Ryan in Ohio

RO: They're not bullshitters and they're not wimps. People who are suicidal, they tend to be looked at as people who are weak and inferior and that's quite the contrary.

SW: Hey there, my name is Sean. On this podcast, Suicide Noted, I talk with suicide attempt survivors so that we can hear their stories. Every year around the world, millions of people try to end their lives and we almost never talk about it. And when we do, many of us, including me, are not very good at it. So one of my goals with this podcast is to have conversations with suicide attempt survivors and hopefully have better conversations. I'm going to try. We are talking about suicide, so this may not be a good fit for everyone. Please take that into account before you listen. I do hope that you listen because there's so much to learn.

I had a long conversation with Ryan, today's guest, and you'll hear that conversation in a moment. We had some tech problems, so a few things you're not going to hear in the interview, and I'd like to share them with you. Ryan shared with me that he first started thinking about suicide when he was 14 years old. He was bullied a lot. He was threatened and made fun of for being different and, in his words, weird. He was also diagnosed with a lot of different things. Autism. Bipolar. Anxiety. He said he couldn't stay still. He couldn't concentrate. He had trouble making friends. had trouble keeping friends. And he never really conformed. Now Ryan's gay and he lives in a conservative area in Ohio so... Well you can imagine some of the challenges he faced. I want to take you now to the interview. Again, this is Ryan. Ryan lives in Ohio and he is a suicide attempt survivor.

How are you doing?

RO:  I'm okay. How are you? 

SW: I'm okay. Thanks for doing this. I suppose based on what you shared, the main thing that I'm wondering about is, you wrote, and I'm paraphrasing, let's do this because I won't be around much longer. Right. So what does that mean?

RO: That means I have a plan and I have things I want to accomplish before I leave this world. So I got things I want to do. But I'm hoping that I'm gone come this winter.

SW: The big question, which probably is hard, is why do you want to do that. Why do you want to end your life?

RO: When your life is filled with disappointment and anger and resentment. And your life is filled with a lot of darkness. And when you've been in and out of therapy for years and you've tried one drug after another and you live in a country whose healthcare system is so fucked, there's nowhere to go. You don't want to prolong the suffering. And it is suffering. It's a form of suffering. It's psychological, it's mental, it manifests itself as physical all the time. There are days I don't want to get out of bed. I can't get out of bed. I can't leave this apartment. There are days I just start crying uncontrollably and I can't stop. I'll be at work. Somebody will say something. I'll come across a smell or a scent or I'll hear something and I'll just start bawling. I mean it's torture and after a while you start wondering why do you want to continue the torture? Why do you want to continue allowing yourself to feel this way. Why are you torturing yourself? And I know it won't get better. I know things, I mean, life is filled with loss and darkness. And I'm not, I didn't sign up for it. I didn't want it. I'm not gonna continue it. I don't want to. So while I'm here, if I can, if I can, I don't know, share my story or, you know, help somebody while I'm still here or like if I can just get my point across before I go, then that's fine. I'm done kind of talking about it and I'm done kind of wishing for it. So I'm trying to work to put an action plan in place. You know what I mean?

SW: Yeah, and you've tried before.

RO: Yes, I tried a couple of times. One was with pills. Another, I had to be talked off a bridge. I figured both ways are pretty quick.

SW: Right, so you've tried twice, so I guess once and almost twice. How long ago were those?

RO: One was like three years ago and one was like 10 years ago and I had a nervous breakdown about four years ago where I was considered briefly for hospitalization but they told me, know, therapy, let's find you a therapist, let's get you on some meds.

SW: You tried once and almost twice and you're planning it. When you didn't succeed, and I don't know if that's the right word, but I think you understand what I'm asking. Did you have a feeling of regret or was it a different kind of feeling?

RO: It wasn't regret specifically and forgive me if I'm a little nervous because I rarely get interviewed for anything. I don't consider it regret. I think maybe a little bit of remorse because I know through my actions or my attempted actions I did hurt people. So now I'm at a point in my life where I'm trying to distance myself away from others. Trying to break some ties so it will be a little more cushioned. I wouldn't call it regret. I'm not going to say I'm unhappy that it didn't work out, but I'm not happy either. I learned from those moments and I moved on and I tried to take what I could from those periods and those incidents and I tried to grow with it. You have understand my theories and my views on death have kind of changed, have kind of evolved because I've been around so much of it. Like I've lost a lot of relatives. I lost friends. you know, I've lost people I love to everything from disease to murder. I just can't express enough that

I just feel like my death wouldn't be like it's a cure. It would be a cure. It's not gonna be a loss. It'll be good for me. It'll be good. People have, people in my life, they have others. They have friends, they have relatives, they have loved ones, they have children. They have people. Like, so there's not gonna be a lot of time for people to miss me, and there's not gonna be a lot of remorse or regret there because, you know, I mean, the world's not gonna stop for little old me, and it should be fine. I've thought a lot about this and I have things in place and I'm planning things and I'm

SW: And I'm curious, so you said you're 33, right?

RO: Did I not look good?

SW: You're good, man. I thought you were younger. Are you living alone?

RO: Yeah, I live alone. I'm in a new relationship, but I honestly don't know how long it's going to last or how far it's going to last.

SW: Do they know how you feel and what you're planning? 

RO: No, they don't. No one knows I'm planning on killing myself. Nobody knows. Most people would just see it's a cry for attention.

SW: Right and it's and it sounds like it's not. You said that you have a job, right?

RO: I do. I work.

SW: Right. And so I'm curious, what kind of work do you do, if you want to share?

RO: I am actually a supervisor in retail. I work for the very dreaded Walmart.

SW: And so when you go to work, if it's like most jobs, you have to kind of present in some way that is, I don't know if it's professional, friendly. You can't be miserable looking. I don't think, right?

RO: No, I mean not not if you want to be taken semi seriously.

SW: Right, and so is that something that helps you? It helps you because you kind of have to force yourself to be a certain way or is it like a nightmare because it's not how you're feeling, but you have to fake it.

RO: It's sort of in between. I mean, it's third shift, so we let our hair down. And since the stores are closed now early, it's a little easier to just kind of be a little more down to earth and a little more just casual in your thoughts and in your words and what you say. I'm a casual person. I don't, you know, my standards are not, they do not conform with social standards at all. Like I don't have a problem with too much of anything so long as it's not overly offensive to groups, you know, to minorities and you know, to people who are socially targeted. As a person, I'm very liberated and I'm an open individual and a very comfortable individual. I'm comfortable in my own skin. I'm comfortable with who and what I am. My standards for everything are just basically live and let live and just, it's all about feeling good and, and and trying to feel good and trying to feel human and trying to feel, trying to make others feel that way too. So, you know, I don't have any problems with a lot of stuff.

SW: Yeah, it's really interesting because I would think that if someone wants to die that they wouldn't typically feel comfortable in their own skin. But yet you do.

RO: I do.

SW: Yeah.

RO: It's not my skin that's the problem. I've learned that.

SW: Like if there was a magic wand that would get rid of your suffering. Do you think you would still want to die or is it really around the suffering?

RO: I don't want to be here anymore. You know, I read a lot of Byron and I read a lot of Wolf and I've read a lot of neoclassical stuff and I read a lot of Nietzsche and I really am convinced that this world is all about pain and suffering and this world is all about loss and I've just had enough loss. I've had all the loss I can take. I can't take it anymore. Nobody asked me, like I didn't sign up for any of this. So I'm not, you know, the world isn't full of people like you. I mean, there's a lot of really shitty people out there.

SW: Oh I can be pretty shitty too.

RO: I can too, but. Yeah.

SW: We tried. So if you were able to get all of your stuff in order, if that were done today, would you go through with it today, tomorrow, sometime very soon?

RO: Yes.

SW: Is one of the reasons that you don't share because of the way people respond to you?

RO: Yeah, I stopped talking a lot about it because of that reason. And I find that people feel uncomfortable about it. People feel... Yeah, it's a lot like sex. I equate death with sex in that regard where people, they have certain thought processes about it and certain things are better discussed in other places and times. I find that the less I say about it, the better. I had to learn the same thing about, I had to learn the same thing about sex. I don't know. I guess I'm just not fit for this world.

SW: Yeah. Were there a lot of people that knew? I know there were two different occasions. Once you said, I think you said you took pills, right?

RO: A few friends and some family and that was it.

SW: Did anybody respond to you in a way that you didn't find annoying or hurtful or uncomfortable that they just were able to listen or whatever it is that you needed?

RO: No! And then when we were done, we just kind of swept it under the rug and moved on.

SW: Which probably doesn't work.

RO: No.

SW: Hmm. Did you write a note for either of those?

RO: No.

SW: I had a,  my closest friend many years ago took his own life. I remember he wrote a note and what struck me about the note was it was so brief, sort of thinking out loud if people who write notes are in a slightly different space maybe than people who don't.

RO: Well, they are. I think a lot of suicides probably aren't as crafted. They're not as methodical and they're not as planned. And a lot of times people want closure and they're worried. One of the biggest things, one of the bugaboos about suicide in the first place is the fact that it affects the living in a lot of ways and that there's no closure, there's no goodbye, there's no reason for it. And a lot of people see that and they want to give their loved ones some kind of message, you know, some kind of explanation, but I think it all depends on what space they're occupying in their head because it's different. But I think most people, most people view the suicide note as a tool.  Just to say goodbye or just… because I've read a lot. I've read a lot of them. I studied them because, you know, I was thinking about what would I say to the people in my life after I took my own life? What would I say and how would I say it? What would I leave behind? I studied different suicides, different suicides in popular culture and like different, different methods. And I studied the suicide note itself. I've read dozens from people of all walks of life and they're all different. Some of them were almost like a novella, very long and others almost like a to-do list. Like let the dog out and call the bank and don't go upstairs basically, you know. It's practical. I'm content with not needing to explain myself to anyone. So if I did leave one, it would be short and sweet and it would not be directed at any probably particular person.

SW: But I'm curious why you read them.

RO: I guess I wanted to see what was… to see if there was anything in their head like I could take from their experiences. You know, history is written by the victor. So all we have in regards to suicide are the survivor stories and their accounts. We don't necessarily have the views of those who actually commit suicide. So I think it's kind of, I think a lot of people need to read those notes. Like for a culture that is so immersed in death and dying and destruction and decay. I mean look at our, you know, everything from our entertainment and our theater and our, our film and you know, our literature to what we allow our politicians to do overseas in all of these various conflicts, to all the fighting in the streets and all the racism and the homophobia. I mean, the nation has submerged itself in death and destruction. And for a nation that is so into it, so into death and hurting others we have such weird, kind of almost taboo looks on death and dying. And I can't really explain it. I just know that it's ridiculous. We're building monuments all the time and we're always memorializing people and yet we can't talk about death. We can't talk about it in a practical, real sense. And we can't talk about suicide. We can't talk about murder. And we can't talk about it. We're supposed to feel uncomfortable about it but you know, we're also at the same time supposed to just… we worship death And yet it's it's something alien to us And I think that needs to kind of change

SW: I agree with you, but I also think we really treat suicide as a very special, different category. We just are so, there's just this revulsion, so to speak, around it and extreme judgment. I've just found very few people who accept it or who are… accepting it doesn't necessarily mean that you're promoting it or encouraging it, but it's...This is what happened. This is how someone feels. This is their choice. And I don't think we do that. I think that there's very little conversation around it. And I wonder why.

RO: I think people are selfish too. They don't want to lose people. I try to feel as good as possible in my life. I put a lot of effort into putting the physical and the sensual in the forefront because I want to feel good. I want to try to hide the pain. Some people do it through drugs. I do it through sex. It doesn't make people feel good to talk about it. It doesn't make people feel good to talk about death or suicide.

SW: Right.

RO: So I get it, you know, they wanna try to avoid those subjects. But when all you feel is pain, death is not, I mean, you're almost kind of numb to it.

SW: Sure.

RO: There are a couple of people in my life, like there are friends, like I do have a couple of close people, but I don't see them often. And with this pandemic, it's kind of been even harder. But basically the connection I feel on a personal level, is what helps. But everything else is just kind of  temporary. And food just makes me fatter and shopping just makes me poor. And, you know, drinking just makes me even more of a mess. Like I have an addictive personality as it is. My father was an alcoholic, so I don't like the idea of drinking. You know, my mother likes to drink. My brother used to like to drink. Smoking makes me more unhealthy. So above everything in my head, I'm going to eventually, you know, get physically unhealthy as well. So, and I'm physically unhealthy enough as it is because, you know, my mental health is affecting my physical health as well. So self-medicating can only go so far. And as far as medication is concerned, I've been in and out of therapy for years. I've never really been comfortable with almost any therapist I've ever had. I've never really been…  I mean, I'm more open to you now than I probably have been open to almost anybody.

SW: What's the difference do you think… so someone's a therapist and they've gone to school and they may not be very good. They might be great. Who knows? And so there's some differences with what we're doing here, right? But what what? And I'm not looking for any stroking of my ego, but is there a difference because of the fact that it's a different time in your life or it's online or I'm not here to sort of diagnose or is it like what do you think's the difference?

RO: Like I can relate to you and like I find you to be comfortable with you. could spend, you know, I just, you know, I just find you somebody I could talk to and someone I can relate to and someone I could be friends with and a therapist…They may not have similar experiences, but even though they're educated in them, they haven't experienced them. And they may be impartial, but at the same time, their impartiality also comes at sort of almost a stoic price. There has to be barriers, and I'd not have so many barriers. You and I, we could talk, and I feel comfortable with you. I feel like I could say or do anything around you and you're good. I tell my therapist I want to die. They're going to contact the authorities. They're going to get a lot of people involved. They're going to make it even more complicated for me. I have total faith that you're not going to make this more complicated for me. I talk to you about this and be open and non-judgmental. They're not, they're eventually going to want to give advice because they're legally obligated to do so. And you're not.

SW: I actually don't know. I don't think I am. Certainly not advice. I don't know what happens, frankly, if you tell me when we get off this call, I'm going to go plunge my car into the river. I don't know. And that might be irresponsible or even immoral on my end. I don't think anything I say or do is going to change what you plan to do and I don't think it's my place. But again, from a legal point of view, I'm not sure which is probably something I should check out, but I'm okay for now.

RO: Well, if it makes you feel any better, don't plan on plunging anything into a river.

SW: My goal here is just for you to share stuff. You know, part of the reason I did this, part of it's selfish. I feel a little less alone, which I think is important. And I think there's a lot of people, and I'm sort of stating the obvious, that feel shitty, really shitty. And so I think in them hearing you and being honest and open about your stuff, maybe it'll help them feel a little better, or maybe not even better, just a little less shitty is my sort of cynical New York way of framing it.

In addition, though, I think there's a way to raise awareness or understanding. If there's somebody out there listening and they're in, whether it's a similar position or just really contemplating this stuff, anything that you would say to them without knowing much of their lives or any of their lives, just a person who's like, fuck this, I’m out. What would you say?

RO: I would reassure them that I'm in a non-conforming, non-judgmental space and that before they do anything that they could feel free to reach out. That's what I would say. If you're gonna do it, just reach out first. And have a plan, but also just unload find somebody who is open and incredibly open and just curious and you know like I would tell them just reach out to me just talk to me just talk and go from there because there's no there's no harm in communication. And part of it's selfish too, on my end, you know, this interview. I'm glad. I'm glad I'm just able to say that I'm going to do it. I'm planning on doing it and here's why, and I want it to stop. I don't have a… I don't really have a soapbox, but I don't have an agenda. And you gave that to me, and I appreciate that. I can be open and I can be honest and I can be uninhibited. And I never have that. And I think too, a lot of it is… everything about this is kind of selfishness and that's fine because there are reasons you're on your end of this and I'm on my end.

SW: How far away are you in the plan? When is this going to happen?

RO:I don’t know. I'm pushing for September or October, latest. I always love the fall and I don't want to die around Christmas and I don't want to die on my birthday and that's coming up soon. And I'm probably going to just take some pills or there's like 30 steps in this and I'm on like step number eight. And that is step number like 20.  I know it's going to be around, it's going to be just before dusk, like as the sun is starting to set, because I love that time of day.

SW: Yeah, I've learned just from reading and talking to people that it's actually quite hard to die sometimes. It's hard to actually do this. Most ways are not. They're not pleasant and they're often not effective. I mean, they're ineffective, they don't work or they often don't work. Are there any myths that you would like to dispel or perhaps it's just something that most people don't understand.

RO: They're not attention seekers. They're not bullshitters and they're not wimps. People who are suicidal, they tend to be looked at as people who are weak and inferior and that's quite the contrary.

SW: I agree with you.

RO: A lot of these people, their experiences and how they feel, it's a part of them. It's something they live with. It's something that they carry inside them. It's almost inherent in who they are. Part of it kind of makes them who and what they are. People who are dealing with suicide and wanting to commit suicide, they're not freaks and they're damaged. They're hurting and they're

important and they have a story. And I think, you know, we deal with them all about, it's all about judgment and reaction is how we deal with them. don't just, we don't deal with them the way we should deal with them. We don't give them, we just don't give them a voice. don't let them open up. We twist their arm to either stay here or we chastise them for being mentally ill and unable to cope with life's pressures and difficulties. We don't give them the benefit of the doubt and we don't give them the chance I think they deserve. This is not a game. This isn't somebody wanting attention. This isn't somebody who's playing. This is literally who and what they are and this is literally what they're dealing with. You can call it a crisis or an emergency. You can call it whatever you want, but it is something that we really need to just look at. And I'm not, and I'm not advocating that every suicide needs to be stopped. I'm not advocating that every, you know, that, that help is always available because it's not, I know it's not. I'm telling you right now, it's not, the help is not out there. They say it gets better. It doesn't necessarily get better. It doesn't. So when people deal with the realities of the situation, then we'll be able to deal with the immensity of it and maybe try to prevent some of this. But until then, we're just gonna keep seeing the suicide rates rise. We're gonna keep seeing people continually attempt. We're gonna keep seeing the mental health deteriorate. It's just gonna get worse. Basically everything society views about all of this is a myth and it's and it's false because there's so much more to it that most people don't even understand and that our health care system cannot grapple with I'm proof positive

SW: Your proof positive, yeah.

RO: I think it's pretentious and I think it's sort of almost like, almost like a privileged thing to say.

SW: I agree. Yeah.

RO: Like, you're delegitimizing how they feel because in their view and their minds and in the minds of those who committed it, it doesn't get better. It didn't get better. Just because that's your situation doesn't mean it's theirs.

SW: And I feel like people are, I don't know if the word is gaslighted, a lot. Like where they, it's like, of course you don't think it gets better. You're ill. That's how ill people think. They're people who just make a choice for whatever their reasons are.

RO: You get me. You get me and you get the situation better than anyone else I've ever talked to about it. So, it's another reason why I came to you.

SW: Thank you. But here's the thing. I wonder when we talk to people and we say, you know, people need to be heard, right? Let them talk, give them their voice. I think a lot of people, some people are just not, their intentions are shitty and they don't actually care. And maybe they say they care and it's going to reflect in those kinds of conversations. And they're going to be the things that you talked about earlier, that are not helpful. I wonder when you're in those conversations and maybe it's you on the end of somebody else who's thinking about ending their life, what is it that we do or don't do that really can help? So for example, I know that we could listen better, but I want to get more granular. Like, what do we really do that maybe inadvertently fucks those conversations up? Even for well-intentioned people, right? They want to help, but they just fuck it up.

RO: I think what fucks it up for people who want to help are the platitudes. People in crises, they don't want to hear a bumper sticker or they don't want to hear a poster on some 12 year olds like bedroom wall. They want communication and they want understanding. And I think people

play into those platitudes a lot. And I think also people try to put themselves in situations that they themselves are not capable of handling. And then other people, they say they're there for you if you ever want to talk, whatever. And then the next time you say something, they grow impatient or they grow uncomfortable. All this is all you ever talk about or this is all you ever think about. You know, it's getting on my nerves. Right. You know, people have a short fuse and a short memory and they say, if ever you want to talk about this, that's fine. And when you go back to them, they get angry with you. They get short with you. They say this is all you think about. And other people have problems, you know. And I think at the core, the biggest problem is just comparing and contrasting people. I think people like to compare situations to others. Like y'all think you have it bad. Right. And I think that’s where a lot of people fuck up.

SW: Yeah, I mean, I get why people do that. I do that. You need a reference point of some kind, right? And the only way to do that is to sort of think about other people's lives or your own life. I wonder for people who are in pain or suffering and they don't need to be suicidal and anybody in pain. Doesn't take doesn't take much for them to never go back to somebody. You say that I'm here for you and then I come to you and I say, and you say to me, wow, you're you're always feeling this way. Even if it’s said kindly, how likely am I going to go back to that person? 

RO: Right. You’re not.

SW: What else would you want anybody who might listen to this to know or understand or learn or anything else?

RO: It's okay to feel this way and be like this. It's all right to want to have an intolerable situation end. It's not justifiable for someone to take away that from you, to deny you how you feel, to invalidate your feelings and your end. You deserve the validation. But more importantly, if you don't even have the validation, it's okay because there are, there are people in similar circumstances who do get it and you don't even have to reach out to them. But you're not unacceptable. You're not what our society deems you as. It's okay. It’s okay.

SW: Thank you very much for talking.

RO: Thank you for having me.

SW: My pleasure. I hope I don’t sound at all trite, but I know this pandemic thing. For some people, I think they're actually, in a weird way, good. But for most, it's not financially or socially or otherwise. So it's been a bit of a mixed blessing for me. Are you going to work every day or are you working from home?

RO: I'm going to work every day. I've been taking off though because I've just not been feeling well. I'm not sick or anything. I have a migraine now these migraines but it's mostly my depression and it's my anxiety and everything so I've been staying home a lot. but I haven't been missing too much work through all of this. It's probably been a good thing because if I wasn't working then I would probably be just sitting home and just thinking about how shitty everything is.

SW: Maybe so, yeah. The other thought that crossed my mind when we first started talking, you said you're in a town outside of Dayton. I don't know much about Ohio, but I'm guessing from what you shared that it's probably not the most tolerant place in some ways.

RO: Yeah, a lot of rednecks, lot of hicks, a lot of homophobia for me to live here and  be sexually active. It's kind of inhibiting. Yeah.

SW: You've gotta get creative, I imagine.

RO: Yeah, I do.

SW: Yeah, all right, Ryan, thanks again.

RO: You too, and I appreciate you.

SW: Alright, likewise. Have a good day.

RO: You too. Bye bye.

SW: Thanks so much for joining us today. If you like this podcast, I encourage you to subscribe and leave a review because that will also help other people find the podcast and hear these stories. If you or someone you know would like to join us and share your story, you can reach us at hello@suicidenoted.com Thanks again. Talk to you soon and stay strong.