Ask Lemmy

Used to be. Since I had kids, the answer is no.

Yes, I'm only worried about it being painful and my partner having to raise my son alone until she finds someone else. I'm much more worried about losing mobility and or faculties as I age, it can be devastating.

Why be afraid of my energy returning to the universe from whence it came?

I’ve gone through it all so many times in my head, I do think I’d be prepared, but I am not ready, never have been, as illustrated by my consistently disappointing attempts at suicide, more so when I was younger, but not so many years ago, too.

There’s, fortunately, enough for me here not to be ready, instincts fight back, the mind finds a way to end in a satisfying enough compromise for whatever acute drives me there at the time. But since I’ve gone far enough on many of those occasions, I’ve done a lot of both mental and emotional work to be prepared, I’m happy with how my life is and has been, I wouldn’t feel like I miss anything, or I didn’t get to do all I wanted. I have. The important bits, that is. All the rest are just nice little things to do while I’m stuck here.

I was never suicidal in the bitter or angry sense. I’ve always just been simply too tired to bear everything life brings. It’s just too much and not worth it in my mind. But apparently my subconscious thinks otherwise. Which is fine. It’s a beautiful world, for the most part people are amazing and full of light, the nature just fills your soul with joy and a sense of wonder, animals are just so impossibly adorable to observe from afar, some from close enough that their excitement and love just rubs into me, too.

It’s all good, but not worth all the rest of it. It’s just way too tiring. Makes you empty and drained on a daily basis. There’s so much love and beauty, but not enough time, not enough resources, not enough anything to really reach them in a consistent enough basis, so you fight and you fight, you bear through everything to get there more often, and it’s simply not enough. It’s not worth it. I’d rather cease to exist and be blissfully oblivious to all of it. And be happy I got the time I did with it all. It was beautiful, in part, and it was so endearing, in part, but I’d rather leave it at that, smile and fade away to nothingness, away from all the toil and effort it takes to barely reach anything.

So in a conscious sense I’m all prepared, I’ve even gone and talked my friends and family through all this, so they’d be prepared too, so there wouldn’t be any threads left hanging. It’s all wrapped up nicely in a beautiful, happy little bundle, that should let me join eternity in peace, with a smile. I’d even like to think I’m ready, but in practice, I’ve had to come to accept my subconscious self simply doesn’t agree. Every time it feels like it does, finally, and I go through all the song and dance, and at the last minute, it halts my hand and makes me back off. Sometimes so bitterly close to release.

So I can’t really say I’m ready, even though I feel ready. Have felt for a very long time. Decades.

But I’m happy enough to remain here. It’s still a beautiful world. People, animals, nature are still so full or wonder and love. It feels barely worth it, I’d even say not worth it really, but the subconscious self has its own evaluation which doesn’t line up so nicely with mine. But I guess I should be happy about it, since while each and every day brings further drain, more burden, heavier a weight on my shoulders, it also adds up slowly to the pile of beauty and love and light and all. Not in a bearable ratio, in my mind, but who am I to question my subconscious. It’s still beauty, love and light. I’ll take it, if I have to, and I’ll cling to it all for sense of self and purpose.

Once I get to go, I’ll be all the more relieved, the more the burdens grow and the eyes tire. And the pile of beauty and love will have grown a bit bigger.

Yes, since I already experienced it once. Before that I was terrified.

Dying is the easy part. Living meaningfully? I'm looking for ways to improve that.

One of the reasons my panic attacks never last long is that I feel like I’m dying and once I think “hey wait why am I freaking out? I don’t care if I die and if I do I’d rather not die feeling so stressed” usually my body calms down very fast.

Same thing with a time when I almost drowned. I realized I’d rather just let go, so I stopped flailing about and let myself start sinking. Then it’s like “okay this is taking longer than expected to die, I could probably push myself up to take a breath or maybe even swim to shallow water before I die”

Accepting death is a great way to calm yourself down in stressful situations and calming yourself down is helpful in most stressful situations lol

Yeah. But, I have kids who truly have no one else. So I just can’t. Not until I’ve paid off a home and accumulated a good amount of money to leave them.

Not at all, and I don't think I ever will. I want to see what will happen in the future, I want to learn everything, sadly that wont happen.

I'm happy with existence and desperate about it ending.

Emotionally? Maybe. I have so many things that I still want to do that death is not even on the radar, and wasn’t even on the radar when I was a socially isolated and depressed teen. So I am not ready, but I would be able to accept it.

Mentally? Yes. As an atheist, I am of the firm belief that everything that has a beginning has an end, and death itself holds no fear for me.

Rather, it is the potentially-painful process of dying that has me nervous. And the concept of wanting to wrap things up and just shut it all down, but being stuck in hospice and no longer having a legal right to do so, is absolutely terrifying for me. Which is why I am now walking my Octogenarian parents through the process of MAiD such that they can still leverage it whenever they want to and for as long as possible; to give them the agency to flip that switch as they see fit. Supporting and maintaining their right of self-determination and agency right to the very end is probably the biggest gift I could ever give them.

Physically? Dear goodness, I hope not. Seeing as my own father is inching rather close to 90, and doing so in good physical condition, gives me hope that I can get another three-plus decades under my belt as well. I just hope I won’t mirror his cognitive decline.

Does it matter? One of the nice things about being dead is that I don't have to react to it.

Yes. I wonder what will happen to my plushies. It seems idiot I know, but I have around 150 plushies and they are bound together. They share a story. I don't want them to split, I don't want us to be apart, and I don't want them to "die".

heck no. ive got so many people that i love and as much as i think they shouldnt, they love me back. im hopeful that my life improves, and im figuring out how to be and enjoy being myself. im figuring out how to express myself to people and through art. im discovering music that makes me feel good. and again, the people i love so much and who love me so much.

im never gonna make it happen myself and im kinda scared that somethings gonna make me die

Not really, I really don't wanna die.

My entire existence is bizzare as fuck.

I was supposed to be terminated under the One Child Policy since I was the 2nd one, but somehow I managed to live and survive till birth.

I've always had existential crisis about it ever since my mom told me about it.

No I don't wanna die. I'm scared. But I'm also feeling suicidal simultaneously, but also wtf brain stop it, I wanna live, wtf r u doing brain, stop thinking about suicide.

so... yeah... brain is weird...

I'd panic...

I remember once seeing a nuclear mushroom cloud outside my window... then the electronics died to the emp... then I woke up...

It was a dream...

I think I was just full with adrenaline...

I think biology will take over and survival instincts will make me scare af at my final hour.

Its why people believe in spirts and souls and stuff... its literally biology... coping mechanism...

I sort of believe in reincarnation too... yes I know its probably copium... but otherwise I'd be an even bigger puddle of depression.

I sometimes wonder if "god" intervened and that why I was born... cuz normally you'd just become an aborted fetus in China. They say 400 million government forced abortions in China... but somehow I lived. Bizzare.

Great ice breaker tho, I haven't really told anyone IRL yet... I kinda tried to stop thinking about it for the past 10 years since it constantly get me thinking: what if I was never born

My mom keeps reminding me about it. I get a burst of existential crisis every time... her words sounds so... like... it makes the entire atmosphere dark whenever my mom retells my "origin story".

Would worrying about it make a difference?

Yes.

I am not emotionally prepared to die because I'm not ready to die. I still have shit to do

I feel like I'll be prepared later on but I'm fully expecting to not be ready when the time comes.

It doesnt matter if you are prepared or not, and once it happens you wont be around to feel anything about it anyway. So its not really worth worrying about.

No. I have many regrets. There are many things that I have not experienced, or would like to continue to experience. The world has not changed enough that others will not be hurt in the ways I am.

I realize that I would not feel distressed about these things after there is no I to feel distressed about these things, but I still am and what I am is afraid of dying. Also some still-living people would be sad and I'd rather not do that to them.

No

Yeah, but it would be disappointing. Still plenty I'd like to do, and I'm only a handful of years from retirement, so I would be just shy of some well-earned down time.

As far as fear? I've never been afraid of dying. The time immediately prior to dying, yes, that is potentially scary. Being dead isn't something you experience, though, so what is there to fear?

Yea

Nope

Yes, no and perhaps.

Yes, because, simply put, it is inevitable. It is the only certain thing. I will end.

No, because I don't want to leave those who need or may need me to be left alone. I would like to see all those I love and cherish grow, build their families and carve their place into the world.

Perhaps, because there is nothing I can do to prevent, avoid or delay it. It will happen. When it happens, it will be sad but it will have to happen.

That's it.

I don't think so.

As bleak as things are in the world, I still have hope. I want to observe the next 20 years unfold. I also want to watch my kids grow up.

The thought of dying makes me incredibly sad.