discussing sui thoughts

Do you talk about it with your therapist?

I guess I don't feel safe telling him. I always tell him when I feel like i'm going to die, or want to die, but usually that's it.

There's been times I have been really suicidal during our therapy, and I feel so alone that I can't talk with him about it. Right now is one of those times.

One time he asked me about it further, and I said "we don't need to discuss the details". I just didn't want him to know. Part of me doesn't want him to worry; another part is that I don't want to see him not care when I tell him. Another part is too ashamed to talk about it. Yet another, is I worry he will think i'm being dramatic or faking or trying to get attention.

So I cry in silence.

I have felt the same way, but, I did finally bring it up to my T about a month or so ago. It has helped me to feel understood, and has also taken a bit of power away from the sui thoughts.

Fortunately, my T will discuss this situation openly with me. Some T's will not. They are advised to skirt around the subject as they believe talking about this may be a form of encouragement for some. So if you do bring up the subject and your T brushes you off, do not take offense.

I understand your pain, and I do pray you can find relief from these deceiving thoughts.

I talk to my therapist and my pdoc pretty openly about any suicidal thoughts, ideation, plans, etc. They know me pretty well and are astute at knowing at what point I've crossed that line from just thoughts into being at risk. Being able to be straight with them about it has been really helpful as most of the time, I just needed to talk about thoughts and they were there to listen. Other times that openness has been life saving for me. They've never even slightly implied that I was being dramatic or seeking attention because they absolutely knew that wasn't the case. They've always handled such situations very supportively and respectfully.

No and I never will. I did with my first therapist for seven years and I wonder if that is one reason he terminated with me. I have attempted suicide a few times and I will never talk about it with anyone again. I am not interested in being "talked out of it."

Some therapists see suicidal ideation as a liability and won't work with people who keep having those thoughts. I learned this while searching for a new therapist. Sad, but true.

I am sorry.

How are people supposed to get real help?

I'm worried if I tell him, it will cause my therapist to distance himself from me more.

I know. I wonder this too. How are people supposed to get help if the "helpers" can't deal with suicidal thoughts? All you can do is take a chance. Therapy is mostly about taking chances anyway. I hope if you do he will be able to help somehow.

It makes me feel worthless because he won't show he cares I tell him. Worse, he'll distance himself. It strengthen s the feeling so much.

If I planned to kill myself, the last place I would go is a hospital. I want him to care, but I know he will be rejecting

Why do you think he would be rejecting or distance himself?

Well at Christmas time, I told him it hurt that I wasn't in his Christmas and that i wanted to die.

He said it was anger at him and he got mad at me. The thing is, I get like that at Christmastime every year because I feel so incredibly alone. That I said it hurt was just added to that mindset.

Ever since then, things have not been the same. It feels like out relationship is always hanging by a thread. I already feel abandoned.

I am sorry. That doesn't seem very helpful.

Something I think about...please don't judge, just being honest.

I think about going through with it, to end all the pain. Then I think about how I will affect the people I love. When I think about everyone crying, I want to reach out to them, comfort them, and also be comforted. I want them to show me that level of care when I'm alive. Then that leads me to question my motives? Are they selfish? Is it a way to manipulate people into caring about me? That awful thought usually convinces me to delay my plans. I do not want to manipulate people. But I also don't want to be in pain.

The reason for my response is because you say you want your T to care, you don't know how to get help, and you don't want to be hospitalized. If you do kill yourself, you will never know if your T cared. And if you are serious and don't talk to your T and don't go to the hospital, then why does your T caring matter?

I'm not judging. Honest. I'm in the same boat. I want to be cared about, but don't want to suffer anymore. I want help, but I don't want to lose what little I do have. Part of me is serious about following through, another part desperately wants to hold onto hope. I have trapped myself. But after all the analyzing, I realize I do want to live, I just don't want to live this way anymore. So I do my best to push through the pain. I am honest about my thoughts with my T, but I am constantly reassuring her I'm safe even though don't tell her that I can't guarantee that. I walk a thin line btwn coping and danger. I have to. I know what hospitalization will do to me and my family.

I don't know. I kind of lost track of where I was going. But I just want you to know I relate

Those arent my issues...they are yours.

I want him to care but that is not the reason for the thoughts. I want to talk to him about my thoughts, and not being able to makes me feel more alone and intensifies the feelings.

My sui thoughts come from hopelessness and giving up on life. I dont think I will get better. I'm getting worse from therapy.

I was afraid T would panic and send me away when I first started with him but I was in therapy because I was so suicidal that I needed the help. Finally talking to him about it acted like a pressure valve release plus he did not panic. He was incredibly empathetic and showed immense concern.

If you can't talk to him about something that is effecting you and can be life threatening then how is therapy going to help you?

I'm glad to hear how much that helped.

I don't know. I'm going to try to talk to him.

I called some other therapists. I wasn't interested in any of them but pushed aside my feelings to make one appointment with someone who at least had good credentials but am really worried because of what Puzzlebug said. Who in the world would want me to be their client? Someone who needs a reduced fee, strong borderline traits, and actively suicidal.

I'm concerned that actively seeking help will make me feel worse because of all the rejection that will leave me feeling more isolated. Yet not seeking help won't help either. Maybe the latter is the less of 2 evils and the feelings will pass on their own.

I'm sorry you feel this way.

I told my t when I wanted to die but it seems he didn't believe I really will do it. I tried. He was mad at me and told me he will put me in hospital. He said he will not be my t anymore if I will try to kill myself.
His words made everythink just worse. I don't think that other T would act so cruel.
My T also thought I show my anger by doing this. Maybe it was anger too but at first I was desperete.
Now I think that no matter how I hate my life, there is no reason to die, there also is no reason to live but I will live because only being alive I can change something, I dont want to leave this life when Im not done everything I wanted. I suggest this to you too

When I first made an appointment, for the T I have now, it was for EMDR. I told him I was bulimic, hopeless and suicidal and I was referred to EMDR because exposure therapy was making me worse. So he new right off the bad and chose to take me. Now when I was looking for a psychiatrist and explained all my symptoms and what I was diagnosised with they told me I needed to find someone else right away and good luck o.O I guess that was their way of saying, no way no how are we taking your crazy *** on as a patient.

When I discussed my suicidal intents with T he would express how much I mean to him, how much it would effect his life, how much he felt I had to offer this world and that it is a fact that as a therapist they know that at some point in their career they will lose someone to suicide and he did not want that to be me. I felt really guilty and if guilt stopped me then so be it.

I haven't had really bad experiences when I've shared this. It's been more neutral, like I was talking about the mail being late. So I just don't bring it up anymore. I wonder if it would help to begin by saying what you're looking for (support, understanding, a way to cope, someone to listen, a release valve...whatever it is you need) before you share. That way your therapist at least knows your intention.

I have told mine the quote from David Foster Wallace to help explain:

“...The person in whom Its invisible agony reaches a certain unendurable level will kill herself the same way a trapped person will eventually jump from the window of a burning high-rise. Make no mistake about people who leap from burning windows. Their terror of falling from a great height is still just as great as it would be for you or me standing speculatively at the same window just checking out the view; i.e. the fear of falling remains a constant. The variable here is the other terror, the fire’s flames: when the flames get close enough, falling to death becomes the slightly less terrible of two terrors. It’s not desiring the fall; it’s terror of the flames. And yet nobody down on the sidewalk, looking up and yelling ‘Don’t!’ and ‘Hang on!’, can understand the jump. Not really. You’d have to have personally been trapped and felt flames to really understand a terror way beyond falling.”

There isn't anything they can really do if someone is committed to following through, so maybe some of the standoffishness with some of them is just assessing the risk. Often, though, I think it's that they really just don't understand. And honestly, I don't care. If they don't want to hear it, it's a good way for me to know I need a different therapist.

I would say mine have stayed rather neutral about these discussions too. They never panicked or got overly emotional or angry about what I was saying. It was clear they were assessing my symptoms and making decisions about how to proceed based on the level of danger I was or wasn't in. They have been firm with me in those times when I clearly was in danger and needed hospitalization, but that wasn't anger or panic, simply firmness that I needed to make decisions for my own health and safety. Their ability and clear skill in handling me in those kinds of crises was very supportive and professional.

I've thought about this a bit recently as it came up for me too. When I first went to therapy it was right after being diagnosed with MDD etc and being put on meds. At that time one of my biggest issues, aside from the depression, was suicidal ideation. As I explained it to my psychiatrist, I had no real intention of killing myself, but every day I would have these (intrusive like) thoughts such as driving to work that I should pull into the other lane into a head on collision, or walking by the parking garage, that I should go jump from the top, or in the office, that I should hang myself above my desk. Then I would come home and imagine scenarios, all while sitting in front of TV or something benign, such as I overdose on pills and my husband finds me dead, he is relived, finds a better wife and they live on in our house. Anyways, it was not constant, but it was daily I was having these thoughts, and then when pushed to my limits, if my husband was around and asked what was wrong I would sometimes say "I wish I was dead" or "I hope I don't make it to work today" or something along those lines. He would get mad, called me crazy once, so I would try not to say those things even if that's what I was thinking. I wondered to myself if I was being manipulative, I mean the thoughts were real and happened whether I said anything or not, but I decided not to talk about them at home thinking maybe talking about them was like a cry for help gone too far.

My psychiatrist was/has always been interested in this and always did ask me about it, even long after I was on meds and the thoughts stopped, so he was my main confidant in this area. Every session, he'd ask. I've always been careful in how I talk about it, the first thing I say every time is "I have no real plan to kill myself, but I keep having these morbid thoughts of ways I could die..." mostly to ensure I don't get locked up, but also because it's true, I've never really planned to kill myself. When I started seeing my therapist I told him about the thoughts, I think, but like you I don't anymore. My therapist mentioned once he had a client that killed himself, and ever since then I've not wanted to mention it in the worry it might upset him or remind him of that. It ended up being a non-issue for a while because the thoughts went away, but then recently when I came off my meds there was a time they came back and I had no one to talk to about it. In the end I just decided to go back on meds.

I did read recently that it is a common symptom of C-PTSD, at least according to one guy. I think that you should be able to talk about it, but it is just risky business because it upsets other people to hear that you feel so low. Lucky for me my therapist can sense when I'm depressed even if I'm not saying it, but there is a part of me now that feels like a failure when my mind is really chaotic like that, and I don't want to admit it to him, because that would make his therapy seem like a failure. Bottom line though, if you are having those kind of thoughts often it is at a minimum a sign your depression is back and/or worse and that you should make some changes.

I didn't used to at all. I was afraid to. Then, I started telling T about them several weeks after they happened, so that I wasn't at risk "right now" but could still process what I had experienced. This latest time, I told T as it was happening, and it changed things...I'm back to being hesitant again. I think that now, I'm going to be looking for some kind of compromise between "right now" and "in the past"...at least until I rebuild a little bit of trust that T won't change because I share these thoughts with her.

I do understand that the T has to be responsible and if they feel you're a risk to yourself, take action to mitigate that. On the other hand, I've lived with suicidal thoughts since I was in my late teens...I'm in my late 30's now. I've managed to not act on them for this long...I need my T to trust that I know myself well enough to know whether I'm going to act on the thoughts or not. I think this latest time scared my T.

I think if you're upfront about your issues and they agree to take you as a client then there is probably a decent chance of them not turning you away for disclosing those thoughts. I found that several therapists (and these were pretty far away from where I live because there are no therapists close by) were focused on being short term therapists and not interested in dealing with someone who had severe trauma and severe issues. I think therapists should be upfront about not being able to handle these types of problems.

For me, the times I actually tried to kill myself I did not reach out at all before. I tend to think that talking about suicidal thoughts is not manipulative and it is sad to think that some think that. I would not want a therapist who believes that.

I hold back a bit with my sui feelings as well sometimes, but mostly because I don't want my t or pdoc to think I need to go to the hospital (again).

For the most part, however, I've found that with all the t's and pdocs I've had that they are quite reasonable about it; they don't scare easily and if I tell them it's just thoughts, they believe me.

As for him worrying, you might have to accept that he will worry a little. After all, you're his patient! At the same time, most t's are experienced with all manner of sui ideations and thoughts and can worry in a "professional" way without it impacting them too heavily.

As for him not caring, I don't know your t, but if he doesn't care that you are having sui thoughts, you need a new t. Just remember that he may not show it too much on the surface--he needs to remain professional and not freak you out.

As for being ashamed to talk about it, this is rough. But there's nothing to be ashamed of--and if you can't talk about these feelings with your t, who CAN you talk about them with?

As for being dramatic and faking for attention, I go back to the "t's have experience with this." Does your t know you well? Are you usually prone to faking feelings, etc. for attention? If not, it's doubtful he will think this is the case. If so, just make sure when you discuss it that he knows this is more than a cry for help and you need to be taken seriously.

I'm sorry you are struggling with this. Hold on!

During the first time I was in therapy with my current T, I don't think I ever mentioned I had sui thoughts. I have wanted to talk about it many times, but I never had the courage to tell her about those thoughts.

Since about 1.5 months I've been in therapy with her again. I did mentioned it in the e-mail I send her about why I needed therapy again. And I mentioned it in the intake, which was with another T.
But we haven't really talked about it. I'm a bit afraid to start talking about it again. I have those thoughts every day. I don't have plans and I know I won't have any soon. I think. But I don't know if I will ever get that far that I will do it.

I'm not sure if talking about these sui thoughts will help? We do talk about the things that are the reason why I have those thoughts, so..

My T told me this many time before. Suicidal behavior was one of the reasons why I started therapy.
my t knows that people can manipulate with suicide to get what they want and thats why he very rarely are kind to me when Im suicidal, he doesnt want me to think that only being suicidal is the way he would show me his love.
I dont know about others buy when I am suicidal I crave for love etc but its wrong way to get this love.
Im talking about me not you. If my T told me how much I mean to him only shen Im suicidal, I would be more suicidal to get more his love but its so wrong.
Weird but when he is mad because I want to die it helps me understand that being suicidal is not okay, not good and I cant get love from people that way. Its painful at the time but it changed me and I stopped to cut and overdose what I did for 3 years.
Its about me but we all are different of course.