Personal Narrative: My Suffering Suicidal Ideation

The first time I experienced someone suffering suicidal ideation was when I was very young, with one of my boyfriends. He would start crying and began to mention that he wanted to kill himself, so he could be with his Mum, who was deceased. He had a number of risks factors, firstly, he had no living family and very limited friends. Also, he had been fired from his job and had drug and alcohol issues. On top of all of that, I suspect that he had a mental health disorder.

It was really scary at the time, because I had not experienced anything like it before and I had no idea on how to deal with it. It was unnerving that someone would feel the want/desire to end their own life. I also found it extremely isolating, I felt that there was no one

I started giving him more attention and listening to what he had to say and thinking of ways that may help him to cope better with the situation. After time he would improve for maybe a few weeks.

After some time, I finally realised that he was using suicide as a form of manipulation, so that I would not leave him. It is clear to me now, that it was an abusive relationship and every time I spoke about leaving or I left he would say that he wanted to kill himself, to draw me back, emotional black mail. He would leave notes for me to find or he would ring or txt me saying that he was going to kill himself and it would be my fault.

This was a really difficult situation, as I have said before, I understood that he needed help, the difficultly was deciding or trying to find a balance between trying to help him, while also trying to keep my myself safe psychological and physically. I was pushed to my limit, he was continually draining and sucking my energy and there was a moment that I am not particularly proud of, where I just wanted him to do it, so it would be all over. I was starting to harden and not really care about what happen to him and I knew I was really in need of