If someone tries to commit suicide should I stop them?

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If someone tries to commit suicide should I stop them?

If it is within your capability to prevent their self termination, then yes you should attempt to stop them. Otherwise, depending on how many others are able to help, you and/or they may by inaction lead to the death of whoever the person in question is. The method by which you help them is quite important, because when a person is feeling suicidal they then have basically rejected everything and will tend to push all help away. If their suicide is not immenent, you could attempt to help just by being there for them. However, if it is a matter of physical prevention of the final act, then that depends on knowledge, proximity, and physical capability.

And avoiding risk to yourself. This is one of the first rules of first aid and preventative action. Dont get yourself killed helping someone else.

To a degree, if there is time to think, then yes avoid unnecessary risks. However, if the act is about to be committed nearly immediately and one hesitates for too long considering if the risk is too great, then the act may be over before one is done thinking about that.

Have you taken first aid before p-keet?

You are taught to always take time to think. People that rush into danger often need rescuing themselves. If someone is going to cut themselves up with a knife and you struggle with them, you'll likely get cut too. Possibly quite fatally. And then they are just as likely to continue with their plans, if not moreso.

Back when I was in Cub scouts, yes I had taken the first aid class and learned CPR and dressing wounds and such like that, but if they taught about confronting crisis situations I don't remember. It does depend on the situation as to how things should be handled though. In the case of the knife, if one is physically capable of removing the knife, has the martial arts knowledge of how to safely disarm, and the right opportunity is available, then that opportunity should not be left to sit until it has past. If you aren't physically capable, perhaps attempting to talk the person out of it would work better, while somebody else calls 911.

Yes it doesnt seem likely that they would throw that sort of conundrum at children.

The adult courses I took had to address issues of invisible gas, low oxygen, electrical hazard, potential fire, automotive accidents et cetera. Events where things can be very deadly and quite chaotic. I need to renew my training. Everyone should pass a first aid course.



Yeah, generally if you know whether you are capable of removing the threat, you really are. Part of first aid was about instilling methodology for making fast and correct judgments.

the right to life implies the right to end one's own life. Interference is not nice. You don't want people telling you what to do, so reciprocate.

ruveyn

If someone is young and wants to kill themself because their boy/girlfriend dumped them then yes you should stop them.

If they are older and have terminal cancer which will cause a slow and painful death...... then leave them to it.

Having been down that road, I say "yes."

Anyone who really wants to end their life will do so in a way that no bystander could know what they are about to do.

Most attempts at suicide are cries for intervention...to know that someone, anyone, still gives a damn about them. Hence, they are usually much more public and done in a fashion to give someone, anyone, a chance to stop them.

Ruveyn, you do know that most people who want to suicide are "usually" in depression, which means they are not in their normal state of being. Depression is regarded as a temporary sickness, last i checked. That and, suicide is frowned upon justly so because it is a loss for a whole community (as in, education has been spent, food, etc.). I mean, i don't have to quote Durkheim now do i? -.-

So maybe something like temporarily stopping them, talking with them and make them reconsider and then let them choose (as long as they are over 18).

It depends on the circumstances. If, for example, the person considering suicide is going to die soon from a terminal illness, and is in serious pain, then I think you should let them go ahead and end their life if that's what they want. If, on the other hand, the person is considering suicide because they're depressed about a relationship ending, you should try to stop them.

In most cases I'd say you should try to help them. I think there are times when somebody's desire for suicide is perfectly reasonable, though.

Right, life, Right topic

I helped to prevent my son's suicide in 2005 when I found him trying to strangle himself with a rope attached to a stair railing in our house. After removing the rope, he began to breathe more normally, though his neck was bruised, and his hyoid bone broken. I called 911 as soon as I saw him when Icame home from work early. He is fine now, and I am glad I interfered in his right to end his life.

Fine story; you did the right thing, IMHO.

In such cases all theoretical considerations about the right to suicide etc. cease to be of any importance.

As for the question asked by the OP, I would stop them and ask them to seriously reconsider, for at least a few weeks. I do not contest the fundamental right of any individual to end his or her own life, but I do consider it a waste if such things are done impulsIvely or while under the spell of anything reducing rational thought - severe depression, drugs, etc.

This is exactly right.