It doesn't have to be suicide, like I said before it can be a multitude of things suicide was just the example given. In order to say something is not based on love you have to define what love is...without a clear-cut definition anything can be for love and all the same everything can be for anything but love. The problem I have with love is the varying definitions of it, from one person to the other it changes and it rarely stays within a given context. The subject is always the same "I love..." or something along that, but the lead, draw, and closure is always different.

There is no love because love has been created into such a complex idea that no one is capable of achieving it, it has become something so much larger than it should be, love is almost its own universe anymore. It weighs so heavily on young and old minds alike "will I ever..." or "I want...". We have become such a greedy and selfish civilization that what everyone else has we want, regardless of whether or not it may just not be meant for us to have...so we rush out and get married, quick on having kids (they won't leave if you have kids together), now to raise the children and live the fairy tale...

Five to ten years down the road the bridge to peace crumbles, the white picket fence burns and becomes nothing more than ash, and the children all despise you...for a good amount of people, love, simply isn't for them.

Ahhh I gotcha.

To me, love is selfless and giving. It is receiving pure joy to please and be near another. It is a reciprocity of happiness and respect. There are so may types of love... but it's element for me is a reward. On both sides. We engage in behaviors because we get something from it. With pure love what we receive is pleasure by giving pleasure.

The more I think about it, the more I believe that "love" is something like God or leprechauns, an alluring little fantasy that falls apart under scrutiny.



And here we come to the crux of my doubt -- because everyone who has ever claimed to "love" me has made it their personal project to change me into someone else. That doesn't work with my own personal idea of what "love" was supposed to mean --

I don't get to choose for another what is best for them.... I don't get to decide for them, what is or what isn't ok...


He didn't take his own life..... I understood his desperate WANT for it to end, the constant excrutiating pain, the soul robbing narcotics for the pain, the futility of his existance at that time, his sense of burdening on others....all of it......that is where I could leave out MY selfishness.... and seek the higher understanding...

When he looked at the innocent babies...and their purity of love and raw acceptance of him....he found something in him...courage?.... determination.... life?....to persevere...

We haven't seen him for over ten years now.... but last we heard, he was loved, loving, and living..


That's what I WANTED for him....but he had to WANT it for himself..

after having lost the one i loved to suicide...i can tell you that i would have done anything under the sun to save him. i would have strapped him to a chair, tied him to a bed...had him committed...anything i could have done.

i didn't have that chance, and i watched all the lives that were seriously screwed because of his little "decision".

suicidal people can change their minds...but only if they aren't dead.

I was waiting for your input, always nice to see what input you have in my threads.



I figured he had probably not taken his life, kids seem to be more understanding and loving than most adults...in those eyes it would be difficult to simply end it all. None-the-less you understood why he wanted what he did at the time, and you supported the decision if he did want to make it...even if you didn't like the decision all that much.



Some people cannot be saved, no matter how much you may think they can. You can't change everyones mind, you can try...but when it fails you should accept the decision they made and respect them no less than you did in their life...love. Again, this isn't just about suicide, there are multitudes of decisions a person can make that you may not like.

But re: suicide -- while there is always going to be a knee-jerk reaction to try to help someone, to try to save them, it isn't always possible -- or practical.

The problem I've found when talking with suicidal people is that they have a difficult time believing anyone can truly understand their situation -- and they may be right -- we aren't them, we're not living their lives, we're not feeling what they're feeling, although we may try vicariously.

It gets down to whether or not the person actually wants help. In my experience, people who talk about committing suicide are not usually the ones who are truly intent on following through (though there are exceptions). More often than not, the sheer act of talking about it is a clue, to the informed listener, that we are supposed to talk them out of it somehow -- which is fine, as far as it goes. They may simply want help and not know how to ask.

ben never mentioned being unhappy...ever.

while he was away on the pipeline, i decided it was time to get my **** together and clean up my act. he came home...and i let him know that i couldn't be around the lifestyle any more.

we argued for a couple of hours, and he left and went to his mother's house...and put a bullet through his head.

i once attempted suicide, and i was dead serious. i did not want to live. i didn't tell a soul...i lived, and i fought through to be happy. it took a while, but if i hadn't been stopped, i wouldn't be here...neither would my kids.

our state of mind can change. if he'd truly been in agony, and if it didn't feel like...he was doing it for revenge...then maybe i'd feel differently. of course, maybe not. the problem with suicide is that the survivors are left...with a hole. always wondering, "could i have done something?"

of course, maybe the answer is no...but maybe, a day or a month or a year away...maybe they would have changed their mind.

i've known a couple that talked about it and went through with it...and several that talked about it and went on to live their lives. i'm not sure what the answer is, but i would wish for everyone to understand what they would be doing to the ones left behind. death by suicide is nothing like death by...accident or illness. the emotional scars...just don't even compare.