Dealing With Suicidal Thoughts? Here Are 4 Reasons Not To Kill Yourself

A major depressive episode makes the world dark. But there is hope.

By Jordan Gray — Written on Mar 01, 2020

Photo: arvin keynes on Unsplash

Dealing With Suicidal Thoughts? Here Are 4 Reasons Not To Kill Yourself

If you're searching for reasons not to kill yourself, then you would be doing me the greatest possible service by reading this article. Please. Read this. It's short, and it will help. I promise.

"I have wanted to kill myself, every day, for the last three weeks. I'm only holding on because I think me killing myself might upset my parents."

This is the entirety of an email that I received from a former client of mine, after having not heard from her for several years. She was deeply hurting in her life, and she felt brave enough to reach out to me for help.

As soon as I read the email, tears lept to my eyes. Not only because I loved her and understood her pain, but because I could have written those exact two sentences myself only a few months prior while dealing with my own suicidal thoughts.

The message encapsulated so much of what happens during a depressive episode. According to Harvard Health, "A major depressive episode may occur just once in a person's life or may return repeatedly. People who have many episodes of major depression may also have periods of persistent but milder depressed mood."

In my experience, this is what a major depressive episode feels like:

It is persistent. The woman who wrote to me had wanted to do it for weeks on end. It was in her mind every day.
It distorts reality. She thought that her killing herself might upset her parents. Even if her parents were abusive monsters of human beings in their own worlds of pain, it is fairly undeniable that yes, they would be upset by finding out that the child that they had loved and raised had died by suicide.
A part of us wants to hold on. Some tiny sliver inside of ourselves wants our dark thoughts to be proven wrong... somehow.

I have been through three major depressive episodes in my lifetime. There have been, at the very least, 100 days throughout my lifetime where I thought to myself, "I should just end it. I feel hopeless and terrible all the time, and it isn't worth it."

I've had panic attacks. I've cut myself. I've felt deeply hopeless. I've taken steps to actually kill myself, thinking, "I want to die." Fortunately, l survived and found hope, but I know what suffering feels like, and I know intimately what suicidal ideation sounds like rattling around in my mind for weeks or months on end.

So if you have found your way to this article on an especially dark day, I just want you to know, first and foremost, that I love you. Holy crap, I love you. So much. I can say that with total confidence without ever having met you in person.

I love you because I am you. I love you because I know your pain all too well. And right now, in my mind, I am wrapping my freakishly long arms around you in the world's biggest bear hug as I write these words.

I could have written a list of a hundred reasons not to kill yourself, but I decided that you probably wanted a more quality over quantity approach (because time is of the essence).

So please, take a minute to consider the four following reasons not to kill yourself. I have written them with you in mind, and I want your heart to hear and receive them so badly.

1. There are people who love you dearly, and it would crush them for hundreds of years.

If you add up the emotional pain that all of your friends, relatives, co-workers, admirers, and past lovers would feel if they heard that you had killed yourself, their pain would span over hundreds of years.

I know how, when you're in the depths of it, your mind is adept as rationalizing that only a small handful of people would care just a little bit. I promise you that that isn't true. People you have never met or talked to would be rocked by the news. It would affect certain people for the rest of their lives.

There are so many people who love and care for you. Take whatever the number you think it is and multiply it by at least thirty, and you'll have a more accurate representation of the people who would be crushed by you leaving us too early.

These people also want you to reach out to them. This is no easy task, I understand. In fact, it takes the ultimate courage to reach out and tell people, "I am hurting so much right now. All I think about is killing myself. I don't know of a way out. Please help."

(Side note: If you are at all thinking about hurting yourself or having any kind of persistent suicidal thoughts and you don't feel like you have anyone that you can trust to call on, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline. It's available 24/7, it's free and it's confidential. The number is: 1-800-273-TALK (8255).)

2. There are beautiful moments ahead of you just waiting for you to witness them.

There are so many beautiful and amazing moments still ahead of you.

Having your breath taken away by your favorite musicians at an outdoor concert at a venue that you haven't ever been to before. It will be lightly raining on you and your fellow concert-goers, but you won't care because the warmth of your lover's hand will be keeping yours company.

Your all-time-favorite book hasn't even come out yet. And believe me, when you read it, it will blow you away and reaffirm everything that you know to be true about life, and show you new perspectives that will make you tear up in self-recognition.

You think you've had a decent sex life so far? God/the universe/Jesus/the scientific method/Allah/the deity you believe in just called me. And they told me that, in their eyes, your sex life has barely even begun. There's a ton of fun, crazy, amazing, wildly intimate sex coming down the pipeline and you won't want to miss it.

I know that, with how you feel today, it might be difficult to even get up and have a shower or make yourself a simple meal, but if you keep soldiering on, I promise you that there are thousands of beautiful moments just waiting for you to experience them.

3. The best part of your life is still ahead of you.

Let's use some straight up logic for a second. If it's a fact of life that you only become more self-aware, more educated, more experienced, and more resilient with time, then it's inevitable that life only improves with age.

When I asked my grandfather how he felt about turning 82 a few years ago, he replied, "Great! I get to take all of the lessons I've learned through my first 81 years and compound them into the next one. It'll be my best year yet."

At the time of my writing this, I am only 29 years old. I still have a lot of living to do. But if there's one thing that my three decades on this spinning beach ball has taught me, it's that life experiences (heart break, losing friends and loved ones, having life kick the living crap out of you) only make you stronger.

I know that it sucks right now, but remember that you are only becoming more resilient every time you go through this. You are a superhero. Hold on to this mantra: "I can't wait to meet the version of myself that comes out the other side of this."

4. You won't always feel this way. I promise.

Depression, anxiety, addiction, sadness, grief, your burning desire to bring yourself harm — none of these things are static states of being. Like any and all emotions, they are temporary.

I know that that can be a tough idea to swallow if you've already felt depressed and/or suicidal for weeks or months on end, but no emotion lasts forever. You will move through it. You will look back on this period of your life and laugh with your friends about it. And not because it was funny, but because sometimes you just have to laugh to keep yourself from bawling your eyes out.