Many people who attempt suicide do so impulsively. Extremely impulsively.
One study of people who attempted suicide found that 48% thought of suicide for fewer than 10 minutes before making the suicide attempt.
The haste with which many people die by suicide is staggering. Had they waited a little longer, then the intense impulse to act on suicidal thoughts might have passed.
This brings me to the 3-day rule. I’ve heard about this rule anecdotally and read about it here and there on blogs and other websites. One writer summed it up quite well in a post that is no longer online:
“For me I have a 3 day rule. With most big decisions that will affect my life, I give myself 3 days. If I still think it is the best choice for me after 3 days, then I go with it. Yes even with suicide…
“If even for one moment you feel a smidge of joy or like life is actually worth living, you have to start the 3 days again. Again time many times brings clarity.”
The author, Ali McCollum, also states, “Spoiler… death by my own hand has yet to feel like the right choice for 3 straight days.”
Keep On Keeping On
The old adage “one day at a time” holds true here. With suicidal thoughts, however, the mantra may be “one hour at a time,” or “one minute at a time.”
Even “one moment at a time” can be difficult.
If you hold off for three days, chances are you will not feel 100% intent on dying that entire time. And maybe you will even feel hope, or pleasure, or some other reason to live.
If your suicidal thoughts are so intense that even waiting 3 days seems impossible, please get help immediately. Call 911 (or, if you are outside the U.S., whatever the emergency number is in your country). Or go to an emergency room. Or call someone who will help you stay safe.
Really? Suicidal Thoughts Stop After 3 Days?
Keep in mind that I’m not talking about all suicidal thoughts. It would be foolish to say that suicidal thoughts tend to pass in 3 days. Some people think of suicide for weeks and months, even years.
What I am referring to is the profound intent to act on suicidal thoughts. If someone is on the verge of suicide, those 3 days can mean the difference between life and death.
Suicidal thoughts might persist, but the impulse to act on them can change many times over three days.
To quote the late psychologist Edwin Shneidman, one of the pioneers in suicidology:
“The acute suicidal crisis (or period of high and dangerous lethality) is an interval of relatively short duration – to be counted, typically, in hours or days, not usually in months or years. An individual is at a peak of self-destructiveness for a brief time and is either helped, cools off, or is dead.”
Naturally, my hope is that you are helped or cool off.
What If 3 Days Go By and You Still Want to Die by Suicide?
Time does not heal all wounds, especially not quickly. The 3-day rule aside, I do not mean to imply that you should end your life if you still feel acutely suicidal after three days.
In some ways, 3 days is a long time. A lot can happen. Feelings can change. Perspective can change.
Getting a good night’s sleep during those 3 days, or talking with a friend or suicide hotline, or simply surfing the waves of moods, can weaken the suicidal impulse.
In other ways, 3 days is hardly a blip on the radar screen of an entire life. If after 3 days you still are intent on dying, please get help.
Reach out to others, whether someone you know or a stranger at hotline or online. For a list of places where you can get help anonymously, you can start here.
What Comes Next with Suicidal Thoughts?
Even if you follow the 3-day rule and no longer feel adamantly that suicide is your only option, the suicidal thoughts might still persist or revisit.
Ultimately, to survive suicide’s assault, more is needed than waiting.
You might need to uncover reasons for living. Tapping into hope and rediscovering pleasure can also help.
More than anything, talking back to suicidal thoughts and learning to cope with them can fortify you in your fight against suicidal forces.
A Good Starting Place to Cope with Suicidal Thoughts
The 3-day rule is a good place to start. Not only can it save your life, it can also show you with amazing clarity that suicidal thoughts can waver in their intensity.
Those 3 days can demonstrate that at least the strength of suicidal thoughts, if not suicidal thoughts themselves, can be temporary.
Suicidal thoughts can change, as can you, your mood, and your life.
© 2014 Stacey Freedenthal, PhD, LCSW, All Rights Reserved. Written for Speaking of Suicide.
I was going to kill myself. It was just a matter of waiting until Friday for my paycheck to arrive so I could buy the gun. When Friday rolled around, I no longer felt like killing myself. Funny how life works
Living one day at a time (/3 days) works, yes, but it’s no kind of life worth living. It’s been my reality for too long. I have social anxiety and I can’t walk down the street and look a stranger in the eyes, and of course I’ve never had a relationship due to this. Never travelled, began a career, published a kind of creative output, or anything. I haven’t felt joy in a few years.
I hope the other poor souls who read the article can find peace in this life
[This comment was edited to follow the Comments Policy. – SF]
I’m just a kid (11) and my mom freaked out when she got a call from the school, maybe they saw me cutting my hand all bloody, or maybe they watched me rub my skin off with a plastic spork. Anyway, she sent me to a therapist and that made it SO much worse. I’ve been crying myself to sleep every night. I told my friends but they now see it as a thing of the past. I often think nobody cares, Kill yourself, I DARE you. (that’s what I say to myself.) Can someone please just, just tell me everything is gonna be ok?
Random 6th grader,
I’m so sorry you’re hurting badly. Please talk to somebody about how you’re feeling, especially about your mind telling you to kill yourself. That’s not only painful, but also dangerous. Tell them, too, how you’re sad and crying all the time. You need help, and if this therapist isn’t a good fit for you, somebody else is. It sounds like your mom really cares and is trying, so she’d probably want to know both how much you’re hurting and how your mind is telling you to kill yourself. You can call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 988 or use the Crisis Textline at 741741 (just text “Help,” but there might be a wait). But also, please tell an adult in your day to day life, if not your mom, then another family member, a teacher, a school counselor, or anyone else you know and trust.
I do think everything will be OK, but the hard part is you don’t know when. And waiting for that day to come is hard. Just know, it will come. In the meantime, can you tell your mom about the therapy or are you worried she’ll freak out? It’s ironic, because yesterday somebody posted a comment that their mother won’t take them seriously and get them therapy. It’s all relative, right? Many people freak out or don’t take it seriously enough, and then some are able to find that sweet spot of calm concern. Like I said, your mom seems like she really wants to help you and get you help, so maybe show her this exchange here.
Fore you, these articles also might be helpful:
Talking Back to Suicidal Thoughts
Coping Statements for Suicidal Thoughts
Are You Thinking of Killing Yourself?
I hope you’re able to feel some relief and hope soon. This must be a scary time. You said you’re “just a kid,” but the pain you’re feeling is hard for anybody, of any age. Please stay, and wait, and find out what your life holds for you.
I don’t know what you mean about ‘everything going to be OK’ exactly, however, I can say there are things that you can learn to do which helps to get through it (without killing yourself) – that it is possible to eventually not cry yourself to sleep every night. Others have had this and have made it alive and happy.
Often people with suicidal thoughts don’t really want to kill themselves- they just have trouble coping with what life is at this moment. I feel the trick to this is change the balance and find more coping skills.
One of those things is learning mindfulness. Mindfulness helps one control one’s thinking but learning how to let go of thoughts ‘when thoughts become thinking’. I personally believe suicidal thoughts are con-artists and thieves. They make you think that you have control and only let you see that one path forward. Umm…. and choose a different saying. That thought can come into your head but then just choose to go with something else- something positive.
I believe in talking to others and seeking help. The reason I believe it is that when one is stuck in those thoughts, well, it can be like a ‘bug in a cup’. Think of it like an ant running around the bottom of a coffee mug. It is doing the same thing again and again, seeing the same stuff. If someone else comes along and tilts the mug on the side then the ant can run out. Others can help change perspective. (This came from a guy- a suicidologist, Paul Quinnett- in a book which talked about this https://qprinstitute.com/pdfs/Forever_Decision.pdf)
I do believe people- including kids, teens, adults- can learn skills of emotional regulation which can help. One can also learn self-compassion is way, way better than self-judgment. https://self-compassion.org/self-compassion-test/
Alot of people have these ways of thinking called ‘cognitive distortions’. It is screwed up thinking. One can learn to recognize and find ways to combat them. (https://childmind.org/article/how-to-change-negative-thinking-patterns/ )
I know- there is a lot there. I give you that because there are many ways to learn how to cope better which can make the outlook much better. When the outlook is better, life tends to be better.
Hello, I don’t know if it gets better. But like others have said you learn how to cope better. I personally have used a lot of TIPP techniques. You can find out more here – https://dialecticalbehaviortherapy.com/distress-tolerance/tipp/
Sometimes the skills we learn to help us cope dont always work. Sometimes some work better than others, and sometimes for certain situations some work better. This includes therapy / therapists. I am so sorry it has been worse for you since starting therapy. I hope if you are open to it you find someone who can be your partner in healing.
Always remember you know yourself best, no one else is an expert on who you are inside and out. So trust that, trust that you can work on these skills, and read resources to help you manage these lows. Life may not feel beautiful right now, but it is. Your life is something beautiful. I hope you will share that with the world like you have here.
I was in a similar space when I was your age. I didnt think I would live to see 18. Now I am 28 years old and I’m training to help kids like you. It gets better. I am sending you so much love, and so much light. You are stronger than you feel.
Random 6th Grader I hug your heart and share those words you deserve and desire to hear “Everything Is Gonna Be Ok” It has been months since you requested to be soothed. I pray your mind has joined with more peace since writing your comment in January and I Bless Your Life’s Daily Walk With Strength To Keep Taking Daily Steps to Move Away From Self Hurt of Past. I don’t dare you to do so, I agree with you to do these steps and live, Love Ma Anderson
This breaks my heart. My thoughts and prayers are with you. Eleven year old’s should never have these deep dark thoughts. I am so sorry~
So how come I’ve been convicted for asking for help? And nearly killed
And there’s no media interest in this
The emptiness is so vast that you can never fill it ,everything I throw into disappears into the abyss I lay here on my bed lost,confused,lonely and heartbroken to millions of pieces how the love of my life can just walk away from a marriage of 26 year and 10years of our relationship before that ,I know nothing else ,too old for anything else and it just seems to me that I have no purpose in life anymore, I have failed and I’m so so tired
I wanted to reach out to you and let you know that I can sympathize and empathize with your situation and your feelings. After 20 years of marriage, I found out in the same year, that my mother had Alzheimer’s, my husband had been cheating on me, and that he was trying to sue me for half of my mother’s estate (she wasn’t even dead yet!!). This was six years ago; I navigated figuring out memory care placement for Mom all alone (I’m an “only”), and threw myself into online dating after filing for divorce. I wound up getting arrested for being a drunken mess after catching a boyfriend out with another woman, I quit my good job out of despair. I curbed my crazy dating because I think I was just trying to have some fun which really did not help me in the long run. I needed to heal. My mother died three years ago, and now my Dad’s health is failing. He is alone and only has hired help which is a lot of drama to navigate. I also feel like “throwing in the towel” and giving up ….often!! I am also his only child…so here I go again with the role-reversal and parenting the parent who really was a crappy parent in the first place. But, I regained my professional license, put my resume out there, and have interviews set up for the next few weeks. My son is my main reason for living; he’s 21 and a wonderful, smart, caring, and handsome man. I’m so proud that I helped create him. Do you have children and/or other family members such as siblings, cousins, aunts/uncles? Reach out to them and connect. I know it’s tough and a struggle to even make the effort, yet it has helped me. All I have is a few cousins, one aunt/uncle, and then another 3rd cousin. I have gone 3-4 days wearing the same clothes and not leaving my house for nearly a week. I know what depression and despair feel like. I also volunteer and have met a few nice people that way; it helps to think outside of myself and think about others who are less fortunate than me. Tomorrow I have promised myself to put up a few more pieces of art on my walls, take my five mile walk/trot around the neighborhood, and continue listening to my audio book. I have a few pieces of furniture in mind that I’d like to purchase. I’m depressed about travel restrictions over the last few years, but I’ll keep looking. Maybe I’ll get one of the jobs from the interviews. Your family and friends love you and care…and I care. I have tried out a few churches in my area; nothing really “stuck”, but that doesn’t mean I won’t keep trying. I have an appointment for some botox and filler on friday for a “freshen up”…it’s a luxury I can afford, and I deserve it. Perhaps you can make a hair appointment and get your nails done? You deserve it. I also bought myself a few nice pieces of jewelry and some nice watches. Just for me; not to show off or impress anyone but myself. Again, i care about you and there are many others you know that care. This too shall pass; I promise. To Hell with the husband who walked out; you most likely would have wound up having to nurse him in his old age; let someone else do that!