Is it true that there tends to be lower incidences of

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suicide amongst people with AS?

Good question, but i dont think its any different, or much different, than the NT rates. In the end, it boils down to the individual and what kind of stress/emotional threshold they've hit. However, one true fact is that people who commit suicide are quite selfish, or extremely egocentric, believing that their problems are the only things that matter and if they cant solve it, then there is no more reason to live, or if they cant get any attention and think a last act of theatrics will do something for them. Admittedly, my thoughts have skirted this, but in the end the final act would only create more problems for my family, and i'll be damned if i do that to them. "Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem," as my family's saying tends to go.

I always say suicide is for cowards. The gray areas are if the person is going to kill himself it better be because he is in psychical pain and it hurts so bad he can't do anything or even relax and will live that way for the rest of his life. The family would be releaved because he doesn't have to suffer anymore even though he had killed himself. Or you're trapped in a burning building that is over 100 stories high and the plane had crashed into it. You are above the fire and you have no way out of the building, you have two choices, burn to death or go down with the crumbling building or jump out the window. Yeah everyone knows what I"m referring to The families of those people wouldn't suffer as much because they all know their loved one would have died anyway so it be illogical to be upset about their suicide.
Or if the person was making a sacrifice to save all our lives like Bruce Willis did in Armageddon. He was very brave. But of course that be a great mission for anyone who is living a sh***y life.

I am and have been suicidal in the past and your post really hurts/upsets me. I already despise myself enough without people such as yourself telling me I'm selfish and egocentric. People give lip service and say "things will get better" but they have no convincing evidence. For people such as myself who've been depressed for years on end WHILE taking multiple anti-depressants AND receiving therapy that saying falls deafeningly flat. I won't kill myself now because I still have family but if didn't have any family I don't think my quality of life warrants my continued existence, not unless they come up with some miracle drug for depression. I have no obligation to live in abject misery for corporate societies sake.

I've been suicidal before but never attempted it of course. Too chicken and also I wasn't a quitter and I agreed to what he said.

Did you read this somewhere?

Sorry, but no one asked about your feelings on suicide. Re-read the first post.

In the States and UK, the suicide rates are roughly 8 per 100,000 people, or .00008 percent. This sample is, I'm assuming, largely NT (with current AS diagnosis rates of .6/1000, roughly 600 of those 100,000 people have AS). A NAS study in the UK found that 8 percent of sampled autistic adults have seriously contemplated or attempted suicide, but no information on the size of the sample was given. A separate study concluded that out of 27 autistic adults, 4 had attempted suicide, an instance rate of 14 percent. Note that this data applies to adults on the spectrum, rather than simply adults with AS, though since AS makes up a large percentage of ASD diagnoses, it wouldn't be a stretch to say AS suicide contemplation rates are very similar, if not marginally lower.

In addition, Tony Attwood, in his 2006 Book The Complete Guide to Aspergers Syndrome, posited that adults with AS have a higher likelihood of suicide than the neurotypical population due to feelings of being "alienated, socially isolated, and not understood."

Hope I've helped.

I would actually expect people with AS to have a higher rate of suicide considering the amount of additional society-induced stress we have to go through that NT's are able to avoid by being able to blend in and be socially acceptable. Hard to prove though statistically, since there's no telling how many people with AS end up killing themselves without a diagnosis or having ever heard of AS during their lifetimes. If they didn't know they had AS, then they probably just thought of themselves as a freak or a defect or something, while those who get diagnosed with AS at least know they're not alone and can get support that would help them avoid suicide, which would skew statistics toward those with AS committing suicide less, if indeed any statistics saying so have been taken.

I've got to agree with Marshall, being told that being suicidal is "selfish" doesn't do us any good. I've been there a bunch of times, and in that mindset, I was only thinking about how much better off my family, friends and the world would be if I stopped living; sure they wouldn't understand it at first and be sad and everything, but eventually they'd get over it and be happier. At least that's what I was thinking. In a proper mindset like now, I know they'd never actually let themselves admit to being better off without me existing even if they actually were, they'd feel guilty thinking thoughts like that. But still, thinking about killing myself was almost never about how it would help ME feel better, I was always thinking about everyone else who I've hurt, dissapointed, let down, and how just one final act of doing so would save them from enduring another lifetime of me screwing things up for them. I was always too chicken to do it myself though, even all of my attempts were pretty half-assed. Since learning about AS though and learning I'm not a lone freak in the world, my general outlook on life has improved.

I don't think there was anything wrong with her talking about that. The original post can't be answered with a simple yes or no. It's a topic that requires some discussion in order to be answered, I believe. if it even can be answered. Spokane_Girl just brought some interesting "food for thought" into the discussion. That's a good thing, not a bad thing.

That in no way resembles a fact, nor offers any empirical evidence for a fact.

That might be the reason why YOU would ever consider ending your life, just as some might consider such a thing believing that others will feel pity for them, or regret their treatment of them once they're gone, and those reasons yes, sound rather selfish and immature, and it says a lot about you that those are the only reasons you can leap to in imagining why another individual might end their life.

However, those are not the only reasons for a human to be painfully unhappy. You cannot know what sorts of emotional or psychological agony others may go through that simply doesn't resonate within your limited life experience. Therefore you are not qualified to categorize their decisions or the process by which they reach those decisions, nor to pass such superficial judgment.

Sometimes suicide isn't about HOW BIG someone's petty problems may or may not be, nor is it about slamming other people with guilt trips. Sometimes it's just about stopping an excruciating and endless internal suffering. Sometimes it's simply about a lack of hope. If you can no longer convince yourself that tomorrow or the next day might be any less desolate than the last, then it might just be about pulling the plug and going to sleep rather than continuing to ache to the core of your soul. Pointlessly. Forever. Perhaps one can't judge what constitutes cowardice who isn't living in those shoes.

It seems pretty damned selfish to me for you or anyone else to demand that someone in unspeakable distress and misery should continue to suffer just to spare YOU the discomfort of attending a funeral. My money says you wouldn't go anyway, so what do you care?

Here's a fact: Depression and self-pity are not necessarily the same thing.

Last edited by Willard on 10 Dec 2009, 3:38 pm, edited 2 times in total.

I would think it's nearly impossible to determine whether there are fewer or more suicides among those with AS, since there are so many people who are undiagnosed.

Apologies for the harsh statement as it relates to how ive been raised. I can understand certain aspects of life's pains as so bad that ending the misery is the only option (mainly is the physiological contect), but Im also taking into accounts of people who commit suicide just because they were rejected/neglected, or had a bad breakup/divorce, etc. Hell, i had a relative who pretty much committed slow suicide because something he discovered was not publicized and instead put into someone else's name (died by not relieving his bladder). When a stock crashes, how many people do you think end their lives just because they dont want to be put out on the streets? That, to me, is stupid and selfish suicide because he/she doesnt want to even try and move on. When a person suffers from an incurable cancer and cannot hold out any longer, suicide is the only course. That is acceptable since it is a form of misery that will ONLY disappear when dead. Suicide for social reasons vs physiological reasons vs mental . . . any others im forgetting?

Sorry but I was replying to the poster above me.

That's weird that you think that OP. Considering how many threads in The Haven section read something along the lines of "cant live anymore" or "I'm going to kill myself" (and this is not to say I haven't or would end up doing my own suicide thread one day) you would think that maybe the suicide rate among aspies would be bigger and like one person said, the rate could be higher when you consider the number of people who are undiagnosed that have committed suicide.

Marshall, I dont think you're selfish or egocentric at all for having those feelings that you do and like you I get really bland lifeless responses from family and friends whenever I bring up the topic of suicide up. My dad threatens me not to talk about it and tries to sweep it under the rug (despite the fact that is own ego is contributing to my desire to kill myself). I think the thing that ought to matter is that you were feeling really awful and felt there was no way out when you considered it. It's not selfish or egocentric if the feeling of misery cannot be help. I've heard of very ridiculous reasons in the past that NTs have committed suicide over but then I am aspie and maybe I cant relate to their version of pain. Maybe that's why the topic of aspie suicide falls on death ears to NTs. They're just not getting why it's so miserable to be us or why it's so difficult for some of us to "find a reason to live".

My reason to live was I wanted a relationship and have kids. That was my reason for staying alive.
I lived on my own and had a job so that was something to be grateful for. But I hated where I lived and wanted out of there.
Then when I moved, I was depressed but my reason to stay alive was waiting for things to get better and getting settled in.
Then I lived with my aunt and uncle, I was looking for a job, my reason to stay alive.
Then I met my husband and I really liked him, another reason to stay alive.


I always thought positive. I didn't give up. I'm glad I am still alive.

I read that as well, it kind of figures.

I meet some people who get pretty heavy about suicide, and who say some of the things I've read here, about it being selfish, egocentric or whatever. I know that some people who get depressed can sometimes start feeling very bad, but can reason with themselves that suicide is not the thing to do.

But when someone starts actively thinking about suicide, or even decides to go through with it, it's because that ability to reason has gone. So, in my limited understanding, it's maybe not helpful to pummel that person with even more blows to their self-esteem. Why does someone get to a point where they genuinely believe that dying is better than living? To discredit mental torment and suffering as a possible reason for that is to deny the human experience. Mental suffering can be something much greater than physical suffering.

I've tried to kill myself. Two other members of my family have tried to kill themselves. Two of my friends succeeded in killing themselves, and I know of others. I'm glad I'm still alive. I'm glad it didn't work. But it does sting a little to be accused of cowardice. I was ill, very ill. What I really needed when I was feeling that bad was for someone to actually understand what I was going through, to support me and to help me feel like life was worth living somehow. Not to re-confirm my own opinion of myself that I was a complete loser.

I think I see where someone is coming from if they say that suicide is cowardly or selfish. But I don't agree with it. To me it's not a wise thing to do, but it's not a matter of cowardice or selfishness to be thinking about it - it's normally a response to incredible pain and desperation. People who are thinking about it, or who attempt it, need love not rejection.

That's just my opinion though, and everyone's entitled to one, especially the people I disagree with