Firstly, so that it doesn’t seem like I have ZERO experience with this: I’ve been suicidal, and my niece committed suicide last year. We buried her the day after Kate Spade committed suicide. There are two or three posts about it in my Medium space.

Secondly, every suicidal person’s experience is different. I suspect that you’ll disagree with my opinions based on your experience, and that’s fine. I respect that.

Now, onto my opinions…

“Selfish” isn’t always a bad thing. I believe that many people who attempt suicide have tried lots of ways to cope before taking action to end their pain and suffering. Suicide is often the last resort. Every single person walking this planet is dealing with shit. Everyone is trying to deal with life.

Some people are healthy and thus better equipped to cope. Others are unwell and therefore have a harder time. I almost said, “mentally healthy,” but the mind and body are one, and often it’s our “body health” making our brains crazy.

After living unwell, choosing to no longer live in the world is often an act of self-care. I’m not saying that suicide is a good thing, but people who aren’t experiencing these feelings often don’t consider what lead up to the suicide attempt. Healthy people don’t commit suicide. I do think that the people online who judged you were wrong to do so, but I agree that a person needs to suck it up (stop hosting the pity parties, as you say) and take responsibility by welcoming help and resources and working on themselves.

It’s easy to judge others, but we need to show compassion and make attempts to show up for others in whatever way they need. We need to show up for ourselves.