Hi there Sheid,
I must say that a post like this is very insensitive and not helpful at all to most Ostomates. It reminds me of the phrase "...people who commit suicide are just selfish..." also very unhelpful. You/we have no idea what else is going on in another person's life. When I was 24 (never sick a day in my life) and in my college library, I never thought that I was about to have my future turned completely upside down, right out of the blue. I collapsed on the floor, bleeding from my anus. Just when things were working out in my life. Having moved to the US from Ireland to NY, then on to San Francisco. I worked my ass off in construction to pay for college and while I took on a full load of credits. I did everything I was supposed to do...as a decent, "normal" person and suddenly everything was a blur for several years to come. Luckily, I had family in the US who cared about me and helped me through the rough parts and loved me for who I was when I thought I was a freak who would never be normal. I went back to school and had panic attacks, etc., but the support of my family got me through in one piece.
People are different and have different tolerances for disruption to their lives and their psyche...Nobody reacts the same, as an Ostomate, you should know this!!! I myself contemplated suicide many times, on my worst days.
Then one day, one of the good ones, I was riding my bike across the Golden Gate Bridge for my regular ten-mile bike ride, every morning no matter how much my ass hurt (put your weight on the knees and don't sit on the saddle). At about 7 am, I was in the middle of the bridge on my way back to Pacific Heights (I managed an apartment building there) when I saw a person with long blond hair which blew straight upwards from the strong updraft at the edge of the bridge. As I got closer, I saw that the person was standing on the bridge railing, holding on with one hand, being rocked by the strong updraft around the South tower on the city side of the bridge. Every little detail is forever embedded in my brain.
As I got closer, it became clear that this person was on the outside of the railing, standing on a narrow gauge rail track which the painters use. I stopped my bike at the tower and walked to the railing. The sky was the brightest blue I have ever seen, the seagulls were fluttering in the updraft, the bridge was totally empty as the tourists had not arrived yet to see this beautiful vision of a beautiful city. Traffic was very light, it was on a Sunday morning. There was not a breath of wind except for the constant updraft which followed the line of the tower, straight up. There were a few sailboats lazily drifting or fighting the strong currents of the "potato patch", where the current from the outgoing Sacramento River meets the incoming tide of the extremely cold Pacific currents.
The person wore a long heavy coat to the ankles, and I thought this was strange on such a beautiful morning. My mind could not accept what was happening before me. Finally, I saw the reality. I slowly walked to the railing and was within arm's reach. I had to almost shout to be heard above the moaning wind swirling around the tower. I looked over the railing, and the person had one foot on the track and one hand on the orange bridge cable. Staring at the city and then looking down at the water, about three hundred feet below, the person did not move, did not answer, and did not turn although I was just three feet away. I thought it must be a teenager from Haifgt Street, one of the many abused runaways, the victims of modern life, possibly stoned, smoked a bit too much weed, maybe took some Acid...who knows. I said, "Wow!!..that's one hell of a view, but there are safer ways to see it, I think you're a bit close to the edge there, my friend, why don't you come over here where it's safer." I got no reply, no response at all...then I knew.
I could have grabbed her, I only found out later that it was a girl. Her hair blew so crazily in the wind that I never saw her face, and she never spoke. I stood there for ten minutes talking with no response. I thought that if I could keep talking long enough that the bridge police would see her/us on their video cameras....apparently not!! Then I saw a lone biker coming from the San Francisco side. When in range, I quietly waved my arm to indicate trouble. She saw me and pedaled faster towards me. I turned my full attention back to the young lady on the rail.
When the biker was about thirty feet away, I saw the girl let her hand slip from the cable, almost in a gesture of submission to the inevitable. Her hand slid down the orange cable as she rocked in the wind. She seemed to balance like this for ages. One foot resting on the track and the other barely touching it. It was like a nightmarish ballet or a ghoulish circus act where there could be only one grisly ending.
Suddenly she seemed to levitate about a foot off the rail on which her foot had balanced, almost straight upwards. She had pushed herself up and out, feet first off the painters' track. Her oversized coat fluttered in the wind, and she seemed to just hang there for seconds, flat on her back, looking up at the beautiful blue sky. Her arms spread like Jesus on the cross, feet together, her coat flapping wildly in the rush of the air swirling around her. My first thought was that the coat would slow her fall a little, maybe she would be ok. As I watched her get smaller and smaller, I knew that this could only end in one way.
As her feet left the rail, I thought, "Here is a living person, looking healthy, able to balance on this four-inch piece of steel, conscious...in about fifteen seconds that healthy person will be dead. This thought just flashed through my brain like a tsunami...now alive...now dead. There was no reason that was readily apparent, no disability...just a person who wanted to die. A person who had no reason to want life anymore, a person who had fallen into the "Black Hole" (you know who you are, you know the feeling). Backed into a corner by life itself in a pitch-black room, your back to the wall with no exit, no escape. This was her exit from the Black Hole. Her life, her history, her pain were a mystery to me, I just knew one thing about her with absolute certainty...she did not want and could not stand to be alive anymore.
Just as the huge splash emerged from the water's surface, the biker arrived by my side. I told her to go and alert the bridge police, and I would stay and watch to see where the current took the woman's body. The currents under the bridge can be like a fast-flowing river, lethal in seconds.
The Coast Guard station is nearby, and they arrived in minutes, and I watched them remove her from the rushing water. I went to the bridge police to report what I had seen and was truly shocked. The officer just sighed, gave me a form, and said, "Fill this out." I was still shaking. I thought..."I could have grabbed her coat??? But if she wasn't jumping, I might have actually killed her by grabbing her...so many emotions.
The point of this overly long exercise is that suicide is not "Stupid"...it is desperation in its purest form when it seems that no other option is open and the last door to redemption has been closed in your face. Most of all, it is a waste and most definitely not the act of a coward.
I once sat in a room and could almost see the blackness surrounding me, engulfing me. It felt like I was lying in a hole, and black liquid was pouring in and slowly rising, surrounding me, burying me slowly. For me, it was temporary and very quickly passed. If I had no close family, I would never have come back from that deep hole I had fallen into.
Watching that poor girl fall to the waves confirmed to me that suicide was never an option...BUT...if I made that decision, I would have to consider the people who love and care about me. Because I consciously consider how this would impact upon others, I know that I could never do it. These thoughts imply rationality, and suicide is often accompanied by irrational and insurmountable fears. The company of others can defeat those fears and calm the spirit.
Self-isolation is dangerous...don't do it.
All the best to all the Bag People out there, everything we do or do not do has consequences.
