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[ENFP] ENFP confronted to suicide

KLessard

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I was wondering how an ENFP would react if a friend was to attempt suicide and he found out about secret pains the person was living with.

What would it do to you? Would you cry? Would you wish to defend or protect the person?

What would you say if you were to go and see the person at the hospital?
:9436:

Has it ever happened to you?
 

animenagai

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I would be quite torn really. I never thought suicide was logical. I'll probably try and talk to them about their problems. Not that anyone could commit suicide when I'm their friend. Who would want to live in a nagai-less world?

edit: last sentence is silliness. DOH!
 

Vamp

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I'd be able to relate immensely. I wouldn't judge someone in that situation because in part, judgments lead to that situation, I know what it's like to literally be in that much pain.
 

kyuuei

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I can't relate to feeling suicidal. At all.

But, I do react when someone tells me. I don't pretend it's not there.. or maybe they're over-reacting. I take it. Very serious. I witnessed a rather gruesome one occur when I was younger.. so I know people are very capable of it if driven to that point.

If they don't get help, or show signs of wanting to fix the situation themselves after they confess it to me, I will inform someone (a family member, a close friend of theirs, etc.) and probably pay extra attention to them until I am sure the situation is diffused.

I don't judge them.. I don't give an opinion. "Well, its your fault this," or "It was totally not your fault that" I don't try to take any sides on the situation. It is what it is. I can't really have strong opinions on something I cannot relate to.. the only one I have is that if you're suicidal, you need to get help, and as a friend, you need to be part of that help. So.. I'm sticking to that plan.
 

angell_m

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I can't relate to people who would openly express that they're about to commit suicide;
whine and force that problem on to others. When I was a handfull of pills away, I didn't
tell anyone about it. I instead locked my apartment up, opened up the living room
window to let the air out and turned off the heating. I was prepared to make it
comfortable for whoever found my dead body weeks/months later. I would never cry for
help. What the fuck would anybody help me with anyway? Few can relate to my
problems, and even if they could I would never acknowledge it. This is, of course, yet
another taboo subject for many, blah blah blah, but I won't give you my sympathy.
 

alcea rosea

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I was wondering how an ENFP would react if a friend was to attempt suicide and he found out about secret pains the person was living with.

What would it do to you? Would you cry? Would you wish to defend or protect the person?

What would you say if you were to go and see the person at the hospital?
:9436:

Has it ever happened to you?

It has happened to me more than once (the suicide rates are quite high in this country) that somebody quite close to me has attempted suicide and succeeded on it.

It is terrible "swamp" of emotions that one goes through. I did sense something even without those people telling me about their plans to end their lives, but I didn't believe my intuition. But, as I've realized after those happenings (those people died, they didn't just try to kill themselves), that a person cannot be helped if they dont' want to be helped. There is no point in blaming yourself afterwards. You do as much as you can to help but at the end it's their choice, not yours.

Emotionally, it's terrible time. I wanted to understand but I've also learned that I cannot understand it, nobody can, except if you have been on the same desparate state as they are. And I haven't been there, I'm happy to say. Suicide is not usually seen as a way to die for those who try to kill themselves, it's seen as a way to escape the desperate situations (there are studies about this).

Anyway, it is terrible and I hope nobody has to go trough it, the suicide of somebody close to you. I even wish that nobody would commit suicide because it's so horrible thing. But it happens. And even an ENFP can deal with it but it'll take time, many years before it's only a part of past live. And even so, you'll always miss the people that aren't with us anymore. And the question "why" doesn't ever go away, it just gets a little bit "smaller" over the years.

But after somebody trying to kill themselves, and not succeeding (a good thing!) I would try to support that other person and not trying to blame them anyway. I would try to make them accept some professional help in dealing with their problems and stand by them all the time. I would also suggest that you, the support person, would seek some help, somebody to talk to , somebody who you can lean on to, maybe even professional help, so you can sort out your own thoughts and emotions.
 

KLessard

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I can't relate to people who would openly express that they're about to commit suicide;
whine and force that problem on to others. When I was a handfull of pills away, I didn't
tell anyone about it. I instead locked my apartment up, opened up the living room
window to let the air out and turned off the heating. I was prepared to make it
comfortable for whoever found my dead body weeks/months later. I would never cry for
help. What the fuck would anybody help me with anyway? Few can relate to my
problems, and even if they could I would never acknowledge it. This is, of course, yet
another taboo subject for many, blah blah blah, but I won't give you my sympathy.

I was rather wondering how you would react if your friend failed at it and you found out afterwards that he was so depressive. If he kept all this to himself like you said.

Sorry to hear you've come near suicide yourself. Are you better now?
 

angell_m

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If someone told me that, I would be indifferent to the cause. I honestly wouldn't care.

If it was my brother who did it, I would call him a selfish prick, because he's got a
daughter to take care of. He would lose my respect. His own father commited suicide
when he was a kid, so he should know what it's like growing up without a father. And
my father tried to commit suicide when I was eight, while I was waiting for him to come
pick me up after school. Parent's should know better; that their kids depend on them.

I'm not being a hypocrite neither. The only ones I have, are my friends, and friends
come and go, none of them depend on me. It's completely irrelevant in comparison.
 

BlueScreen

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I've known 5 people who've suicided. All meant something to me while living, though they were family friends, teammates, younger people who I'd helped out with things, older people who I'd looked up to when younger. I was never really that friend they'd confide in. I think the biggest problem is people not knowing there is even a threat of it happening, which was true in 4 of the 5 cases. If someone actually told me and gave me a chance to change it, I'd do all I could to get them out of there. I don't really know anyone who'd pretend they were going to, so that option would probably get little weight.
 

Nonsensical

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The closest I've been been to suicide was my best friends dad who shot himself (rather out of no-where) this past May. It was so unexpected that it really just smacked everyone in the face...it took a while to sink in.

Suicide is the worst thing ever. The idea of having absolutely nothing to live for or no one to connect with is the most troubling, scary, and saddest thought to me...

I'd take a proactive approach if I knew anyone was suicidal. I'd give up my time to discuss and spend time with them, no matter who it was.

Someone once told me suicide was a choice. A choice? When you are that far down the path of depression, ANY human is incapable of rational thought. It is not a choice and I would NEVER ever blame a person for committing suicide. Afterall, who are we to even try to understand the troubles of a person? The most we can do it offer our service and make ourselves available to anyone who is suffering.
 

KLessard

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If someone told me that, I would be indifferent to the cause. I honestly wouldn't care.

If it was my brother who did it, I would call him a selfish prick, because he's got a
daughter to take care of. He would lose my respect. His own father commited suicide
when he was a kid, so he should know what it's like growing up without a father. And
my father tried to commit suicide when I was eight, while I was waiting for him to come
pick me up after school. Parent's should know better; that their kids depend on them.

I'm not being a hypocrite neither. The only ones I have, are my friends, and friends
come and go, none of them depend on me. It's completely irrelevant in comparison.

To angell-m:
I'm sorry you've had to go through all this. :sad: I understand your position.


I was recently in touch with an ESTP who opened up to me about his childhood. Abandonment, sexual abuse and betrayal left him wounded. He said he tried to "leave" (kill himself) at eleven.

What if the person was a child who felt unwanted and just decided he wouldn't be a burden to anyone anymore (that's the precise case I had in mind).
 

KLessard

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It has happened to me more than once (the suicide rates are quite high in this country)

Do you live in Québec too? I know Québec had the highest suicide rate in the world at some point.

I have a very vivid memory concerning suicide.
When I was in college (I was about 18), one of my classmates attempted suicide by sliting her wrists. Some of her close friends heard about it while at school and I remember them coming into class with red eyes and unable to concentrate on their exam.
 

Queen Kat

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Suicide isn't something you'd expect in a place like where I live, a suburb with nearly only white middle class people. But, in fact, suicide isn't uncommon here. Almost every year I hear of someone my cousins/friends/acquaintances know who committed suicide. I wonder how it's possible that our town hasn't reached the newspaper when it comes to high suicide rates. These people who kill themselves are actually quite uncreative when it comes to suicide, they all decide to go and hug a train (it's so common a friend and I have a special name for it: "Ronnieing", after an acquaintance of ours who hugged a train). The reasons are usually unclear, or it's because the person had psychological problems their whole life and now got dumped by their lovers and so they couldn't take it any longer. The first time I got confronted with suicide, it was when I was 13 and a friend of mine admitted she had attempted to kill herself a few times before she moved to our neighbourhood. I asked her if she was better now and she told she was happy now and didn't want to die anymore. I was so naive I believed her, but a few weeks later she tried it again. I felt really betrayed. If there was anything wrong, she should have told me, because I told her my darkest secrets too. I just tried to keep her happy, protect her against people who could harm her self image. Not long after that it was my life that got ruined. I got socially isolated, couldn't contact my friends and I hated the people I could contact. I got in a deep depression myself and there were times when even I thought death was the only solution. Fortunately I was born as an optimistic person and I tried to find other solutions and I sought hope in other things (which all turned out to be false hope, but that doesn't matter). In the end I cured myself after two years. I stayed in a social vacuum, but I wasn't depressed anymore. That's when I found out I wanted to become a psychologist, I guess. :D
 

Vamp

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I can't believe some of the negativity in this thread. No wonder it's so hard for suicidal/depressive people to get better. Some people are wrongly expecting a suicidal person to be in the right frame of mind (which in unfair) and being judgmental towards them and applying XYZ to an individual situation and calling them selfish (which is also unfair). If his tendency to apply someone else's baggage to another person's individual problem would go away. ..we'd have less suicide.

If people would stop trying to punish others for their "weakness" and focus on helping them pick up the pieces the suicidal person wouldn't feel like a terrible person for daring to feel suicidal in the first place which is a self hating feeling that tends to lead to feeling suicidal all over again.
 

KLessard

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I can't believe some of the negativity in this thread. No wonder it's so hard for suicidal/depressive people to get better. Some people are wrongly expecting a suicidal person to be in the right frame of mind (which in unfair) and being judgmental towards them and applying XYZ to an individual situation and calling them selfish (which is also unfair). If his tendency to apply someone else's baggage to another person's individual problem would go away. ..we'd have less suicide.

If people would stop trying to punish others for their "weakness" and focus on helping them pick up the pieces the suicidal person wouldn't feel like a terrible person for daring to feel suicidal in the first place which is a self hating feeling that tends to lead to feeling suicidal all over again.

I agree.
I was speaking to an INTJ last summer, and she was talking about calvinism (a system I can't believe in) and saying how human beings are such wretched sinners, etc. She was so hard core hard.
And then I said, yes, but self-hatred isn't healthy and can lead people to destroy themselves, and this isn't God's will, and she replied: "Even those who commit suicide do it out of excessive self-love and are so self-absorbed."
I was astonished. :cry:

But I understand angell_m's bitterness because of his own life experience.
 

Vamp

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I agree.
I was speaking to an INTJ last summer, and she was talking about calvinism (a system I can't believe in) and saying how human beings are such wretched sinners, etc. She was so hard core hard.
And then I said, yes, but self-hatred isn't healthy and can lead people to destroy themselves, and this isn't God's will, and she replied: "Even those who commit suicide do it out of excessive self-love and are so self-absorbed."
I was astonished. :cry:

But I understand angell_m's bitterness because of his own life experience.

Wow. That is astonishing. Unfortunately, suicide (and even merely being depressive) is seen as "selfish" all too often. I think this creates shame and makes getting help that much harder; who would want to admit being "selfish" and "weak"? Which means you have to keep it bottled up and it can only get worse from there. :(
 

Chloe

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I was wondering how an ENFP would react if a friend was to attempt suicide and he found out about secret pains the person was living with.

What would it do to you? Would you cry? Would you wish to defend or protect the person?

What would you say if you were to go and see the person at the hospital?
:9436:

Has it ever happened to you?

I have a friend who tried to kill herself.. but then we werent friends. If it happens again, I'd do everything to stop it, prevent it. Probably would talk to her a lot, definately wouldnt cry, more like focus on making them believe they have very bright future, and would organize some real help to her and not just leave it on the words because in such cases there must be some real action.

Also, i know one guy, we were kinda friends, from my neighborhood who killed himself. I spent just few nights talking with him on some party, but I noticed then, 5yrs ago, that something is wrong with him, he was obsessed with Jesenjin (Yesenin?) etc. It's so sad because he was very talented writer but he saw no perspective because he was poor..
 

stringstheory

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I can't believe some of the negativity in this thread. No wonder it's so hard for suicidal/depressive people to get better. Some people are wrongly expecting a suicidal person to be in the right frame of mind (which in unfair) and being judgmental towards them and applying XYZ to an individual situation and calling them selfish (which is also unfair). If his tendency to apply someone else's baggage to another person's individual problem would go away. ..we'd have less suicide.

I'm having a hard time believing it myself. Speaking from personal experience having to cope with such feelings, they are in and of themselves "selfish". When you're feeling THAT down, how could they be anything else? That i understand.

However, below the surface there's usually a lot more going on. For many these intrusive thoughts are the result of chemical imbalances in the brain, and beyond becoming self-aware enough to seek proper treatment (which is not easy) the thoughts cannot be controlled. Hell even with treatment I've had to learn to just quickly dismiss such thoughts from time to time, they are so pervasive, but it's not something that comes naturally. It's not something you just "snap out of".

If people would stop trying to punish others for their "weakness" and focus on helping them pick up the pieces the suicidal person wouldn't feel like a terrible person for daring to feel suicidal in the first place which is a self hating feeling that tends to lead to feeling suicidal all over again.

Exactly; i don't think this brand of "tough love" is helpful here. Ironically, while I understand the negative reactions to such a situation, I find them ironic in that selfish accusations being tossed about are usually pretty selfish themselves, as they're often unable to get past how their friends dark feelings make THEM feel.
 

am_i_evil666

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No, I never felt suicidal. But I would try to help that person. Especially if it was a friend. I'd try to convince them not to and that life has more to offer.
 

Vamp

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I'm having a hard time believing it myself. Speaking from personal experience having to cope with such feelings, they are in and of themselves "selfish". When you're feeling THAT down, how could they be anything else? That i understand.

However, below the surface there's usually a lot more going on. For many these intrusive thoughts are the result of chemical imbalances in the brain, and beyond becoming self-aware enough to seek proper treatment (which is not easy) the thoughts cannot be controlled. Hell even with treatment I've had to learn to just quickly dismiss such thoughts from time to time, they are so pervasive, but it's not something that comes naturally. It's not something you just "snap out of".



Exactly; i don't think this brand of "tough love" is helpful here. Ironically, while I understand the negative reactions to such a situation, I find them ironic in that selfish accusations being tossed about are usually pretty selfish themselves, as they're often unable to get past how their friends dark feelings make THEM feel.

Oh man. The thoughts are pervasive and DEEP. Sometimes I stop telling myself not to think them because it seems like doing that makes them worse.
It's beyond "down", it's all the way over the edge. And some people reach the point of no return. But I don't have to tell you that. :)
It gets so tiring, fighting day after day ....and then you have people on the outside telling you that you're selfish, weak etc., and well add in that you're never "cured" it's just a recipe for disaster. I consider myself living on borrowed time. I'm in such a dark place right now I can't even talk lucidly about the low points because I am in a low point right now. :shrug:
 
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