![]() Generally speaking, I do not try to persuade the suicidal person with all the reasons not to end one’s life. Many people don’t have family who could care for their pets, and the thought of the pets going to a shelter – or even worse, being killed – horrifies them. They fear what would happen to their pets. Some parents are deterred because they know that their suicide would make it more likely that their child would die by suicide. They fear that escaping their pain in this life will consign them to more pain, and more lessons to learn, in the next. This is another fear that has stopped some of my clients from killing themselves. They worry they will be reincarnated into a life of more pain. Many of my clients fear what might await them after death. Many people have shot themselves, overdosed, tried to hang themselves, and cut themselves only to suffer blindness, paralysis, brain damage, or disfigurement. ![]() Their suicide attempt might not be fatal, and they might suffer lifelong injuries. The fear-based reasons for not attempting suicide center on the bad things that can happen: In these cases, fear-based reasons tend to dominate. Unfortunately, many people who struggle with suicidal thoughts are bereft of hope or pleasure, so there may be no life-affirming or hopeful reasons to keep going. These are the reasons the person has to stay alive. The life-affirming reasons center on the good things that can still happen for the person if they stay alive: the things to do, the people to love, the sights to see, the hopes to realize. With my therapy clients and in my readings of research studies, I have observed two types of reasons people give for not killing themselves: life-affirming reasons, and fear-based reasons. The answers might fortify you, or even surprise you. ![]() “What are your reasons for staying alive?”Īnd if you are reading this post because you yourself have suicidal thoughts, please ask yourself these questions, too. “What has stopped you from killing yourself?”Ī related question to ask, as I discuss in this post, is: So, if you are working with a client who has thoughts of suicide, it can be helpful to ask this simple question: If nothing deterred them, they would not still be alive. Something has indeed stopped a living and breathing suicidal person from acting on their suicidal thoughts. Otherwise, they might not recognize hopes and fears that are reasons to keep fighting for their life. And if they don’t consider the question already, they should. To the contrary, asking the question “What stops you?” merely involves saying aloud what many suicidal individuals ask themselves constantly. They see this almost as a dare, as if they are saying to a hurting, suicidal person, If you really wanted to kill yourself, you would have done it already. I advise my students to ask their suicidal clients, “What stops you? What stops you from killing yourself?”
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