... they were selfish/manipulative).
In closing, I am expressing a lot of opinions and disagreeing with many people. Please consider all of these as "polite". I think that, as a society, we have a very poor view of the mentally ill (I was of the opinion that society dealt with the mentally ill inappropriately before my diagnosis, fyi).
In general, we hide the mentally ill. Many times if someone commits suicide, the cause of death is either reported dishonestly (so-and-so had a "heart attack") or not at all. (My cousin committed suicide last week (distant cousin, haven't seen him in 15+ years) and his obituary does not list the cause of death.) We tend to look past/through homeless people, the overwhelming majority of whom are mentally ill.
I don't mean to give the impression that I have all of the answers or any of the answers for that matter. I am certain, though, that there are questions that most of us do not ask.
p.s. Depression or any other form of mental illness is NOT an excuse for bad behavior. I did awful things but I am still responsible for those awful things.
[This message edited by barcher144 at 7:33 AM, June 8th (Thursday)]
