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Daddy isn’t coming back

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271–280 of 430 posts

Re: Daddy isn’t coming back

#271
post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the many things needing overhauling in our mental health system. I avoided seeking help for a long time because I was interested in jobs that would likely require government security clearances, and (I don't know how true this is) I had heard from multiple sources that a history of seeking help for mental health issues may disqualify you. Which is a little backwards in practice. If there's an issue I want to a…

Company resources are next to useless. They are meant to be short term and are encouraged to turn you around in a few sessions. If you can, go private, since it's more open ended and the process of over over the basics of your life story are tedious.

Agreed. I eventually found a very good counselor for my situation.

But I'm extremely fortunate that I'm both very well off and wasn't suicidal. And it was very apparent to me that if I was different in either respect, I perhaps wouldn't have been able to turn things around.

Re: Daddy isn’t coming back

#272

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>However, it generates $50 billion relative to the actual state of the world in which there is a cost that large due to suicides. What does that mean? What if I say a life is worth 1 trillion dollars, of 1 google dollars? does that mean that if I save a life the world is 1 trillion dollars richer?

It would mean that if you decided a life was worth a trillion dollars. This is intrinsically a very hard question to answer. Fortunately there are ways to make better estimates for that number than by guessing. The way people behave when buying either insurance products, products which enhance their safety (in particular: reduce the risk of mortality) are informative about these implicit valuations. There is a large…

I get that there are different ways to price a human life. I was mostly curious about what you meant by this statement

>relative to the actual state of the world

"the actual state of the world" does translate to any definition I know.

Re: Daddy isn’t coming back

#273
post #266
post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Man, what. Psychiatrists have to commit you if they think you're an immediate danger to yourself. I'm sure shitty ones do it in situations where they shouldn't, but speaking as someone who has actually experienced being suicidal, my psychiatrist was the only person I actually fully trusted to help me get what I needed. Maybe I'm just lucky to have ended up with psychs who will take on more risk to avoid having to com…

Suicide is a human right. Interfering with someone's basic right to self-determination is absolutely despicable, no matter how ill the person is.

What if that self-determination is a fleeting thought?

Re: Daddy isn’t coming back

#274

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you are suicidal, do not call a hotline. Everything you said above is true, but this is advice that I feel on the fence about giving. If you call a hotline, it is not unlikely that your life will be disrupted. You may very well be involuntarily committed to a psych ward for days/weeks/months, depending on your mental state. Some psych wards aren't great, but some really aren't all that bad. It may sound scary to…

As someone who was very badly affected by the Australian medical system, let me just say that what happens to you in the system will almost certainly traumatize you as much as the event that led up to it. It's very easy for someone to say otherwise, unless they have experienced it first hand. Have you?

[deleted]

Re: Daddy isn’t coming back

#275
post #180

This is the part where every one piles in posting suicide hotline numbers. I would argue most of those people do not have any experience with, or understanding of those hotlines and it's just a trite thing to throw out to show support like "fuck cancer". You should seriously understand what you are signing yourself up for if you call one of those numbers on yourself or someone else. For one you are volunteering that…

Your post is dead on

I have what is essentially a terminal illness and the fuck cancer resonates

You just want to turn to those people and say "I'm dying". While they are trying to be supportive but they completely miss the mark because they don't get it

Similar things can be said about people regarding addiction

Re: Daddy isn’t coming back

#276
post #266
post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Man, what. Psychiatrists have to commit you if they think you're an immediate danger to yourself. I'm sure shitty ones do it in situations where they shouldn't, but speaking as someone who has actually experienced being suicidal, my psychiatrist was the only person I actually fully trusted to help me get what I needed. Maybe I'm just lucky to have ended up with psychs who will take on more risk to avoid having to com…

Suicide is a human right. Interfering with someone's basic right to self-determination is absolutely despicable, no matter how ill the person is.

It's not quite as simple as that. One of the reasons the suicide rate is so high in the US is because of how easy it is to access firearms. This suggests that peoples' propensity to commit suicide is at least somewhat dependent on their environment. Given that, do you want to make their environment more or less likely to cause them to commit suicide? I'm in the latter category.

As for the concern about basic rights, I fundamentally agree. For some people, perhaps, they will never get better and in those cases we should have a path to assisted suicide. In all cases, we should do our best to help suicidal people, who are ultimately suffering a lot. I don't think most people who are suicidal want to specifically die more than they want an end to their suffering, to which they see no realistic alternative other than death (which I assure you remains quite scary even when you're really depressed.) I think giving them an escape other than death is morally obligatory and humane, where it's possible.

Re: Daddy isn’t coming back

#277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you don't mind me asking, is there anywhere I can read more about this aspect of the system? This comment seems really extreme and it's a perspective I haven't really seen anywhere else.

So speaking as someone who has worked in psychiatry and mental health care, I can say it's basically true. It's not the intent of those working in it, but I think like a lot of things it's sort of what has emerged through the system. I had a colleague, now retired, who was the president of state mental health associations, etc. who made the argument that most suicide treatment programs are really designed to protect…

Anyone seeking help with a minor physical disorder from the local urgent care facility here (California) is promptly asked: "Have you had thoughts of harming yourself or anyone else?".

Immediate tingling of danger -- but wondered if my suspicions might be little more than the product of a cynical mind. Didn't think so -- but thanks for the confirmation!

Re: Daddy isn’t coming back

#278
post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Involuntary commitment from mental health is a min. 72 hours here, but I think you can be in and out of a drunk tank faster than that, which is usually just a few hours to sober up. I could see a bail hearing happening quick enough that you get in and out before 72 hours, but I don't know how common that is.

It's true that you'll be stuck in the mental hospital for at least a week (those are 72 business hours). I couldn't afford bail, though, so I was stuck in jail for 3 months[0]. There were plenty of other inmates there in similar situations. YMMV. [0] That's how long it took for me to get a court date at which point I was released with time served (2 weeks). Getting out of the mental hospital never even required a law…

>"I couldn't afford bail, though, so I was stuck in jail for 3 months[0]. There were plenty of other inmates there in similar situations"

Some justice here. Instead of singing songs about rights abuses in whatever country they decided not to like at the moment why don't they look and fix things under their own fucking noses.

Re: Daddy isn’t coming back

#279

Wait list for private psychiatric care here can be six months long now. As for public assistance clinics, good luck... Clinical-level psychiatric cases have increased since onset of the covid-19 pandemic. A number of doctors I have spoken to have said they are seeing twice as many patients, and cannot sustain this case load much longer.

The last time I tried an EAP program, the phone call they scheduled was six weeks out.

I told them not to bother.

Re: Daddy isn’t coming back

#280
post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not how it works in real life. Family (and maybe generous government healthcare) will take care of "too broke" to give any yield, in the future, people. Anyone else who isn't lucky to have that kind of support will find himself in the streets. And that's fine. Societies can only function if the yield from the people it invested in is higher than the investment. This is why socialized healthcare is tricky. If y…

> And that's fine. Societies can only function if the yield from the people it invested in is higher than the investment. This is why socialized healthcare is tricky. If you invest too much, you might be wasting resources and endangering all of your society. If you invest too little, you might be leaving people who would otherwise be productive once the investment is made. This is quite evidently not how most sociali…

> In fact, taken to the logical conclusion it would mean killing retirees instead of paying them pensions (imagine what society could spend all that money on, right?).

only a logical conclusion in a very simplistic sense. if you kill all the retirees, it will be hard to persuade the working population to produce any surplus.

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