Thanks for the thoughtful reply. In a lot of ways you're right, but there are still solid reasons why I want to go through with this (at least by my standards, if there are any holes in my logic feel free to point them out). Sorry about the essay btw lmao
I guess you're right that I lack agency, I feel like I have always lacked agency in my life and people never take me seriously. I have an awful habit of acting ditzy and airheaded, and I at least used to have a real tendency to make stupid mistakes (I feel as though I make these mistakes about as often as other people, but when I make them they tend to be extra obvious and everyone notices, in contrast to when I do something right or make a correct prediction that nobody notices or cares about), and this combined means that nobody ever fully trusts me or respects my decisions like I wish they would. One of my strongest desires is to be good at something and be respected in that field. Over the years I've been working towards it, but the more progress I make (even after considerable progress where I know I have an amount of real skill in the area), the more I realize that I still feel as incompetent as before, and I just feel even worse. I know this is a solvable problem though, it'll just be really difficult to change the way I act and to be an expert in the field I'm making a career in, so it's not really a major factor in my decision, just a minor one which has been emotionally bothering me.
There are one or two people in my life that I wish cared about me more, but if/once I clearly communicate to them how I feel, that would solve the problem. I'm close with them for a reason and ctb would be a much less practical solution than just communicating with them, which I actually did just earlier today, so that isn't really a factor either. Also, I would never ctb mainly or solely over the thoughts and opinions of other people, that doesn't matter that much to me - I would only do it over my own emotional suffering.
The main reason why I want to ctb is because I have a permanent problem so I need a permanent solution. I am transgender (ftm) and I will never be male. I can get surgery, I can transition, I can get as close as I possibly can afford, but I will still be persecuted, I will still be harassed, I can never have kids the way I want, etc, etc. I don't even want to transition, I want to be feminine, but I want to see myself as a feminine man, which is impossible for me. I did a lot of research and learning about what effects are the result of different types of transitioning, and I decided I really don't want a lot of those effects. I have tried different forms of acceptance and therapy for years but nothing has helped or worked, and I went into the process with a lot of hope as well as a positive outlook. It's hard to even shower or get changed because I don't want to look at myself. My body has been permanently disfigured by puberty and the only way out is to escape my body by ctb. I have been in several relationships and it always made it so much worse. I dont even recognize my own face when I look in the mirror. In college I cut my hair and socially transitioned to see fi that would help and I just got worse overall because the escapism I used my entire life to avoid these emotions was finally slipping.
When I was having thoughts of ctb in middle school, I persisted because I held out hope that high school could be better. In high school, it was worse, but despite everything I still remained optimistic that I could improve in college. Looking back at the patterns of my actions and thoughts, I just keep progressively getting worse no matter how many therapists I go through and how many strategies I try. I'm not going to try the same thing over and over again, hoping that somehow the future will be better and then progressively suffering more and more because of it. I know a lot of other people get caught in a cycle where they put off something that they have always wanted to do for the future - they wait for a perfect time and that time never comes. I have had on and off thoughts of ctb since middle school but I kept putting it off because of an incorrect belief that my suffering would improve; I don't want this to keep happening.
My ADHD and depression have been getting even more debilitating as the only main coping mechanism that worked well, escapism, stopped working in college, and now I'm failing all my classes. I don't know how much longer i can go on like this. I even reached out to college resources and my professors to get help, but there's not much they can do. I'm in therapy for about the 5th time in my life because I'm desperately trying to fight this but at this point I'm so upset every day that I dont want to fight anymore. Ever since 6th grade I have had a constant backlog of schoolwork, I try so hard to keep up with the work assigned to me and I got generally good grades on tests and quizzes but the homework took me too long and I could never finish it. I feel so awful about my grades and how much work I should be doing that I'm not able to keep up with, and I doubt it will be much better when I get a job and have work assigned to me with deadlines. I haven't been able to figure this shit out in over 7 years, even with multiple executive functioning coaches and other resources wasted on me so it is reasonable to expect that my behavior follows this pattern and I will feel incompetent, stressed, and disappointed in myself for years to come. I'm even on medication, which helps a little, but only barely enough to not drop out of college. This is a large supporting factor in why I want to ctb but being trans and hating my body is the main one, since it is the only 100% guaranteed permanent problem
One of the main reasons why I feel hesitation to go through with it definitively is because I know I have 3 main people who care about me and I do not want them to be upset, especially my mentor figure. I respect him deeply as a friend and a mentor and I am worried that he would be upset if I went through with it and actually died, I don't want him to feel any sense of responsibility even though he seems probably rational enough to realize that he is the main reason I lived this long in the first place and that he did everything he could. Him and my 2 other closest friends have made me question whether or not the positives of being with them could outweigh all the other negative factors in my life ( I will only ctb if I am certain that the overall negative emotions I have been experiencing heavily heavily outweigh the positive emotions, and that there is no hope of this ratio changing). I was also worried that one of them would ctb after I did, but luckily I got confirmation today that if I died, he would continue living, which is a relief.
I also want to gamble for irrational reasons, just because it feels less scary and a lot more emotionally satisfying to know that there is an element of uncertainty. If the entire point of ctb is to cater to my emotions and relieve myself of negative emotion, then I might as well choose the method that makes me feel the best when I think about it. I completely understand if you don't think this is a good enough reason, I guess, but since I've been trying to solve emotional problems in my life with rationality and logical problem-solving/thinking and it hasn't been working, I decided I wanted to try an emotionally satisfying approach even if it might not seem like as good of an idea. The definition of insanity is trying the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. Being rational and logical has not been helping my emotions no matter what I do so maybe it's time to just act on my emotions and see where it takes me. Other people act immature and indulge their emotions all the time and leave me to pick up after them, yet I've been holding back for my entire life. Now it's my turn, I guess; I kinda feel like I've earned the right to do this.
Again, sorry for the essay, but I hope this gives you more insight into why I'm very certain about this, even if I want to gamble.
Well, welcome I guess. Also apparently you're in a college right now? Look, I know that life can get quite difficult at times, but remember, try to make everything work out before you actually go through with things. I heard someone say once that some dude in their college had committed suicide by cutting themselves in their dorm room tub on like the last day of their second year I believe and they probably had a difficult home situation and did not want to go back to it, but remember, you can do this! You absolutely can! You will graduate and you will earn good grades! I promise you! Really bro!
Thanks for the welcome :) unfortunately I have a terrible gpa despite my 4+ gpa in high school and I'm failing multiple classes right now, it's really not looking good for me. Even if I get good grades and get a good career, though, I highly doubt it would fix my problems. I have a good life, a life that a lot of people would be jealous of, but I still suffer too much emotionally to be able to really enjoy any of it. If you want more details then I typed a big essay in a reply to someone else on this thread that you can read, it goes into some more of the details of why I want to ctb and why I want to gamble.
ok huh my replies get combined into one big blob. thats kinda cool actually, nvm what I said before about looking at the other reply if its all combined into one chunk of text lol
hi! i dont think ive ever seen someone on this site say they wanted to gamble on their life. damn thats crazy but anyway all attempts have a chance to survive even if its a very very small chance.
i am curious as to why you would want a chance at surviving an attempt since sometimes surviving can put u in a worse situation yk?
regardless tho, i hope you dont go through with it & i hope you succeed in college & get past these pesky deadlines
i also hope whatever is standing in your way mentally or physically, you are able to get around
I love your pusheen profile picture very much. you understand what peak is
I won't retype but in the big chunk of text that makes up my reply to all the ppl on this thread, the 6th and 7th (67) (sorry) paragraphs are the ones that explain your question, just in case you only want the relevant sections and you dont want to read my entire sob story lmao
also, this was another question I was going to ask at some point, but if I am forced to get help after a survived attempt, what could that look like? I figure it's different depending on the region, so I'll specify that im in the northern USA. I'm particularly concerned about expenses and whether or not my parents could be involved, I just really don't want to have to talk to them about how I'm struggling since they will just make things worse. How could that also affect a potential government or government-contractor employment opportunity in the future? If I survive, I will definitely want to go for a job like that; the possibility that I could be capable of getting one of those jobs was actually what kept me from considering ctb for a long while
