Whereas some people struggle with not being able to see the wrongs in their actions, I struggle to see the rights in my actions. I somehow am not able to believe that I am right in any slight situation.
It is my fault because I constantly pinpoint the fault in my stars.
The core issue I struggle with is self-hate and self-blame. I tend to internalise the pain and blame myself to cope with stressful situations that occur. For me, I believe if I take the blame for what happened, then it’s easier to move on with the stressful and painful situation. It’s a form of selfless yet also selfish sacrifice, where on one hand, I hold the blame towards myself and on the other hand, I start to blame myself a bit too much to the point where my resentment towards myself grows.
It’s a constant vicious cycle.
The more I blame myself, the more I convince myself I am wrong in every situation, the more my hatred towards myself grows, and the more I harm myself.
In other words, someone can stab my back with a knife and I would apologise for their actions, take the knife from my back and stab myself more. With the traumatic events that happened to me, I blame myself for these things, hating myself more, hurting myself more…
For sure, I blame myself because I want to avoid interpersonal conflict. It is easier to take the blame and say I am at fault when a conflict arises to lessen the conflict. But at the end of the day, I am hurting myself more by doing so.
While it is good to take accountability for one’s own actions, no one can be at fault for everything. There is a bigger picture, a bigger perspective, to it all. Human relationships occur in a complex web of opinions, emotions and feelings that are not always factual. It is always important to look at events that occur from an outsider’s perspective — the bigger perspective — to avoid bias.
A bit about a week ago, on 10 September 2025, I tried to take my life once again after a series of unfortunate, stressful events that occurred. Before this, I was experiencing a month-long heavy depressive episode with psychotic symptoms of auditory hallucinations and delusions. In a state of psychosis, I blanked out during my suicide attempt, and my memory fails me in remembering the events that occurred during and the following days after. I remember bits and pieces, such as waking up in the psych ward, but for the most part, what was mostly said and done is not within my memory.
I was yelled at after my suicide attempt by someone I care a lot about. They said the following:
‘Do you not think about us? Do you even care about us? You know suicide is selfish, right? You always say you hear voices, but how dare you listen to the voices more than us? Do you care about fictional voices more than us? Do the voices matter to you more than us? If the voices tell you to do things, then don’t listen to the voices.‘
‘Do you not think about us? Do you even care about us?’
I think and I care too much about other people, such as what they say about me, what they think about me, that it is the reason for my own downfall. I don’t just think about everyone else, I overthink too much, and it ends up with me forgetting about myself and blaming and hating myself.
‘You know suicide is selfish, right?’
One can think of suicide as a selfish act, yes, because that person doesn’t understand how complex suicide and suicide attempts can be.
Is it fair to also consider that a person can be in so much pain to the point of feeling trapped and desperation in their pain, that they cannot find other ways to deal with it but by doing the ‘selfish’ act?
I am not justifying suicide or suicidal behaviour; I am merely trying to make one understand the perspective of someone who is suicidal. It is not easy for anyone, and it is not a matter of selfishness. If you think it is hard for someone to deal with someone who is suicidal, imagine the amount of pain that the suicidal person is going through. Imagine how much pain someone has to go through to have to find ways to end their life; it is not just an easy ‘selfish’ decision.
And is it fair to say I’m being selfish when I was not even aware I was attempting suicide? Truth stands, I was in a state of psychosis, where the hallucinations and delusions, but also my emotions, were severely heightened, the mental pain I was feeling was seeping through my physical body, to the point where I completely blanked out, did things my body and mind could not control, to the point where I could not remember the events that occurred during and after. Yet, I’m selfish?
‘You always say you hear voices, but how dare you listen to the voices more than us? Do you care about fictional voices more than us? Do the voices matter to you more than us? If the voices tell you to do things, then don’t listen to the voices.’
I know how it feels to be constantly misunderstood and judged for simply going through problems you cannot control. Therefore, I have made it my life mission to be compassionate and caring to everyone. I think having compassion and a greater understanding of one’s struggles is an important aspect of the human experience. I spend too much time caring about others, giving compassion to people who sometimes don’t deserve my compassion, and I try my best to understand everyone.
I cannot lie, what I go through is intense for me, but also for others as well. The constant unpredictable swings from hypomania to depression, the psychosis, the intense emotions. They are not easy for others to watch me go through, but I simply ask others to understand that it is also not easy for me, who is actually going through them. However, I care too much about how others feel and what they think of me; therefore, I tend to push aside these problems and downplay my problems to the point where I believe I have no problems myself. Due to this, my problems tend to boil over more than they should have.
You always say you hear voices, but how dare you listen to the voices more than us? I suffer from auditory hallucinations pretty much daily. If it is true that I were to listen to the voices more than anyone else, I would have been in a far worse situation than I am in right now.
Complex, but that is the matter of truth. However, I refuse to blame myself anymore for these things that happen. When I am in a stressful situation, these voices get more intense, and I tend to hear them on repeat, the same gruesome voices, loud and screaming at me. It is to the point I cannot distinguish between what is real or not, oh! As if that is not what psychosis is about, not being able to distinguish between reality and fake.
It is complex and not easy for me; it is difficult for everyone. I apologise for this complexity being that is me, but these are things that I am working on every day. I do my best every day to show up, to do better than yesterday. I am compassionate towards others’ struggles, yet when I am struggling, there is a lack of compassion towards my issues.
I have always blamed myself for the pain others caused me; it is not fair to me to be blamed for doing something out of my control, such as the suicide attempt.
I have always been told growing up that I am too emotional, too messy, too chaotic, too impulsive, too caring, too compassionate, too much this, too much that. I am always too much, yet I am never enough, and I will never be enough for anyone, as a matter of fact. What others think of me is not my problem anymore. It is out of my control, as I cannot control how others perceive me.
I cared too much about people that I let people walk over me, hurt and degrade me. It has gotten to the point where I forget about myself and hurt myself more in the process.
I am boiling with anger. I am not okay with this, at least not anymore.