I've known about a half-dozen folks that have committed suicide and about another half-dozen or so that tried. Some of these were close friends. I've also got a few friends that were going to off themselves and somehow I got them turned around.
Looking back, I can tell you that all of them were somehow mentally ill and needed help that they were not getting. None of them were in any physical pain. They just had their heads messed up.
I dated a chick that volunteered at a suicide prevention hotline. In those days, I was doing a graveyard shift at a local radio station, and she would call me up and talk to me between suicide calls. She wasn't so hot at giving out advice, so she'd put the people on hold and pick up our line and ask what to do.
What I can tell you from all this is that suicide, at least how I've encountered it, is mostly about folks being blind to their options. They get their head so far up their own asses that they can't see alternatives. If someone can show them a way out, they'll take it, but most of them are past all that, and it's the folks making the suggestions that are often times the cause.
Of the folks that were able to walk away from it, they all had to walk away from toxic mindset and see alternatives. They all had to put down the shovel and stop digging and start to climb out.
I will always be wholly unforgiving of suicide. Not because it is cowardice or un-Godly, but because it is just not to be condoned. There has to be that moral conviction that "You just can't do that!" if there is someone out there looking for a reason to go ahead and do it. There HAS to be an alternative because there always IS an alternative.
I had a buddy years ago that showed up at my house for a dinner appointment and admitted that he'd tried to off himself with pills two nights previously. He'd woken up the next morning a little hungover, but still alive. He asked me what I thought about it.
"Damn you, John!" I barked, "You were going to miss our appointment and not call to cancel. I find that exceedingly rude!"
John agreed and promised not to do it again. He'd had multiple attempts over the years. This was his last. He survived another decade before dying of natural causes.
