The candid post explores the factors that contribute to someone being more likely to commit suicide, including how no longer fearing death can make a person more likely to end their life.

Overcoming the fear of death might seem like a monumental feat, but what happens when a lack of fear leads to a higher likelihood of dying? Death is an inevitable stage in life, but that doesn’t leave its uncertainty any less frightening. While the fear of dying could paralyze living, a healthy dose of apprehension might not be the worst thing. People who start to not fear death might be more likely to end their lives. However, this isn’t the only trait that can heighten the likelihood of an individual attempting to end their life.

While investigating chronic pain, I discovered several articles that examined the correlation between chronic suffering and suicide. Naturally one of the reasons why people who experience daily debilitating pain would want to end their lives is because they want to escape the physical agony of their condition. Suicide, therefore, seems like the less bleak solution when faced with a lifetime of apparent suffering. However, it is not the escape alone that motivates the act. Some chronic pain sufferers are more likely to end their lives or attempt to do so because they no longer fear death after experiencing so much agony while still alive.

In this sense, fearing death isn’t necessarily a negative thing. A healthy dose of fear is more likely to keep individuals rooted in their lives since they don’t want to face the uncertainty of what comes after death. On the other end of the spectrum, fearing death can be negative when done to the extreme. For example, people who are apprehensive to leave their homes due to the unknown risks of living ironically waste their years only to meet the same ultimate fate. However, those who are free of fear might be more likely to engage in risky practices that could prematurely end their lives. Therefore, it appears that a careful dose of fear is the best solution for staying grounded in life.

While the absence of fear of death and the presence of grating physical pain can wear down one’s will to live, these aren’t the only factors that cause chronic pain suffers to be at a seemingly higher risk for both suicide attempts and suicide completions. Chronic pain is often tied to psychological ailments. While doctors debate which condition is more likely to lead to the other, it’s rather difficult to keep one’s morale high when one is dealing with daily physical suffering. Many people underestimate the grueling impact on the psyche that constant physical pain can have. Ultimately, however, it appears that a lack of fear of death is the leading factor that causes chronic pain sufferers to end their own lives.

Chronic pain is an ever more powerful and crushing phenomenon than some people might expect, as it can overpower the fear of dying, something that is innate to mankind. Chronic pain has such a powerful and profound effect on the brain that it can essentially snuff out this fear and make the looming unknown seem like a welcome reprieve from one’s current condition. That’s why chronic pain sufferers need to seek support systems and develop skills for coping with their pain. However, as a fellow chronic pain sufferer, I understand that these words can sound futile when faced with an endless stretch of painful days looming ahead of you full of expected agony.

Often when I consider the meaning of life and whether life is worth living in face of enormous pain, I recall what Albert Camus said in the opening of my favorite essay, “The Myth Of Sisyphus”. Judging whether life is or is not worth living amounts to answering the fundamental question of philosophy. Always I am drawn to the same conclusion, even if I spell it out with clenched teeth. We must continue to roll our boulders and live for the moments of realization in which we can see the truth of things and accept them without the futile and feverish desire to sway the course that is laid out for us.

In conclusion, death doesn’t have to be feared to give oneself a reason to go on living.

Continued Reading: This Is Why You Should Not Die