Death dates
Whenever I am suicidal, I pick a date that I want to kill myself on. Then if I don’t want to die on that day, I don’t have to go through with it. So far, I am still alive. It was a close call my last date because I wanted to die very badly. I had enough of living and figured it was the only way out of the situation I was in. But my therapist and psychiatrist got me through it. I felt cheated and angry they stopped me. The only thing that got me through was picking another date. This time it is almost a month a way from now. It is how I manage being intensely suicidal. Trouble is, I am not feeling terribly suicidal at this time. Suicide is furthest from my mind, yet I have this date in mind and I am thinking about going through with it anyway just so I don’t have to suffer anymore pain like I have tonight.
My therapist knows about this date but my psychiatrist doesn’t, least not yet. I don’t know if I am going to remind either of them of this plan. I don’t even know how I am going to die. Sure, I have a few ideas but I am not going to do them in my room where a family member will find me. No, I want to be found by a stranger some place away from home. I would love for it to be a hotel room but I don’t have the money to do the deed. How sad is that? Here I want to kill myself and I can’t basically afford to do it in a place I would like to do it in. There has been no downward circumstances to cause me to think about this date. I just wanted it to be before my birthday.
For some reason, my 9th anniversary of my cauda equina syndrome diagnosis is coming up in two weeks and it is bothering me. Normally the day passes and I don’t even notice. But I marked it on my calendar and the memories of that time period have been flooding back. I remember not being able to move my left leg at all because it was too weak. I lost a lot of strength with this surgery. I had to have a blood patch because I had a CSF leak and then I had to be operated again because a fragment of the disc was embedded in my nerve root causing me these problems. It was not a fun time. I then got a nice UTI that made me sick. The antibiotics made me sicker and then they discharged me only for me to come back to the ER the next day for fluids as I was shitting my brains out. I was very sick. But that surgery and the rehab afterwards failed to notice my current problem and that is why I am disabled today. That is why I have pain every day of my life for the past three years. That is why I cannot walk more than a few blocks at a time. My walking distance is 0.4 miles which isn’t much considering that I was once able to walk 20 miles without a problem. Sure I was sore the next day but that was to be expected. But now I can barely walk a mile without pain. And I leak urine if I walk too much. That is something that I have no control over. This is one of the reasons why I want to end my life. I am tired of the pain, the leaks, the immobility. But that is just the physical side of things. It has nothing to do with the mental side.
The mental side I am very depressed. I see no future but lately I have been. It’s been tough to see but I think things are not as bleak as they have been in the past. Despite my physical disability, I am able to look ahead. Just yesterday, I decided on the place where my sisters and I will eat out on my birthday, should I leave this date that I have planned. Four weeks I have to decide to go through with it or not. I know my therapist and psych would rather I not talk about this. Perhaps, they might not want to know about it. I just think that if I want to die, the decision should be left up to me and not my treaters. Sure they have the legal right to hospitalize me against my will but that will not stop the thoughts or planning. Am I a danger to myself? Not today. Will I soon? I don’t know. Depends on a few things.
midnightdemons7 
I also like your strategy in dealing with your suicidal thoughts. I’ve attempted suicide many times in my youth, but there is no comparison to your experience and ongoing struggles. I’m glad you are having some good days, and pray that you find peace one way or another.
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That is the problem and one that unfortunately, keeps me here. It sucks!!
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I am sorry that you’re stuck with this awful thing. I’m sorry you’re in so much pain. I have to say it’s interesting to read your strategy for getting from one suicide date to another. I hadn’t thought of that one. Mine is more based on level of pain and function (dysfunction, really). I had this conversation with my therapist last week. She asked if I was “there yet,” and I said no, not yet. I still have some reasons to live, and my level of functioning has taken a big dive over the past few years, but there are still things I enjoy and am able to do, but I don’t want to wait until I’m so disabled that I can’t even kill myself, which is what happened to my father. He was in his eighties, though. I’m twenty years younger, on an accelerated path.
I would like to suggest, no, beg, that if you do decide to end your life, that you don’t do it in a hotel. Or in front of a bus or train or even walking out in traffic. Reason why: some unfortunate stranger is going to find you, and think of the impact on that person’s life, forever after! It will be like killing two people, you plus them. I used to be married to a railroad man. He was on call to clean up the results of people using trains for suicide. It fucked him up really bad. Then I met an engineer who had run over a suicidal person on the tracks. Jeez, that guy beat himself up over it even though there was no way he could get the train stopped in time. He had terrible PTSD from it.
Take-home message is that I believe that we do have a right to decide when enough is enough of suffering, but we do not have the right to drag anybody else into it.
This does leave us with a big problem of how the hell to get it done without horribly damaging someone else?
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