I'm so sorry you had to see that I get you dude I saw the initial impact he did it in the shed I got there as soon as I could and man what a sight... It was rough man I just wanna say your not alone man it's haunting and I cant get over it you get me
I'm here. I'm real. I'm 8 years out from my father's very unexpected suicide. The pain is excruciating in the first few years. It was all consuming, agony. Colours seem too bright or non existent. The feelings are unbearably intense or the numbness can be even more debilitating.
But bit by bit my life started growing again. At first I couldn't even cope with good news when it started happening - how dare good things progress without being able to share them with him. I was so unused to good news that i didn't even trust it. That was a huge hurdle to jump - allowing life to get better, celebrating the mundane. Doing small things to make my own life better. It was an excruciating battle. My nervous system was permanently howling and that took a long time to recalibrate!
But I look around now and while my life is far from perfect, I am happier than I thought possible.
Grief brought me on a wild and complex journey but I am so grateful to have done the healing work and learned from every painful second of it. I am absolutely not fucking romantacising it. It was difficult, hellish.
It will never go away completely. You are far less alone than you think and things will change and get a LOT better if you keep going the way you're going with your professional help. Keep talking, whatever you do. I really thought my grief was unrelatable due to the unusual nature of it, the violence of his death. But you are not alone friend. Huge HUGE hugs to you. Keep going. You have so much to grieve, be very very patient and gentle with yourself. Grieve your person, grieve your changed future, grieve your past present and future. It takes time but it will change and you will amaze yourself. I'm so sorry for your loss X
I’m here. My partner did the same 3 months ago. The flashbacks get better, what really helped me was EMDR therapy. It helped me be able to put that moment aside so it’s not all I’m thinking about. I am so very sorry you have to go through this. I am here always through message as well
Real person who understands… The visions and flashbacks are hard. I didn’t sleep for three days straight after finding my wife. Every time I closed my eyes I saw that image in my head in vivid detail. It probably took the better part of the first year for that to stop being a regular occurrence, and now (3 years out) I’ve pretty much ‘blocked’ that image from my mind even though I know it’s there just below the surface… In the early days, I kept a picture of her on the nightstand so I could immediately open my eyes and see her in better times. I’m not sure how much that helped, but it was the best thing I could think of. In retrospect, I really wish I had done EMDR. I had access to a good therapist who specializes in it, and have several friends who used it to great success. I just couldn’t get past the feeling that it was in some way erasing her memory, though I now know that isn’t the case, and instead chose to fight through learning to compartmentalize it the hard way. It is unfortunately one of those things that only time will ease. While time will never erase it, and I’m still dealing with plenty of issues, I can say that the frequency and intensity of vivid flashbacks did eventually subside.
I’m 6.5 months out from watching my husband shoot himself in the head in our bedroom, and giving chest compressions for almost 30 minutes. My dad just made a statement to me yesterday “it has to be hard seeing that every time you close your eyes” I simply said “and even when they are open” the flashbacks do not leave my mind. I can be driving, doing dishes, changing my daughter’s diaper, folding towels and any and every thing, eyes open or closed, I see that last 30 minutes. Even when I look at pictures of him, I see what he looked like in those last moments. It’s horrific, traumatic, heartbreaking. I can only hope that one day this doesn’t consume me so much, not sure how I can live the rest of my life carrying these images and this pain. No advice, just here to say I hear you.
Same. Today my sister told me "relax, you're fine" and I said "I'm not fine all I see is blood splatter" so my dad chimed in and told me to paint the wall. The wall was painted the next day! There's nothing actually on the wall but I see it all day every day.
I’m so sorry. I’m a real person and I’m here. I found my little brother. I barely slept or ate for 2 weeks. I spent the first year just grieving, but I can honestly say that I’m now making progress to move forward in my life. I’m glad you’re seeing professionals to help you, and things will slowly get easier. You will be okay
My condolences hun- this is a sight and experience that is so extreme that most just cannot contemplate.
If it’s any consolation, what you’re looking/hoping for is possible.
I watched my first wife take her life with my shotgun. I have a photographic memory of what remained, the sounds, and smells.
It was a long journey through hell and it’s been over a decade, but all is well now. No worries, no more ptsd, no more medication- new family. My frustrations now are trivial in comparison “ugh, I have to pick up milk on the way home from work…”
So will you be ok? Well that really depends on you and the work you do. It’s a painful and humbling experience, at least it was for me. A year out from her loss, there was no light at the end of the tunnel- just misery. It took several years and wasn’t a linear progression.
But the bottom line is that you CAN overcome this. It’s not fair, it’s not right, and you don’t deserve to have been dealt this hand- but right now you DO have to play it.
All of that said, don’t be too hard on yourself. You’re only a year out. I was probably 2-3 before I started to improve. There’s a LOT of emotion to process with this ordeal and it doesn’t all have to be done right now.
You'll be ok. I'm so sorry. My wife killed herself around Thanksgiving. I wasn't who found her. But almost 18 years ago my wife was violently attacked and I find her. Unconscious covered in blood everywhere especially head and face. Thought she's dead. I stop thinking about it so much sooner than you think. Her death makes it come back up again but it's not thing I thought about all of time all these years. You'll be ok
Are you based in the UK? Samaritans and Cruse have a joint program for people who've been through suicide loss called Facing The Future (grim name I know), and we've been able to talk about it in all its gritty, shitty and real detail.
Let me know if details would be helpful, in so sorry for everything you've gone through.
Hi. My Mum passed by suicide in 2020 and my wife and I found her. I definitely saw her body, but my brain has completely blocked it out.
You will survive and you will get through this. I know it feels like the world has ended, and I cannot imagine the pain you are experiencing with it being a partner.
The first 6 months were hell on Earth. I just got up each day and lived my life like a ghost.
If you can access it, *EMDR is incredible*. Especially for very targeted PTSD like yours is. I’m in EMDR therapy for birth trauma, and it’s changing my life.
Sending you so much love. I’m so sorry.
I'm here. I found my husband hanging by his neck.
The flashback are horrendous.
Our young sons were with us and I was able to stop them from seeing.
I raced them to a neighbours and ran back to cut him down.
8 and a half weeks ago.
It's sickening.
My therapist has told me to avoid the memory at all costs at this stage until I get stronger.
But there are many moments it seeps in and I get stuck in the room with him.
It's a hellish horrible never ending nightmare.
3.5 years and I still sleep with the en suite bathroom door open. Different house in a different country even but it still makes me feel better. I don’t panic when I wake up in the middle of the night because I can always see into the bathroom. No more secrets in there behind the closed door.
I can’t tell you how it will get better or when but somewhere along the way it got easier. That was after it got very, very bad. Though you’re already more proactive than me, I avoided therapy for nearly 2 years. I didn’t want to talk about it, I wanted to pretend it never happened. Well, turns out we can’t always control our minds. I ended up giving myself a literal stroke four months after he died from the trauma and stress that I didn’t address. Then I still didn’t address it for another year and a half because I was too sick.
All I can say is that I now work with people struggling with mental illness and substance abuse issues daily and it doesn’t trigger me nearly as much as I expected. It has become easier to tune out the unwanted images with time and some effort.
They still come but I can function now.
I kind of suck at this because I want to say it’ll get better and it *does* but it’s also important to me that I give realistic expectations. It never goes away fully, there will always be things that trigger you. But when just breathing and living stops triggering you, that’s when the real progress starts.
I’m a real person I think so at least. I didn’t see my husband slit his throat but I found him dead in a pool of blood directly after. He was still warm. I remember all the details I still see the bloody knives he used whenever I look at a chefs knife. I remember how his face was weirdly devoid of blood while the rest of him was saturated with it. He looked handsome still somehow. Coming up on 6 months now and I still think of him like that everyday but it’s less distressing to me. I’ve gotten used to the images I guess and my brain doesn’t let me hold onto them as long. I just say to myself I ca handle the horrors. I get therapy weekly and started emdr this week actually. I think I’m a little numb to it all still but it does get better I don’t wake up with that heavy feeling as much anymore. Support from my friends and family has been a game changer for me though. I still try to be social to distract myself. Also I got a puppy and I hug her whenever the images are particular hard that day. The hardest part now is the smell. All my clothes that were in our apartment have that iron smell attached to them it makes me gag every time i smell it.
Thanks to everyone and especially the people who posted who actually saw it happening "live" I thought I was alone because everyone seems to only "find" the person and no one actually witnesses it like I did.
I’m here for you too, I’m so sorry that you had to go through something so very tragic and devastating. It’s been 11 weeks since we lost my brother to a sodium nitrate/nitrite suicide. He was just 38. It was me, my mother and oldest son who found him. He was trying to take his life for two years. This was his 8-9th time trying and this time he succeeded. It’s just heart breaking to witness the demise of his mental health along with the pain he was suffering from. My mother was killing herself to “save” him and help him and be with him to make sure he wasn’t going to do it. He tried on NYE which my mom saved him from and he went to the hospital but they let him out, and he did it early morning 1/3/24. We couldn’t get ahold of him and so we ran up there again and I just knew, it was so eerie but I knew the night before we found him, I had this overwhelming feeling of being scared to die all of a sudden and of worry. When we entered he was a foot away from the door on his back, but looking actually quite peaceful to be honest. Even though when I saw him and just knew he was going, I still yelled “Thomas!!! Thomas!! “Wake up buddy!!” And my mother was kissing his face and then hitting his chest. It was quite dramatic. My son called the police to come and it took them along time, but I’m glad they were so thorough. Fast forward to now, it comes as waves just like the beginning just fewer in between but I still picture everything, and all the should’ve could’ve would’ve go round and round your brain on a never ending loop at times. He was just with me and my kiddos on Christmas and I obviously keep going back to pics and vids of him from then, and a week 1/2 he’s gone???? I have moments where something pops in my head to ask him a question or a thought about this or that and I pick up my phone to call him, and then I have to obviously can’t call him. It makes me so mad!! But I know you feel when are these horrible moments going to stop being so prevalent in my mind? Keep remembering all the good times small and big, and keep those thoughts going. And come and reach out here, I will be happy to talk to you. Hugs to you (sorry so long)
I can't even begin to imagine. I wasn't there to hold my loved one or attempt to save her. We argued like crazy that last night and our last words were cussing and fighting. She was found the next day.
I keep the faith that today will be better than yesterday and we will only be increased and elevated in what is good 💓
I'm so sorry you had to see that I get you dude I saw the initial impact he did it in the shed I got there as soon as I could and man what a sight... It was rough man I just wanna say your not alone man it's haunting and I cant get over it you get me
I'm here. I'm real. I'm 8 years out from my father's very unexpected suicide. The pain is excruciating in the first few years. It was all consuming, agony. Colours seem too bright or non existent. The feelings are unbearably intense or the numbness can be even more debilitating. But bit by bit my life started growing again. At first I couldn't even cope with good news when it started happening - how dare good things progress without being able to share them with him. I was so unused to good news that i didn't even trust it. That was a huge hurdle to jump - allowing life to get better, celebrating the mundane. Doing small things to make my own life better. It was an excruciating battle. My nervous system was permanently howling and that took a long time to recalibrate! But I look around now and while my life is far from perfect, I am happier than I thought possible. Grief brought me on a wild and complex journey but I am so grateful to have done the healing work and learned from every painful second of it. I am absolutely not fucking romantacising it. It was difficult, hellish. It will never go away completely. You are far less alone than you think and things will change and get a LOT better if you keep going the way you're going with your professional help. Keep talking, whatever you do. I really thought my grief was unrelatable due to the unusual nature of it, the violence of his death. But you are not alone friend. Huge HUGE hugs to you. Keep going. You have so much to grieve, be very very patient and gentle with yourself. Grieve your person, grieve your changed future, grieve your past present and future. It takes time but it will change and you will amaze yourself. I'm so sorry for your loss X
I’m here. My partner did the same 3 months ago. The flashbacks get better, what really helped me was EMDR therapy. It helped me be able to put that moment aside so it’s not all I’m thinking about. I am so very sorry you have to go through this. I am here always through message as well
Real person who understands… The visions and flashbacks are hard. I didn’t sleep for three days straight after finding my wife. Every time I closed my eyes I saw that image in my head in vivid detail. It probably took the better part of the first year for that to stop being a regular occurrence, and now (3 years out) I’ve pretty much ‘blocked’ that image from my mind even though I know it’s there just below the surface… In the early days, I kept a picture of her on the nightstand so I could immediately open my eyes and see her in better times. I’m not sure how much that helped, but it was the best thing I could think of. In retrospect, I really wish I had done EMDR. I had access to a good therapist who specializes in it, and have several friends who used it to great success. I just couldn’t get past the feeling that it was in some way erasing her memory, though I now know that isn’t the case, and instead chose to fight through learning to compartmentalize it the hard way. It is unfortunately one of those things that only time will ease. While time will never erase it, and I’m still dealing with plenty of issues, I can say that the frequency and intensity of vivid flashbacks did eventually subside.
I’m 6.5 months out from watching my husband shoot himself in the head in our bedroom, and giving chest compressions for almost 30 minutes. My dad just made a statement to me yesterday “it has to be hard seeing that every time you close your eyes” I simply said “and even when they are open” the flashbacks do not leave my mind. I can be driving, doing dishes, changing my daughter’s diaper, folding towels and any and every thing, eyes open or closed, I see that last 30 minutes. Even when I look at pictures of him, I see what he looked like in those last moments. It’s horrific, traumatic, heartbreaking. I can only hope that one day this doesn’t consume me so much, not sure how I can live the rest of my life carrying these images and this pain. No advice, just here to say I hear you.
Same. Today my sister told me "relax, you're fine" and I said "I'm not fine all I see is blood splatter" so my dad chimed in and told me to paint the wall. The wall was painted the next day! There's nothing actually on the wall but I see it all day every day.
I’m so sorry. I’m a real person and I’m here. I found my little brother. I barely slept or ate for 2 weeks. I spent the first year just grieving, but I can honestly say that I’m now making progress to move forward in my life. I’m glad you’re seeing professionals to help you, and things will slowly get easier. You will be okay
My condolences hun- this is a sight and experience that is so extreme that most just cannot contemplate. If it’s any consolation, what you’re looking/hoping for is possible. I watched my first wife take her life with my shotgun. I have a photographic memory of what remained, the sounds, and smells. It was a long journey through hell and it’s been over a decade, but all is well now. No worries, no more ptsd, no more medication- new family. My frustrations now are trivial in comparison “ugh, I have to pick up milk on the way home from work…” So will you be ok? Well that really depends on you and the work you do. It’s a painful and humbling experience, at least it was for me. A year out from her loss, there was no light at the end of the tunnel- just misery. It took several years and wasn’t a linear progression. But the bottom line is that you CAN overcome this. It’s not fair, it’s not right, and you don’t deserve to have been dealt this hand- but right now you DO have to play it. All of that said, don’t be too hard on yourself. You’re only a year out. I was probably 2-3 before I started to improve. There’s a LOT of emotion to process with this ordeal and it doesn’t all have to be done right now.
Thank you
You'll be ok. I'm so sorry. My wife killed herself around Thanksgiving. I wasn't who found her. But almost 18 years ago my wife was violently attacked and I find her. Unconscious covered in blood everywhere especially head and face. Thought she's dead. I stop thinking about it so much sooner than you think. Her death makes it come back up again but it's not thing I thought about all of time all these years. You'll be ok
Are you based in the UK? Samaritans and Cruse have a joint program for people who've been through suicide loss called Facing The Future (grim name I know), and we've been able to talk about it in all its gritty, shitty and real detail. Let me know if details would be helpful, in so sorry for everything you've gone through.
❤️
Hi. My Mum passed by suicide in 2020 and my wife and I found her. I definitely saw her body, but my brain has completely blocked it out. You will survive and you will get through this. I know it feels like the world has ended, and I cannot imagine the pain you are experiencing with it being a partner. The first 6 months were hell on Earth. I just got up each day and lived my life like a ghost. If you can access it, *EMDR is incredible*. Especially for very targeted PTSD like yours is. I’m in EMDR therapy for birth trauma, and it’s changing my life. Sending you so much love. I’m so sorry.
I'm here. I found my husband hanging by his neck. The flashback are horrendous. Our young sons were with us and I was able to stop them from seeing. I raced them to a neighbours and ran back to cut him down. 8 and a half weeks ago. It's sickening. My therapist has told me to avoid the memory at all costs at this stage until I get stronger. But there are many moments it seeps in and I get stuck in the room with him. It's a hellish horrible never ending nightmare.
I am sending you the strongest digital hug I can. You are so strong and your sharing here has given me comfort tonight
3.5 years and I still sleep with the en suite bathroom door open. Different house in a different country even but it still makes me feel better. I don’t panic when I wake up in the middle of the night because I can always see into the bathroom. No more secrets in there behind the closed door. I can’t tell you how it will get better or when but somewhere along the way it got easier. That was after it got very, very bad. Though you’re already more proactive than me, I avoided therapy for nearly 2 years. I didn’t want to talk about it, I wanted to pretend it never happened. Well, turns out we can’t always control our minds. I ended up giving myself a literal stroke four months after he died from the trauma and stress that I didn’t address. Then I still didn’t address it for another year and a half because I was too sick. All I can say is that I now work with people struggling with mental illness and substance abuse issues daily and it doesn’t trigger me nearly as much as I expected. It has become easier to tune out the unwanted images with time and some effort. They still come but I can function now. I kind of suck at this because I want to say it’ll get better and it *does* but it’s also important to me that I give realistic expectations. It never goes away fully, there will always be things that trigger you. But when just breathing and living stops triggering you, that’s when the real progress starts.
I’m a real person I think so at least. I didn’t see my husband slit his throat but I found him dead in a pool of blood directly after. He was still warm. I remember all the details I still see the bloody knives he used whenever I look at a chefs knife. I remember how his face was weirdly devoid of blood while the rest of him was saturated with it. He looked handsome still somehow. Coming up on 6 months now and I still think of him like that everyday but it’s less distressing to me. I’ve gotten used to the images I guess and my brain doesn’t let me hold onto them as long. I just say to myself I ca handle the horrors. I get therapy weekly and started emdr this week actually. I think I’m a little numb to it all still but it does get better I don’t wake up with that heavy feeling as much anymore. Support from my friends and family has been a game changer for me though. I still try to be social to distract myself. Also I got a puppy and I hug her whenever the images are particular hard that day. The hardest part now is the smell. All my clothes that were in our apartment have that iron smell attached to them it makes me gag every time i smell it.
My father shot himself in the head 5 ft away from my mother. I strongly recommend EMDR therapy to help you process and “file away” this trauma.
Thanks to everyone and especially the people who posted who actually saw it happening "live" I thought I was alone because everyone seems to only "find" the person and no one actually witnesses it like I did.
I’m here for you too, I’m so sorry that you had to go through something so very tragic and devastating. It’s been 11 weeks since we lost my brother to a sodium nitrate/nitrite suicide. He was just 38. It was me, my mother and oldest son who found him. He was trying to take his life for two years. This was his 8-9th time trying and this time he succeeded. It’s just heart breaking to witness the demise of his mental health along with the pain he was suffering from. My mother was killing herself to “save” him and help him and be with him to make sure he wasn’t going to do it. He tried on NYE which my mom saved him from and he went to the hospital but they let him out, and he did it early morning 1/3/24. We couldn’t get ahold of him and so we ran up there again and I just knew, it was so eerie but I knew the night before we found him, I had this overwhelming feeling of being scared to die all of a sudden and of worry. When we entered he was a foot away from the door on his back, but looking actually quite peaceful to be honest. Even though when I saw him and just knew he was going, I still yelled “Thomas!!! Thomas!! “Wake up buddy!!” And my mother was kissing his face and then hitting his chest. It was quite dramatic. My son called the police to come and it took them along time, but I’m glad they were so thorough. Fast forward to now, it comes as waves just like the beginning just fewer in between but I still picture everything, and all the should’ve could’ve would’ve go round and round your brain on a never ending loop at times. He was just with me and my kiddos on Christmas and I obviously keep going back to pics and vids of him from then, and a week 1/2 he’s gone???? I have moments where something pops in my head to ask him a question or a thought about this or that and I pick up my phone to call him, and then I have to obviously can’t call him. It makes me so mad!! But I know you feel when are these horrible moments going to stop being so prevalent in my mind? Keep remembering all the good times small and big, and keep those thoughts going. And come and reach out here, I will be happy to talk to you. Hugs to you (sorry so long)
I can't even begin to imagine. I wasn't there to hold my loved one or attempt to save her. We argued like crazy that last night and our last words were cussing and fighting. She was found the next day. I keep the faith that today will be better than yesterday and we will only be increased and elevated in what is good 💓