There is a lot of talk about suicide in the media at the moment and having felt suicidal both as a teenager and an adult I wanted to share my experience with others who might be contemplating taking their own life.

There have been two points in my life where I felt I was suicidal. As a teenager I made a feeble suicide attempt and as an adult I made a phone call with the intention of committing suicide afterwards. The phone call I believe saved my life. It is possible that I never was really going to kill myself and I can certainly believe that my situation and feelings that drove me are not as bad as that of others or even your own but I ask that you keep reading as maybe you recognize something in my writing that might help.

When I remember my teenage years the feelings and emotions come back to me. Everything was so intense, I felt nothing was going right, nobody cared and after a couple of years it had all become too much for me. On one day I remember walking down the road on the way back home and feeling totally overwhelmed by how helpless I felt and how hopeless the situation had become. As I stepped into the road, I remember looking up and seeing a car coming towards me, so I hesitated and started thinking about what might happen if I was hit by the car. I stood there and willed the car to hit me and just for a a moment I felt better. The car avoided me and the driver didn't seem to react at all but that feeling of release even though it was for just a moment felt good and so I tried again. This time the driver had to stop and he shouted and shook his hands at me, no doubt thinking I was just careless and not considering that I had actually wanted him to hit me. He drove off and this time instead of feeling better I felt worse. A mixture of disappointment that I was still standing there and the sudden realisation of what I had done hit me and overwhelmed me. Now I just wanted to get home and sleep so that I didn't have to think or feel anymore.

My experience as an adult was very different. Recently separated from my wife and feeling that there was no future for me I decided late one night that it was too much. That the situation was totally hopeless and nothing could be done about it. I write these words and I tell you that they seem so powerless compared to my feelings that night. I seem unable to write words that do justice to how bad I really felt at that time. I didn't really want to die and I kept thinking about the consequences of committing suicide. How it would effect my family, the impact it could have on people that I hadn't even met like paramedics or nurses and I hoped that this might help me change my mind - but it didn't. I felt strongly that suicide was the only real answer but decided to speak to some experts to see what they think. I wanted to give them a chance to change my mind. I called the Samaritans and some old bloke answered the phone, he tried to persuade me that things weren't that bad, that things would get better and that it wasn't worth committing suicide - I was furious with this old bloke because he didn't understand what I was going through, he didn't seem to be listening and just kept talking about things that didn't matter anymore - bloody Samaritans! I went to bed very angry and frustrated because I thought the Samaritans weren't of any help at all. Of course, when I woke up I realised they had helped - I was still here!