From: rsr4936@cc.utah.edu (Reay, Robert S.)
Newsgroups: alt.suicide.holiday
Subject: Re: My turn to rant.
Keywords: life sucks
Date: 10 Nov 92 01:54:00 GMT
Distribution: usa
Organization: University of Utah Computer Center
News-Software: VAX/VMS VNEWS 1.4-b1

In article <1992Nov7.093155.21596@panix.com>, rpowers@panix.com (Richard Powers) writes...
{Why exactly am I still here?  What do I think I can salvage out of this
{miserable thing I call a life?


I hate to tell you this, Richard, but you are depressing the hell out 
of me.  Let's see all the things you think aren't worth living for:

{Friends?
{Romance?
{Family?
{Work
{School
{Recreation time.  (Not-work, not-school)
{Learning  (Maybe should have been under "school"- but maybe not).
{Material possessions.
{God/religion.

It seems to me (IMHO, of course) that you spend much time looking for 
things wrong with life in general.  There will always, ALWAYS, be 
stupidity, hate, wrong, etc. wether you look for such things or not.


{So.  Why do I continue through my mothers death, my best friends mother
{death, and loneliness to occupy my time?  Not to mention 7+ years of
{depression.  The memory of my father standing in a window threatening my
{mother he would kill himself (in front of me and my brother as kids).  My
{mother having told me my father tried to rape her.  Two non-fatal suicidal
{"gestures" in those seven(?) years of depression.  Being unable to
{accomplish 90%+ of things I want/decide to do.  Prospects for the future
{about as bright as (1)eventually becoming homeless because I can't manage
{to keep a job (2)ending up in a psychiatric ward (at a STATE hospital) (3)
{dead.  Either from suicide or as a result of (1) or (2).  My "friends"
{basically abandoning me since the latest suicide attempt.  My family a
{complete joke.  Never having had a date in 23 years.  Getting close enough
{to it to know what I'm missing.  Why aren't I getting out the razor
{blades?  I don't know.  Maybe because I don't entirely believe some of the
{things in the top of the message?  Maybe.  I really don't know.
{ 

I can certainly understand your misery.  Instead of pity, let me tell 
you that I've experienced much of what you describe above, and many 
other things as bad.  I have lived under the same conditions as you 
for most of my 23 years, yet I am really a happy person.  I only 
subscribe to this group to remind me how bad things could get for me 
if I would let them.

I have developed some tricks to fight my own personal blackness, maybe 
some of them would apply to you.

	Look for the positive.  Trust me, there is also good in the 
                world.

	Laugh at everything.  The most miserable years of my life were 
		in Jr. high school.  I tried not to smile, or laugh at 
		anything, the reasoning being that if people noticed 
		how miserable I was, they would sympathize.  Yeah, 
		right.  Becoming able to laugh at my own pain and make
		light of suffering made all the difference.

	I' m  sort of ashamed at my last trick.  It involves finding 
		someone more miserable than you and saying to yourself
		"Gee, I'm glad I'm not that person!"  It helps to find
		someone that deserves to be as miserable as they are.
		The saving grace of this trick is that it forces you 
		to think about the things you have that others do not.


Some (or none) of these might help.  I feel that just posting here 
helps (it always feels good to talk.)

Rob
Newsgroups: alt.suicide.holiday