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babybird
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21 Jul 2024, 7:05 am

How does the thought of dying alone make you feel

I mean ultimately I don't suppose it really matters but idk there's just something that makes me feel a bit uncomfortable when I think that there's every possible chance that I will die alone

It kind of makes me want to die in public like outside or something so at least there's someone (even a stranger) there to at least witness it


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DeepHour
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21 Jul 2024, 7:25 am

This thought has bothered me for quite a few years as well. I live on my own, have no family members in the area, and don't like having anyone else in the house anyway. What I really dread is not so much dying alone, as not being discovered for weeks or even months...need I go on? :skull: :eew:

I'm not bothered about the thought of being attended by people I don't know, eg hospital staff, in fact I'd prefer the impersonal and anonymous aspect of it - just as long as there'd be someone to deal with the loose ends. I've never understood this "He/she died surrounded by his (her) family' stuff. I wonder how often they're just making that up when someone's death is announced?


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Last edited by DeepHour on 21 Jul 2024, 7:38 am, edited 1 time in total.

BillyTree
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21 Jul 2024, 7:37 am

I think dying is a lonely experience regardless if you are surrounded by friends and family or not.


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21 Jul 2024, 7:52 am

I've grown to quite like the idea of keeling over when I'm out for a walk. Maybe just enough strength left to drag myself under a hedge or into a ditch. Then just quietly make my exit. Maybe a bird would drop by from time to time to see how I'm getting on. Maybe a deer or a rabbit might watch my passing from a distance they felt comfortable with.

I'd much rather die alone in the woods than surrounded by people in a hospital.


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babybird
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21 Jul 2024, 9:07 am

I'd be begging them to let me go if I was surrounded by people who claimed to know me

I think that's the point with me; people usually only like the version of me that they make up in their owns heads

I can live with that quite easily but I don't wanna die with it


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IsabellaLinton
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21 Jul 2024, 9:09 am

If I were to die alone, it means I'd be at home with the kids out.
My cats would eat me.

That's scarier than dying alone.


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21 Jul 2024, 12:30 pm

This topic is personal for me as my mom died in the ambulance on the way to the hospice. While not literally alone it was not what you read when famous people die “peacefully surrounded by family and friends”. We still feel guilty that she died in that impersonal situation.

If you are lucky you die peacefully but often it is a long agonizing process. While she did appreciate us and the aides around she felt bad we had to see the deterioration process and did get annoyed with all the attention at times. The thought has occurred to me that she “chose” to die there so we could not see it or because she did want to die in a hospice. oBut outside of planned suicides I have my doubts if people can choose when to die.

If my death is not a sudden one, while the attention will be sensory hell, no attention as I become increasingly become disabled will be agony.

I do not think I would want my loved ones to see it. But who knows how I will feel at the time if I am able to have emotions at that point.


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21 Jul 2024, 12:36 pm



babybird
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23 Jul 2024, 10:53 am

Aw :)


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Carbonhalo
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27 Jul 2024, 10:41 pm

babybird wrote:
How does the thought of dying alone make you feel

I mean ultimately I don't suppose it really matters but idk there's just something that makes me feel a bit uncomfortable when I think that there's every possible chance that I will die alone

It kind of makes me want to die in public like outside or something so at least there's someone (even a stranger) there to at least witness it


At the moment of death, we all die alone.
Sometimes I feel like I've spent my life trying to minimise how many people are at my funeral.
I can count my family on one hand and my friends on the other.

I don't advocate this for anyone, but I would rather self terminate than lose agency and end up in aged care surrounded by strangers.
My only concern with this plan is whoever finds me/first responder.
I don't want to traumatise them, but my available methods are either mechanical or explosive.
A captive bolt gun looks like my current preference unless some doctors decide my degenerative disease will result in my death within 6 months
After death?. I want to be eaten by meal worms and have my skeleton mounted (maybe they can replace my missing disk's and get me back to 6'6") or cremation and distribution by rocket over this farm (with my current biggest rocket tooling I would need to be divided between 6)
A passfire and a whistle mix salute and I can cover the whole property.



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23 Aug 2024, 4:55 am

I've been ruminating on this a little bit lately as well.
Its not the actual dying alone that bothers me, at the end everyone is more or less alone.

Its the long years of loneliness leading up to death, in old age, when the few people that I am close to now have passed away, am I just going to be whiling away time waiting for death, everyday alone, isolated?
Like a lot of autistic people I have very few close friends, even as a young person that's able to go out and do whatever they want the world is a lonely place, what is going to be like if I'm still the same way at 80, but now I can't drive to events, or go for walks or run?



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24 Aug 2024, 2:47 am

I worry about dying alone because I have pets who can't notify anyone that I passed away. They also can't feed themselves.



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24 Aug 2024, 3:00 am

babybird wrote:
How does the thought of dying alone make you feel

I mean ultimately I don't suppose it really matters but idk there's just something that makes me feel a bit uncomfortable when I think that there's every possible chance that I will die alone

It kind of makes me want to die in public like outside or something so at least there's someone (even a stranger) there to at least witness it


The thought of dying in general makes me uncomfortable alone or not, so I just try not to think too much about it. I'd rather think of the fact that there are probably tons of spiders in my house that I never see crawling around and catching and eating some of the more annoying insects.


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24 Aug 2024, 6:24 am

I suppose our survival instinct makes death a scary thought, and those of us who get some comfort from being among friends might feel a bit better for having them around. I've always felt I'd benefit from that, though I don't know how to make sure it happens.

To me, death is the worst thing about life. All that acquired wisdom gone forever in a second. Then there's the pain and loss of abilities leading up to death, which I guess is rather depressing on top of knowing you're dying. Even now, in fair health and with maybe 15 or more years left to live, I'm haunted by this feeling that there really isn't time to do much more. I don't know what the statistics say about how many people die painlessly. I hope when I die I won't know much about it.

It must be great to believe you'll wake up in a better place, but the evidence for that seems very weak, and I don't expect to wake up at all.



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24 Aug 2024, 7:07 am

I'd be happier dying alone than dying with anyone who would witness and tell whatever tragic tale.

I don't like it when someone gets upset if I ever die.
Dying itself, to me, is a very liberating prospect.

Even better if I outlive everyone I hold dear, with no one left but me.


Maybe the only way I'd be happier than dying alone is dying with someone who's also dying just as well; not to comfort me, but to comfort them; happier if that's the last thing I'd do before leaving this world...


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Benjamin the Donkey
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05 Sep 2024, 10:17 am

We all die alone.


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