Celebrity Death Thread

[Sharkbait]

I knew a girl once who who had lived a somewhat troubled life. Beaten by her (Georgia Redneck) husband, had two beautiful children, and she herself would have made a qualifying candidate for one of Drew's avitars. She met a guy who killed himself the day after they were married. A tragedy I will never understand and bothered me for a very long time. Sometmes I think suicide victims don't think about other people, and the pain they are trying to escape is passed on to those they leave behind.

[bimmer84]

Suicide is the ultimate form of selfishness.

[-Deborah-]

I think so, too.

Shark that's quite a sad situation. :(

[Malto Marko]

Suicide is the ultimate form of selfishness.

I dunno.

I can not say I have had a suicide touch my life but, I have had several very close people in my life fail an attempt.

I am not sure selfishness is as much of a motivating factor as despair is.

I am lucky enough that both of the people I love dearly failed in their attempt so I was able to try to understand what their motivation was. Both had strikingly similar feelings but neither were aquainted well enough to have used a copy cat explanation.

[Sharkbait]

Those that fail do not want to die, else they would have. Mostly looking for attention, sympathy, understanding, {fill in the blank}. Any way you slice it, it is not a good situation.

[-Deborah-]

Mark, I understand the despair. But to be so self-absorbed as to either not realize what your suicide would do to your loved ones or to not care and go ahead with it means selfishness to me.

[unknown lions fan]

It is selfish.

The loved ones left behind have to suffer the loss for the rest of their lives. Not so much for the one who copped out.

[unknown lions fan]

The silliest thing to me is that people don't understand how precious life is. There is nothing you can't get past.

Everyone has it tough at times. And with the passing of time, the pain fades. Ultimately, we move on and find happiness again.

It is a horrible act of cowardice to bail out.

I'm speaking of people who commit suicide for emotional or relationship problems, not those who are terminally ill, btw.

[-Deborah-]

I agree completely, Dave. And I also think that the terninally ill really should have that option. Hell, we are able to put our pets out of their misery, but not our loved ones. I guess there's too much potential for abuse?

[Newbomb Turk]

I used to think people who commit suicide are very selfish but now I think it's their life and if living in the world is too painful, it's their call.

you cannot fathom the hole someone leaves in the souls of those who loved them.

you sentence them to a lifetime of greiving and pondering the unanswerable question "Why couldn't I stop it from happening?"

[Dan V]

I agree completely, Dave. And I also think that the terninally ill really should have that option. Hell, we are able to put our pets out of their misery, but not our loved ones. I guess there's too much potential for abuse?

This is a touchey and controversial subject.

My father did more for us and others in the last 14 months that he lived when diagnosed with terminal cancer than his entire life before that . It wasn't that he was a bad or selfish person before he got his diagnosis, it was that he relished every moment of his life because he knew life was SO PRECIOUS and he embraced each day.

I know someone who killed himself after his girlfriend broke up with him. What a waste! What a selfish coward! His mother has never been quite the same since.

[-Deborah-]

Dan, I would never advocate allowing the death of a terminally ill person as long as they have some quality of life as your father must have had. I guess I'm imagining my step mother in her final weeks when the cancer had spread to her brain and she was incoherent and in terrible pain. She didn't last too long in that condition, but it was longer than anyone should have had to go through.

[Malto Marko]

Mark, I understand the despair. But to be so self-absorbed as to either not realize what your suicide would do to your loved ones or to not care and go ahead with it means selfishness to me.

We have control of our own feelings. We do not control others. My experience taught me that those that tried to end their lives felt they no longer had control of their own feelings. Since they never had control of others feelings, what others felt, was not the issue.

I do not disagree that the impact suicide has on those that survive is significant. I only assert that my experience teaches me that those that take action towards it, feel that they no longer have control over their feelings (or lives) and no longer wish to continue in that way.

Life is a most precious gift. We only realize that when we are taught it from infancy and have love and support around us. Not everyone is afforded that luxury but fortunately, not everyone that has been slighted feels a need to cash in their chips.

[YT]

Dan, I would never advocate allowing the death of a terminally ill person as long as they have some quality of life as your father must have had. I guess I'm imagining my step mother in her final weeks when the cancer had spread to her brain and she was incoherent and in terrible pain. She didn't last too long in that condition, but it was longer than anyone should have had to go through.

Deb, your experience with your step-mom are almost an exact copy of what I went through with my mom.

I guess seeing first hand the aftermath of suicide attempts (sucessful and unsucessful), I am very harsh on people who use suicide as permenent solution to a temporary problem.

But then again, who am I to judge....

Yet I am very understanding about assisted suicide for terminally ill patients.

In some ways, I think my mom should have used assisted suicide to spare her the tremendous pain she was in the last 3 months of her life.

The last 2 weeks of her life, I would constantly pray to God help her die to put her out of her misery...

What kind of son does that????

I still have a lot of guilt over this, and I'm still fucked up emotionally and mentally about it

[-Deborah-]

YT, any son who didn't want their Mom to suffer would do that. You can not feel guilty for wanting to spare her pain. It's not that you didn't want her around anymore! You didn't want her to go through all that pain. Perfectly understandable and exactly what a loving son would do.