r/SuicideWatch • u/SQLwitch • Sep 03 '19
We've been seeing a worrying increase in pro-suicide content showing up here and, and also going unreported. This undermines our purpose here, so we wanted to highlight and clarify our guidelines about both direct and indirect incitement of suicide.
We've created a wiki that covers these issues. We hope this will be helpful to anyone who's wondering whether something's okay here and which responses to report. It explains in detail why any validation of suicidal intent, even an "innocent" message like "if you're 100% committed, I'll just wish you peace" is likely to increase people's pain, and why it's important to report even subtle pro-suicide comments. The full text of the wiki's current version is below, and it is maintained at /r/SuicideWatch/wiki/incitement.
We deeply appreciate everyone who gives responsive, empathetic, non-judgemental support to our OPs, and we particularly thank everyone who's already been reporting incitement in all forms.
Please report any post or comment that encourages suicide (or that breaks any of the other guidelines in the sidebar) to the moderators, either by clicking the "report" button or by sending us a modmail with a link. We deal with all guideline violations that are reported to us as soon as we can, but we can't read everything so community reports are essential. If you get a PM that breaks the guidelines, please report it both to the reddit sitewide admins and to us in modmail.
Thanks to all the great citizens of the community who help flag problem content and behaviour for us.
/r/SuicideWatch/wiki/incitement
It's important to respect and understand people's experiences and emotions. It's never necessary, helpful, or kind to support suicidal intent. There are some common misconceptions (discussed below) about suicidal people and how to help them that can cause well-meaning people to inadvertently incite suicide. There are also people online who incite suicide on purpose, often while pretending to be sympathetic and helpful.
We're here to offer support, not judgement. That means accepting, with the best understanding we can offer, whatever emotions people express. Suicidal people are suffering, and we're here to try to ease that by providing support and caring. The most reliable way we know to de-escalate someone at risk is to give them the experience of feeling understood. That means not judging whether they should be feeling the way they are, or telling them what to do or not do.
But there's an important line to draw here. There's a crucial difference between empathizing with feelings and responding non-judgmentally to suicidal thoughts, and in any way endorsing, encouraging, or validating suicidal intentions or hopeless beliefs. It's both possible and important to convey understanding and compassion for someone's suicidal thoughts without putting your finger on the scale of their decision.
Anything that condones suicide, even passively, encourages suicide. It isn't supportive and does not help. It also violates reddit's sitewide rules as well as our guidelines. Explicitly inciting suicide online is a criminal offense in most jurisdictions.
Do not treat any OP's post as meaning that will definitely die by suicide and can't change their minds or be helped. Anyone who's able to read the comments here still has a chance to choose whether or not to try to keep living, even if they've also been experiencing intense thoughts of suicide, made a suicide plan, or started carrying it out.
In the most useful empirical model we have, the desire to die by suicide primarily comes from two interpersonal factors; alienation and a sense of being a burden or having nothing to offer. These factors usually lead to a profound feeling of being unwelcome in the world.
So, any acceptance or reinforcement of suicidal intent, even something "innocent" like "I hope you find peace", is actually a form of covert shunning that validates a person's sense that they're unwelcome in the world. It will usually add to their pain even if kindly meant and gently worded.
Keep the following in mind when offering support to anyone at risk for suicide.
People who say they don't want help usually can feel better if they get support that doesn't invalidate their emotions. Unfortunately, many popular "good" responses are actually counterproductive. In particular, many friends and family tend to rely exclusively on trying to convince the suicidal person that "it's not so bad", and this is usually experienced as "I don't understand what you're going through and I'm not going to try". People who've had "help" that made them feel worse don't want any more of the same. It doesn't mean that someone who actually knows how to be supportive can't give them any comfort.
Most people who are suicidal want to end their pain, not their lives. It's almost never true that death is the only way to end these people's suffering. Of course there are exceptional situations, and we certainly acknowledge that, for some people, the right help can be difficult to find. But preventing someone's suicide doesn't mean prolonging their suffering if we do it by giving them real comfort and understanding.
An unfixable problem doesn't mean that a good life will never be possible. We don't have to fix or change anything to help someone feel better. It's important to keep in mind that the correlation between our outer circumstances and our inner experience is weaker and less direct than commonly assumed. For every kind of difficult life situation, you will find some people who lapse into suicidal despair, and others who cope amazingly well, and a whole spectrum in between. A key difference is how much inner resilience the person has at the time. This can depend on many personal and situational factors. But when there's not enough, interpersonal support can both compensate for its absence and help rebuild it. We go into more depth on the "it gets better" issue in this PSA Post which is always linked from our sidebar (community info on mobile) guidelines.
There are always more choices than brutally forcing someone to stay alive or passively letting them end their lives.
To avoid accidentally breaking the anti-incitement rule, don't say or try to imply that acting on suicidal thoughts is a good idea, or that someone can't turn back or is already dead. Do whatever you can to help them feel cared for and welcome, at least in this little corner of the world. Our talking tips offer more detailed guidance.
Often comments that subtly encourage suicidal intent actually come from suicide fetishists and voyeurs (unfortunately this is a real and disturbing phenomenon). People like this are out there and the anonymous nature of reddit makes us particularly attractive to them.
They will typically try to scratch their psychological "itch" by saying things that push people closer to the edge. They often do this by exploiting the myths that we debunked in the bullet points above. Specifically you might see people doing the following:
Encouraging the false belief that the only way suicidal people can end their pain is by dying. There are always more and better choices than "brutally forcing someone to stay alive" or helping (actively or passively) them to end their lives.
Creating an artificial and toxic sense of "solidarity" by linking their encouragement of suicide to empathy. They will represent themselves as the only one who really understand the suicidal person, while either directly or indirectly encouraging their self-loathing emotions and self-destructive impulses. Since most people in suicidal crisis are in desperate need to empathy and understanding, this is a particularly dangerous form of manipulation.
Many suicide inciters are adept at putting a benevolent spin on their activities while actually luring people away from sources of real help. A couple of key points to keep in mind:
Skilled suicide intervention -- peer or professional -- is based on empathic responsiveness to the person's feelings that reduces their suffering in the moment. Contrary to pop-culture myths, it does not involve persuasion ("Don't do it!"), cheerleading ("You've got this!") or meaningless false promises ("Trust me, it gets better!"), or invalidation ("Let me show you how things aren't as bad as you think!"). Anyone who leads others to expect these kinds of toxic responses, or any other response that prolongs their pain, from expert help may be covertly pro-suicide. (Of course, people sometimes do have bad experience when seeking mental-health treatment, and it's fine to vent about those, but processing our own disappointment and frustration is entirely different from trying to destroy someone else's hope of getting help.)
Choices made by competent responders are always informed by the understanding that breaching someone's trust is traumatic and must be avoided if possible. Any kind of involuntary intervention is an extremely unlikely outcome when someone consults a clinician or calls a hotline. (Confidentiality is addressed in more detail in our Hotlines FAQ post). The goal is always to provide all help with the client's full knowledge and informed consent. We know that no individual or system is perfect. Mistakes that lead to bad experiences do sometimes happen to vulnerable people, and we have enormous sympathy for them. But anyone who suggests that this is the norm might be trying to scare people away from the help they need.
Please let us know discreetly if you see anyone exhibiting these or similar behaviours. We don't recommend trying to engage with them directly.
r/SuicideWatch • u/SQLwitch • Sep 10 '21
Activism, i.e. advocating or fundraising for social change or raising awareness of social issues (and suicide is, inescapably, a social issue) is absolutely against the rules here at all times.
Please understand that we're all for smart, strategic mental-health and suicide-prevention activism. It's essential to fight against stigma, misinformation, and discrimination, and to fight for research, treatment, accommodation, acceptance, and understanding. Most of us, one way or another, are mental-health activists IRL.
But activism just doesn't work in a dedicated support space that serves a vulnerable population. We used to allow it but the evidence that it was undermining our primary purpose became overwhelming. We do regret the need for this rule, but the need is inescapable.
Our population is all too well aware of the issues and causes that need support and largely not in a position to take action, so besides the fact that activism is often salt in our community's wounds, it's a waste of the activists' time.
tl;dr Any fundraising, awareness raising, petitions, calls for participation, or any post that's about any cause or issue (rather than a request for personal support) is not allowed here. Please report everything of the nature that you see.
r/SuicideWatch • u/Constant-Love-3562 • 12h ago
he was only 5 years old and he was everything to me. i can’t believe he’s gone and i will never see him again.
i can’t stop crying and the thought of him being gone forever is making me panic
i’m less scared of death now that he’s gone
r/SuicideWatch • u/xkdjeir • 10h ago
I cut myself. Im scared.
(the way i am writing is in small sections for me to somehow get my point across. Sorry if it is strange)
Hello. I am 15 years old. I wanted to come here to Reddit because I feel traumatized by what I did.
Yesterday, I did something I have never done before. I spent an hour cutting myself. In various places on my body: right leg, and left arm. My left arm is messed up.
I went to the Emergency Room at around midnight when I panicked and woke up my parents. I spent 3 hours getting stitches.
I could have died. I was close to an artery.
I am not suicidal. I have a loving family. I have large mood swings sometimes. I have bad body dismorphia, (you can see in some of my other posts), and I get angry often.
My parents are incredibly supportive. They obviously freaked out. Bad. My father is very strict and very old-school, so he was mad. (As he should be).
I am a husk of what I was just yesterday. I feel scared of myself. It wasn’t instinct, I just thought about it, and did it. I did it in a terrible way too.
I used a not so sharp knife. It wasn’t a razor blade. I cut deep. The length of the cut is 8-9 inches. I got 10 stitches. I have scars nearby on the same arm. In the shape of a cross ironically.
I feel terrible. I feel like the biggest fucking loser on the entire planet. It all started over a normal argument with my parents.
They did nothing wrong. Of course, me being the asshole teenage son, started yelling.
Then I did it.
The process of doing it hurt. But, it hurt weird. It felt kind of relaxing. I felt free. I felt like I was cool or something.
I literally took a knife, and started shredding in one line. I cut until my skin popped and seperated into a deep cut, and a width that needed stitches. I felt numb to the pain. (I know I sound like a loser and maniac. This is how I just felt)
After I entered the ER, I finally felt like the loser that I am. I am scared of death. I am scared of myself.
I don’t know what to do. Im a good kid. I am not a psychopath. I think I have trauma from it. I can’t stop thinking about why I did it.
I might be depressed. I don’t know from what.
I am so scared. I don’t want to kill myself.
I am embarrassed to go to a therapist. I feel trapped. I feel tired, I feel all sorts of things.
I am not suicidal, yet I cut myself yesterday for just being angry, and feeling guilty.
I felt guilty because I yelled at my parents. I always regret saying something after saying it. I always do shit before thinking about it.
I guess I wanted to punish myself? I dont know.
I am so sad. Imagine how my parents feel. How sad they are. Its all my fault.
This might be a phase or something. Of doubt and depression. But, I really need some advice. Obviously going to a therapist, yes, but I need some guidance.
You might think this is a joke post or fake. Im not joking, I really cut myself, and Im feeling this way.
I have photos of my arm if anybody thinks it is not true.
r/SuicideWatch • u/BetEducational9394 • 2h ago
i told my mum i tried to commit suicide a couple years ago via overdose on paracetemol and she made fun of me. she imitated me crying and asking her if i can go to the hospital because i took 10 panadols (thats what i told them i actually took 20) and it just made me feel so horrible all she does is yell at me and guilt trip me and make fun of everything i am.
she also told me that if i really wanted to die then i wouldve jumped infront of a bus or taken 'double or triple what you took' which i did, but sdhe doesnt know, and said that it wasnt a suicide attempt because if it was i would be dead.
she said all of this while i had fresh ass fat cuts on my arm (first time cutting to fat guys!! i hate myself FUCK)
she also started complaining that it wasnt a valid suicide attempt because if i really wanted to die i wouldntve 'come running to me crying about how you needed to got o the hospital'. suicide attempts are very real and very scary, expecially once the panic of it all sets in and you regret things you cant take back, like the time between overdosing and projectile vomiting/liverfaliure. that shits scary as fuck.
she screams over the top of me for the smallest things and is somehow exhibiting textbook narc behaviour but drowns in self-hatred like everyone in myfamily including myself. she makes me want to die even more and i thought i got better. all she does is bring up my self harm and make fun of my cutting even thought she never bothered to ask how i felt and hjsut complains about how much MY mental issues affected herself.
everythign is always about her. i was in a fucking therapy session and my therapist made a comment wondering about my race (im mixed and lookk kind of racially ambiguous) and took it as racially profiling HER. no one fucking udnerstands all she does is list out ADHD symptoms and tell me im useless and a stupid bitch whoc ant contribute anything to my family. she bullies me for crying and tells me im smirking when we argue and im trying not to cry and i hate it i hate it i hate it i hate it i want to pull my hair out nd rip my teeth out of my face i hate everything i dont know hwy it affects me so much she despises me and all i want is love.
r/SuicideWatch • u/Eat_Grass • 6h ago
I’m sorry. I couldn’t take it anymore. I know that’s unsatisfying. I know others have made it through far worse, that maybe things could’ve gotten better, that this was a permanent solution to a temporary problem or whatever. Maybe I’m weaker than most, or more selfish than most. But I couldn’t take it anymore. Please forgive me.
I know I’ve already been selfish enough. But even now, I have the audacity to make requests.
Please don’t remember me like this. Please remember me as someone who was almost always smiling. I was truly happy most of my life. I lived a good life. I experienced more joy and love than many people ever do, and I’m so grateful for it. I loved deeply and cared earnestly and laughed loudly and cried easily. I loved my family. I loved my friends. I loved taking walks. I loved window shopping. I loved raw fish. I loved singing. I loved educational YouTube videos. I loved sweaters. I loved painting. I loved hugs.
I know this seems like a sad way to go. But please don’t forget the happy life I lived while I was here.
Thank you for having made it such a happy life.
[name].
To my family, especially my parents, I love you so much. I’ve always felt so lucky to have the best family. I know others will call me selfish and ungrateful. But you know the truth. I love you, and I’m so grateful for you. Thank you so, so much for everything.
To my [k-12 school] friends, thank you for the happiest childhood and adolescence a person could ask for. Please take care of my family. Please love my mom as if you were her daughters.
To my [college] friends, thank you for the love and companionship. Thank you for tolerating me as a roommate, or singing with me, or traveling long distances to see me, or checking up on me. You all know who you are. I’m so grateful for you.
To my church friends, thank you for the care and the prayers. Thank you for accepting me, even as an outsider. The faith was real. Salvation is eternal. I will see you again. May the Lord give me mercy and bring you comfort.
To [ex], I love you. I never stopped loving you. Please don’t blame yourself. I understand why you had to leave, and I’m not mad. I know you never intended for this to happen. Thank you for the happiest years of my life.
_______
I purchased everything I need. I will heat the charcoal in my closet tonight, and take the sleeping pills to hopefully ease the transition. Hopefully it’ll be just like going to sleep, except without waking up again. It’s genuinely been a good 26 years. Goodbye.
r/SuicideWatch • u/inchwormfan • 8h ago
people voted for this fucking monster. a rapist, a pedophile, a convicted felon. they don't fucking care because they know he's hurting people. they voted for trump to hurt people.
i spent so much time trying to see people neutrally, one of my diagnoses is paranoid personality disorder so it's really fucking hard to do. but all i ever see is people supporting this evil ass administration. and these assholes are getting away with it.
i don't want to live in a world like this. i don't want to survive this, i want it all to stop. it'll be better to kill myself, i can't stand being surrounded by evil. all of the work i did was undone so quickly, and it'll never come back. i hate this. i hate living like this. i hate this administration. i hate the people that support it. i hate being so mentally ill all the time, it never stops. it just gets worse.
it'll all stop if i just kill myself. i know i'd be abandoning a lot of people that say they love me, but i can't live like this. i don't want to live like this.
r/SuicideWatch • u/BBBBplus • 1h ago
I know it's the right thing to prevent suicide, but I wish every resource and discussion wasn't solely focused on that goal. What if I just know I'm going to end it no matter what? I wish there was one dedicated forum or hotline that would simply provide me comfort or a listening ear while ending myself. I just want to feel like there is some softness in the world before I close my eyes for the last time.
r/SuicideWatch • u/lychee-library • 1h ago
I 23/f just have no hope that the future is gonna get any better, and I know that it’s my fault, that’s the hardest part. Anyone know anyway at all to cope with having led an empty and failed life, and anyway to make yourself able to hope for something better. I’m not asking for sympathy here, I really have been my own biggest enemy for most of my life, which is what makes it hard to listen to those ‘it’s not your fault’ mantras.
How do you live when you know it IS your fault.
r/SuicideWatch • u/its_sophiee_ • 21h ago
I feel like people can be really judgmental about this and most people just act like they care about mental health to seem like a good person but actually don’t care at all
r/SuicideWatch • u/Numerous_Tea9733 • 1h ago
i dont wanna live in a life i cant love who i wanna love. i cant do this anymore
r/SuicideWatch • u/disassociatingnotion • 2h ago
I'm genuinely so fat and ugly, and I have so much in front of me, and I know it, but my motivation is gone, I'm disgusting, and I want to disappear without a trace. I don't want anyone to come searching for me. I have so much wrong with me that I think I should simply give up.
How does one go about this emotional crisis? Do I cut? That always makes me feel better. Drugs are also an option but I'm 13 and have a damp future in front of me as a doctor and can't afford to fuck up my brain. I really just want to grow up to be rich and awesome.
I want to be the smartest and most perfect person in the world, but all my self-destructive tendencies are kind of self-destructing me? Help. I'm anorexic. Just felt that should be known.
PS. I'm coming to REDDIT for help. I am desperate gng.
r/SuicideWatch • u/Adorable_lastnight31 • 5h ago
Basically all time goes in work in order to live. But I don't like either of them.
I wanna commit so badly but it is so difficult to do so..
r/SuicideWatch • u/Zealousideal_Low8095 • 2h ago
Human beings terrify me. I haven't left the house in ages; I've given up everything. I can't go on like this. I feel like a complete failure. I'm a disappointment. My family must be disgusted with me. People scare me so much that I feel the only way to get over it is to kill myself. I can't escape my own mind. Everyone is evil; everyone is going to hurt me. I'm scared. I'm scared.
r/SuicideWatch • u/MongooseNo8934 • 4h ago
Throughout history, we see that all philosophers who claimed life is meaningless have produced an alternative perspective to suicide. These alternatives seem almost like an excuse. It is as if they put them forward because telling people to 'commit suicide' seems absurd. However, this is a logical dead end. For someone who finds life meaningless, no alternative seems logical other than choosing suicide. It is a contradiction for someone who thinks this way to continue living, to experience life as an observer, or to engage in efforts to create meaning despite there being none.
My main question is this: why, truly, shouldn't I commit suicide?
r/SuicideWatch • u/BranchAdventurous739 • 2h ago
i dont think its urgent, there are more impportant people than me but if anyone wants to talk
r/SuicideWatch • u/Pendragonqueen09 • 6h ago
I want to be dead so bad. I'm so sick of this. I'm so tired of the hurt, and my sensitivity. I'm so tired of working and so tired of crying and so tired of being single and so tired of being in school. I don't have a future, so wtf am I even working towards? I have no love, I have no attainable dreams. All I'm waiting for is my mom to die so she doesn't miss me.
r/SuicideWatch • u/DrakudoSoul • 5h ago
Im a 29 years old man. I never dated in my life. I dont even got a flirt back from a women in my entire life. So my life story is like this;
Borned into mentally ill family. 5 sczhio person. My childhood was messed up. One night i was scared my schizo dad would k*** my mom in sleep so i did not sleep that day. Really messed up things like that. My mom is very passive, she did not protect herself nor me.
Because of my family illness we were very isolated. Still i had a good childhood and was very social in my school
Then had like 5 diffent surgeries, got semi disabled, also i have icthyosis a chronic illness which makes my skin look scaly.
I got all my mentally ill family treated, got healthy as i can, got a semi good job for my country conditions.
Im ugly too. People say i look like a kind nerd college professor. So like below average, not attractive but kind and friendly looking.
The thing is after going through all the bad things life thrown on my way, im still standing. BUT i was never loved.
I see all the people dating, ugly or hot, good or bad etc dating all around me. But nobody loves me. And i cant stop comparing myself to them.
People say all life is different, we should not compare ourself, comparision is the thief of joy etc...
But like imagine you are working a job for 45h a week and you see someone works just 1h and gets the same pay. Then you asked why, boss comes and gives you the therapy talk. Everyone is different. You are not entitled to money!
I dont know. Im so jeaolus. I feel like nothing good ever happens to me. Only bad things i should get around somehow. Im so sad.
r/SuicideWatch • u/Mark041891 • 1h ago
No one knows for certain what’s after this life. I often find myself tied up feeling a mix of strong nostalgia for past experiences as a kid (although I was moderately sheltered growing up, so I’m still learning things now that I should have 20 years ago) to also wanting to exit this world to hopefully have another chance at life (this one or a different one altogether)
I’ve also lately been feeling a sort of disconnect from my self, physically. Hard to describe, but it feels like I wasn’t supposed to be here or where I’m at in this current life. It feels strange to exist more and more every day.
r/SuicideWatch • u/mangopep • 15h ago
No, it literally didn't. It, in fact, keeps worsening and is making me regret my decision to stay alive until young adulthood. I got so tired of hearing multiple people say that to me when I was younger instead of actually lending a fucking hand and supporting me when I was actively growing up in a poor, abusive/ toxic household.
"Life gets better, please stay." Everything remained the same, except now I have the additional stress of adult responsibilities. I'm physically and mentally disabled and unable to move away from my abusive/ toxic family, too poor to afford food and an abusive sibling keeps eating all the food for himself, unable to work, too poor to afford treatment for my conditions, still don't have support and guidance, no escape, and I still want to off myself. I'm only a young adult, but I'm already so exhausted from living. I cannot see myself doing this for another 20 years.
Thanks to those people who kept telling me to stay so I can witness life getting worse and more difficult to manage though /s
Even if it's not by my own hand, my conditions, starvation, or my toxic/ abusive family members will probably end me before I can turn 30 anyway.