dealing with suicidal feelings
a safety plan can be as simple or as complicated as will work for you. and it is always something you can change, based on what works, or what is available to you at the time.
one part of my safety plan is to have people i know i can tell when i am feeling suicidal. they know that if i am telling them, it means that i don’t intend to act on the feelings in the near future. i can express the feelings, and they can hear how i am feeling. i don’t expect them to solve the feelings, or take them away. all i really need is for them to hear how i am feeling, and to help if they can.
i have a list of websites i can visit when i am feeling bad, too. some of them are pages like this one: ones that offer some support specifically about being suicidal. some of them are support websites. and some of them are just plain old time-waster websites. i might not be able to do much when i’m suicidal, but i can often manage to play solitaire. the point of the time-waster websites is just to get through time until other kinds of help are available–for example, while i am waiting for someone to call me back.
another part of my safety plan is to make it really clear to myself that it’s ok to ask for help. sometimes, i manage to ask for help before the feelings get intense. other times, i ask for help while i am feeling suicidal. it’s ok either way (although easier on everyone involved if i ask for help sooner rather than later). i have planned with my main support people what the response will be when i tell them i’m feeling suicidal. we have made some plans about how they can respond most helpfully, and how i can ask most usefully.
if you know that you are likely to act on suicidal feelings, it’s a good idea to make that more difficult for yourself. don’t keep a large stash of pills, or a box of razor blades, or weapons, or anything like that, in a place you can access without some preparation. if you do decide to kill yourself, those things can still be obtained. i’d also suggest not bookmarking webpages that give detailed descriptions of how to kill yourself. if you decide you’re ready to commit suicide, you can definitely find those sites again. but there’s no point in keeping those things readily available.
