@windingdown ,
Not to be argumentative but it's always possible that things go wrong. Survival instinct will likely kick in if you're not sufficiently sedated. And THAT doesn not work for everyone.
Even so ... those abdominal issues (I already got those, and am not looking for aggrevation) any idea what causes that ? The nitrite poisoning ?
if sodium nitrate was so great wouldn't everyone be using it ? Also, look at Nitschke's perpective: (motsly elderly) people who are dying anyway, and are suffering horribly.
I take a somewhat different perspective. You've mentioned a few times about seeking help after you've taken something. I would never do that. Once I take it, it's done. I'm just not going to go seeking to be saved. So I will definitely die. For this reason, I'm not worried about the repurcussions of my survival instinct once I've taken SN.
And based on my research, time to unconsciousness is 5-20 minutes. I've had the stomach flu before. It hurt, but I lived. If SN does indeed cause pain, it will be over quickly. I can hang in there. But there's no evidence of definite pain, when taken at a high dose, in the time to unconsciousness. I really, really wish I could come back and share what it was like with you all after I take it. Unfortunately, it seems that anyone who takes SN (except one guy on here who asked for help) is no longer here to share their experience of it. (I take this also as a good sign.)
And I definitely don't presume SN is 'so great'. No suicide method is 'so great', unless there is a peaceful pill that just induces sleep. Nembutal comes close, but unless you take it through a clinic, you have to drink 2 cups (200 ml) veterinary Nembutal, which is very bitter, and which is also a hurdle for people. It would be for me. Based on my reading, SN seems to be the best option for me, out of a lot of frightening options. Part of the problem, though, is that because taking these things results in death, we don't have people here to tell us what it's like. Hopefully Exit International continues to collect data from its members based on observations of death with SN, and other methods they share about, so that people can make increasingly informed choices.
As someone else on here has said, if suicide were easy (I would say, not frightening), a lot more people would be dead.
I don't think Nitschke has meant to suggest that SN is mainly appropriate for those who are dying and suffering horribly, as if it is a horrible way to die, but preferable to the horrible suffering borne by some old people. If that were the case, he'd be recommending something like jumping or hemlock poisoning. The idea with SN, as I understand his message, is to find a peaceful way to die that is accessible to more people than Nembutal is.