# Do not threaten suicide in front of your math tutor, please. **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [May 6, 2005, 1:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684 "2005-05-06T13:28:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![bobkitty](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/c67d28/32.png) [@bobkitty](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bobkitty)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2005, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684/41 "2005-05-06T22:44:36Z")
> [@catsix](#): > > I don’t think she’s better off just because someone decided that she needs help. > > That’s **her** business, and only hers. It is not for other people to decide what she needs. Wow. I totally agree with **Miller**. WTF? If it was only her business, then she should’ve kept her mouth shut around a mandated reporter. If she’s a college student, she must be somewhat literate. All colleges have student handbooks that CLEARLY OUTLINE the policy on suicidal ideations and what happens should someone decide to express them. The fact that you don’t agree with the policy or hold sacred pwecious baby’s personal freedom/future political career doesn’t mean jack shit to someone who’s just trying to do their god damn job. Don’t like it? Go stand on the street corner and screech to anyone who’ll listen that if you want to off yourself, just pull the fucking trigger and don’t pull other people into your bullshit. **Metacom** , I apologise for not being more clear. My second paragraph wasn’t directed at you; it was directed at dumbasses like catshit and Kalhoun. ---
**Author:** ![BoBettie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4af34b/32.png) [@BoBettie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BoBettie)\ **Post date:** [May 6, 2005, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684/42 "2005-05-06T23:21:30Z")
Well hell- I believe in the right to die and that everyone has a choice on how to live (or die), but I also recognize that there are mental illnesses that take away a person’s capability to make such decisions. It’s certainly the case for many people that suicide attempts or suicidal thoughts are a manifestation of illness, not a concious choice of a rational person. They deserve to be treated by a medical professional, and if they can’t make the rational choice to do so, sometimes intervention is needed. If they still want to kill themselves later, there’s certainly ample time, right? ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2005, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684/43 "2005-05-07T00:26:14Z")
> [@bobkitty](#): > > If it was only her business, then she should’ve kept her mouth shut around a mandated reporter. If she’s a college student, she must be somewhat literate. All colleges have student handbooks that CLEARLY OUTLINE the policy on suicidal ideations and what happens should someone decide to express them. The fact that you don’t agree with the policy or hold sacred pwecious baby’s personal freedom/future political career doesn’t mean jack shit to someone who’s just trying to do their god damn job. I have to agree with this. If you don’t want anyone stopping you from offing yourself, shut up about it, especially around people legally obliged to intervene. And if you think it’s so easy for records to get leaked, then I expect everyone who might possibly ever have inklings of a political career better never get tested for STDs or any other potentially embarassing ailments, right? No sense in risking some midlevel political drone position over a case of the clap or something. ---
**Author:** ![Zoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/a4c791/32.png) [@Zoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zoe)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2005, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684/44 "2005-05-07T01:47:07Z")
> [@](#): > > **catsix** : If they’re really serious? It delays it for a while, until they figure out what to say to the shrinks so they can get out of the mental hospital. Rubbish! Plenty of people who are very serious about taking their own lives may have clinical depression which affects that part of the brain responsible for judgment and decision-making. The right therapy has saved many lives including my own. > [@](#): > > It wasn’t his will to be forced to remain alive. The problem is that his free will was taken from him, and I don’t believe in doing that. I certainly had no sense of free will when I tried taking my own life. It was impulsive and compulsive. I barely knew who I was. Thank God people (including college authorities) got me help. Where is your friend’s free will now? Who took it from him permanently? ---
**Author:** ![sinjin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ebca7d/32.png) [@sinjin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/sinjin)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2005, 2:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684/45 "2005-05-07T02:48:32Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > The inside of **catsix** ’s mind is just about the scariest place I can imagine. I’m basically a lurker on the boards, but read them daily, and this sums up my opinion completely. And as an aside, I’ve actually dealt with a suicidal college student as a professor, and experienced the suicide of two family members. ---
**Author:** ![bluecanary](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bluecanary/32/3614_2.png) [@bluecanary](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bluecanary)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2005, 3:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684/46 "2005-05-07T03:06:00Z")
Oh **catsix**. You really don’t know when to stop do you? I usually agree with you, but you’ve way overstepped the bounds of reasonableness (is that a word?) with this one. Yes, there are issues and concerns with the privacy of records and such like, but… Surely the possibility that an individual, student or otherwise, may have a treatable illness that could cost them their lives if they do not get help outweighs that possibility!?! [Political tangent] I’m sure this is going to come up more and more if the erosion of privacy of personal records is not reversed, and I sympathise with the point of view expressed in your first few posts. [/Political Tangent] But suggesting that pointing a suicidal person in the right direction and possibly saving their life is “taking their free will from them” is one of the craziest things I’ve seen here for some time (OK, apart from the phone thread :rolleyes: ) ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2005, 6:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684/47 "2005-05-07T06:11:02Z")
> [@catsix](#): > > I don’t think she’s better off just because someone decided that she needs help. > > That’s **her** business, and only hers. It is not for other people to decide what she needs. Do you know anything about mental illness, **catsix**? A person who is depressed enough to be suicidal is most likely incapable of deciding their own needs. That’s the whole point. The survival instinct in human beings is so strong that attempting suicide is a sign that something is way fucked up. How is a person supposed to have “free will” when their mind is fucked up from something that can be treated? ---
**Author:** ![Siege](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dbc845/32.png) [@Siege](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Siege)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2005, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684/48 "2005-05-07T12:29:42Z")
**catsix** , I’m damned glad I don’t know you in real life. Excuse me, folks. It’s a beautiful spring morning; there’s a wonderful man sleeping in the room next door, and I’m about to open the doors of my own personal hell. You see, when I was in 11th grade, I _did_ tell not only a teacher, but my whole Social Studies class that I’d attempted suicide. I _was_ desperate. It was the last in a series of cries for help which had gone unanswered. No one did anything. No one! Actually, that’s not technically true. Word got back to my parents who punished me for drawing attention to myself. I was desperate for help; I got punishment and ridicule and I learned not to ask for help. Thirteen years later, I was more or less voluntarily committed because I was close to catatonic. Even though I was basically non-responsive, I did have to sign something at the hospital. I don’t remember what it was; I remember almost nothing of that time. In my late 20’s, nearly half a lifetime later, I got the help I’d asked for. Let me tell you what goes through the mind of someone who’s actively considering contemplating suicide. There is immense, unspeakable, unimaginable pain. Imagine your soul being ripped from your body millimeter by excruciating millimeter like slowly and agonizingly being skinned alive. Your mind shifts to insanity. You see yourself as an intolerable burden to those who love you, and you cannot picture being anything else. Any temporary pain killing yourself may cause them will be offset by the freedom of not having you around to drag them down. There is hope of freedom from pain or of any positive outcome or, if there is, it’s too far away and too hard to get to. There’s also an immense sense of weariness, of struggle of knowing that, no matter how hard you try, it _won’t_ make a difference and you’re condemned to an eternity of numbness alternating with pain. At it’s worst, severe depression induces a form of paralysis. I’ve lain in bed with the number of a good and trusted friend running though my mind and been _unable_ to move my hand 6 inches to the phone to call him. The only faintly redeeming thing is that at this point I also can’t move enough to take steps to commit suicide. No, this isn’t a rational mindset; that’s what makes severe clinical depression insanity. One’s mindset becomes disconnected from reality. A quick caveat – the above paragraph is based on my own, personal experience with severe, near lethal depression. Others’ experience will be different. With friends like **catsix** , I’d be long dead and gone. I didn’t know how to seek help on my own; I didn’t know it existed and, given my experience, I didn’t expect to get it. Fortunately, I had and have better friends. I don’t ignore it when someone tells me their suicidal; I don’t argue for involuntary committal – that still scares the hell out of me – but I will strongly advise therapy and do what I can on my own. To me, suicidal depression is like cancer. While spontaneous remission is possible, as a rule, untreated and left to itself, it has a nasty habit of proving lethal. Left to myself, I would have died. Frankly, I prefer living. Just a couple of disclaimers. **Metacom** , when I talked to my therapist, I’d been seeing her for over a year and trusted her completely. She was right. I would have been better off calling her and talking to her rather than someone on a suicide hotline who didn’t know my history and my story. I will also once again assure you folks that right now, life is pretty good. I’m far from suicidal and I’ve got a wonderful day planned. The reason I brought up the ugly stuff is to let people know just how lethal and irresponsible leaving a severely depressed person can be. It wasn’t the way I’d have chosen to start my morning, but oh well. Meanwhile, I do believe there’s someone waking up in the next room who I’d rather like to spend some time with, and later today I’ll be up in the mountains with good friends and family. Yes, the family I mentioned earlier. If a depressed person is given treatment, rather than being left alone, even those wounds can heal. Have a nice day, folks, CJ ---
**Author:** ![EddyTeddyFreddy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eddyteddyfreddy/32/18796_2.png) [@EddyTeddyFreddy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EddyTeddyFreddy)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2005, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684/49 "2005-05-07T13:51:45Z")
Two paths to follow: The path of **Siege** The path of **catsix** **Siege** , I’m right behind ya! ---
**Author:** ![Guinastasia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guinastasia/32/5751_2.png) [@Guinastasia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Guinastasia)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2005, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684/50 "2005-05-07T16:09:02Z")
Not to mention **catsix** claimed her friend was only “joking” and was put away for it. Yet, apparently he wasn’t joking since he later succeeded in killing himself. I’m sorry for what happened to your friend, **catsix** , but trying to stop someone from killing him or her self is not “absurd over-sensitivity.” I think YOUR meme that suicide is an issue of “free will” is “absurd insensitivity.” ---
**Author:** ![lorene](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/65b543/32.png) [@lorene](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lorene)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2005, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684/51 "2005-05-07T16:34:53Z")
> [@Siege](#): > > Let me tell you what goes through the mind of someone who’s actively considering contemplating suicide. There is immense, unspeakable, unimaginable pain. Imagine your soul being ripped from your body millimeter by excruciating millimeter like slowly and agonizingly being skinned alive. This is one of the most painfully, brilliantly, horribly accurate descriptions I’ve ever read. It certainly sums up my experience, 13 or so years ago. > [@Siege](#): > > I will also once again assure you folks that right now, life is pretty good. I’m far from suicidal and I’ve got a wonderful day planned. I’m glad. My life is very, very good, too, and it amazed me to think that I almost didn’t let myself stick around to enjoy it. I hope you enjoyed your wonderful day. IMO, the moral of the OP is simply, “better safe than sorry.” ---
**Author:** ![fessie](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/c37758/32.png) [@fessie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fessie)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2005, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684/52 "2005-05-07T17:32:00Z")
The good thing about idiocy such as that expressed by **catsix** is that sometimes it leads to threads such as this one. **SimonMoon5** I’m so sorry for your loss. **Zoe** , **lorene** , **Siege** - thanks for sharing. **Siege** that was an incredible description, I couldn’t even read all of it. **Humanist** bravo for doing your job and taking your responsibility to your fellow human beings seriously. I could go on to add anecdotes about depression, mine and my family’s, treated and untreated. Suffice to say that I could never have guessed my life would someday include a husband and two wonderful children, and that my mother would play an important role in that family. ---
**Author:** ![Kythereia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/e8c25b/32.png) [@Kythereia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kythereia)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2005, 6:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684/53 "2005-05-07T18:40:14Z")
**Siege**. Can I give you a hug? ---
**Author:** ![Idlewild](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/8491ac/32.png) [@Idlewild](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Idlewild)\ **Post date:** [May 7, 2005, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684/54 "2005-05-07T21:14:15Z")
My own parents listened to me talk about suicide and did nothing. I got through, thanks to my family doctor, and my own bloody-minded determination, but not without nights sitting alone in the dark while my parents were upstairs, trying to decide whether to finish it or not. I confronted my parents several years later about having talked about suicide and they said “Oh, yeah, we were worried.” Great. If only they’d said something, or made me go to the doctor sooner, or something. If someone’s talking about suicide I take it seriously. If it’s a joke they’re welcome to tell me I have no sense of humour and we can have a laugh about it later. ---
**Author:** ![catsix](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e19b73/32.png) [@catsix](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/catsix)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2005, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684/55 "2005-05-08T17:46:34Z")
> [@](#): > > **Guinastasia** said: > Not to mention catsix claimed her friend was only “joking” and was put away for it. Yet, apparently he wasn’t joking since he later succeeded in killing himself. Two different people, **Guin**. One who was kidding, and one who wasn’t. You wanna know about the third one who never told anybody about it? He was probably the smartest one, considering he was intent upon being dead. > [@](#): > > I’m sorry for what happened to your friend, catsix, but trying to stop someone from killing him or her self is not “absurd over-sensitivity.” And I think it’s wrong to force people to live when they don’t want to. I respect the right of anyone to refuse treatment for _any_ disease. That includes mental illnesses. ---
**Author:** ![Dead\_Alive](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/7993a0/32.png) [@Dead\_Alive](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dead_Alive)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2005, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684/56 "2005-05-08T19:03:19Z")
I think if it was really obvious that it was a joke, you would have “got that” somehow even if you aren’t good at reading people. The fact that you reported it shows it was at the least ambiguous, and thus you made the right call. Yes, circular logic. But in this case I think it works. ---
**Author:** ![Contrapuntal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e274bd/32.png) [@Contrapuntal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Contrapuntal)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2005, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684/57 "2005-05-08T19:19:25Z")
> [@catsix](#): > > You wanna know about the third one who never told anybody about it? He was probably the smartest one, considering he was intent upon being dead. Anyone wonder why folks around **catsix** have this nasty habit of killing themselves? ---
**Author:** ![malkavia](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/malkavia/32/5621_2.png) [@malkavia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/malkavia)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2005, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684/58 "2005-05-08T19:43:38Z")
> [@Contrapuntal](#): > > Anyone wonder why folks around **catsix** have this nasty habit of killing themselves? I’m as horrified by **catsix** ’s stance on this as anyone, but that was uncalled for. ---
**Author:** ![Contrapuntal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/e274bd/32.png) [@Contrapuntal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Contrapuntal)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2005, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684/59 "2005-05-08T20:04:11Z")
> [@malkavia](#): > > I’m as horrified by **catsix** ’s stance on this as anyone, but that was uncalled for. Well, perhaps, if true. After her first two anecdotes I was a little suspicious; now I think she’s just pulling them out of her ass. I can’t see how she would take offense, however, as the suicides would just be confirming the natural order of things. ---
**Author:** ![Raygun99](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6f9a4e/32.png) [@Raygun99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Raygun99)\ **Post date:** [May 8, 2005, 8:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684/60 "2005-05-08T20:10:15Z")
> [@Contrapuntal](#): > > Well, perhaps, if true. After her first two anecdotes I was a little suspicious; now I think she’s just pulling them out of her ass. > > I can’t see how she would take offense, however, as the suicides would just be confirming the natural order of things. It’s probably quite easy to live a world where people commit suicide because they are weak, and because you have not committed suicide, you are therefore not weak. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-not-threaten-suicide-in-front-of-your-math-tutor-please/302684.md?page=4)