The urge to live is probably the strongest instinct an organism can have.
Sometimes I wonder whether these suicide attempts, as brutal as they are, have some failure built into them, because some part of you won't let you kill yourself.
It's like a primordial instinct to get help via intense injury. Because everyone can physically see the wound.
But a psychic one, something that is invisible that you can't convince anyone else the truth of...that can drive you mad with frustration.
Nassim Taleb once said he noticed more suicides from financial depressions than the fallout of wars, suggesting humans are particularly sensitive to changes in social status even more so than food and danger.
I think that's true.
I don't think people talk about it, but there is something immensely frustrating of not being able to function because you're dealing with some unstable, emotional landscape that affects every decision, every movement and plan you do. Like there's a weight on your entire sense of being and nobody can directly see it.
So they assume you have capabilities and responsibilities that you just don't have because your limbs all work.
It's maddening. Were I in a wheelchair, nobody could argue with the truth of my burden.
But to have an invisible ghost haunting you.
I get now why people cut themselves. You want everybody to see the depth of your suffering.