3 years ago I tried to kill myself using carbon monoxide and failed miserably. My life has been much worse ever since. Maybe by reading this you will avoid the same mistakes I made.
I prepared my room for the event by sealing all the gaps through which air could escape. I used a combination of wood, adhesive plastic, paper and tape on both the door and window.
I spent 30 hours awake before carrying out the deed. The plan was to set the charcoal, go to sleep and never wake up again. Everybody's dream.
The morning thereof, I burned 3 large cooking pans (≈10L each) of charcoal, but 1 of them failed. My room is 3m x 3m x 3m in size. The 2 cooking pans did not generate enough CO to kill me. That was my biggest mistake; not enough charcoal.
I started it around 8 AM. I was found by my family, weakened but very much alive, around 7 PM.
The memories of the event itself are hazy but I do remember a couple of things:
After being woken up I became the attraction of the street and every member of my family who lived nearby came to see me in my misery. I felt like a zoo animal and I hated everyone who was there.
Due to a respiratory problem, I often sleep on the left side of my body. I did the same this day too. As a consequence, I woke up with the entire left side swollen. My legs, my arms and my face.
2 hours later the ambulance arrived. Every time they touched me to move me to the stretcher/hospital bed my entire body hurt.
In the hospital, I was very high. I kept speaking in another language that I know, I cursed everyone who touched me and asked them to let me die. It must have been quite the sight to my mother.
With one of those hospital bottles, they put some liquid through my nose and kept asking me to swallow it. It was very unpleasant. They put tubes that went all the way down to my lungs that were very uncomfortable and hurt when I pulled one of them out. They put a thing inside my penis, all the way to my bladder, and pulled it out so that it bled and semen leaked. "To clear the pathways", or something. I think they said I suffered severe dehydration? I don't remember the details. There was also a needle in my arm and stuff in my blood.
I kept fading in and out of consciousness, saying a bunch of nonsense but getting gradually more sober each time.
After finally waking up after some 12 hours or so my body still hurt whenever and wherever touched. I sadly contemplated my failure and to my utter rage someone had already posted about it.
After being sent home, the left side of my body remained swollen and hurting for the next 3 days. The inflammation persisted for nearly a month and I could not sleep at night due to the constant pain. It was really unpleasant.
The aftermath:
I lost the movement of my biceps and my left arm was pretty much useless for 6 months. I also could not stretch the fingers of my hand. And the muscle in my leg responsible for turning the leg inwards also died.
The arm nerves healed mostly but the leg one did not. Consequently, I cannot do any form of exercise that causes impact to the joints (like running). Due to the atrophy of the muscle, one leg became shorter than the other and when I run all the impact is concentrated in one of the hips. It causes inflammation and leads to pain.
Not to mention the visual disfiguration of having one arm "emptier" than the other and an inclined torso because one of the legs is shorter.
In the end, I was really upset, sad and angry for having survived. How could I have been so stupid as to think that 2 pans of charcoal would suffice?
I do not mean to discourage you but I wouldn't recommend this method unless you have:
I prepared my room for the event by sealing all the gaps through which air could escape. I used a combination of wood, adhesive plastic, paper and tape on both the door and window.
I spent 30 hours awake before carrying out the deed. The plan was to set the charcoal, go to sleep and never wake up again. Everybody's dream.
The morning thereof, I burned 3 large cooking pans (≈10L each) of charcoal, but 1 of them failed. My room is 3m x 3m x 3m in size. The 2 cooking pans did not generate enough CO to kill me. That was my biggest mistake; not enough charcoal.
I started it around 8 AM. I was found by my family, weakened but very much alive, around 7 PM.
The memories of the event itself are hazy but I do remember a couple of things:
- I got up to turn on the fan because it was too hot. "The room is sealed, the air can't escape, it'll be fine." Probably another big mistake.
- Losing control of my bladder and urinating on the bed.
- Suffocating and thinking to myself "this is not pleasant, this is not pleasant, this is not pleasant".
- Hearing my mother call my name through the window and proceed to break open the door (I'd locked it).
- Repeated cries of "why did you do this my son?"
After being woken up I became the attraction of the street and every member of my family who lived nearby came to see me in my misery. I felt like a zoo animal and I hated everyone who was there.
Due to a respiratory problem, I often sleep on the left side of my body. I did the same this day too. As a consequence, I woke up with the entire left side swollen. My legs, my arms and my face.
2 hours later the ambulance arrived. Every time they touched me to move me to the stretcher/hospital bed my entire body hurt.
In the hospital, I was very high. I kept speaking in another language that I know, I cursed everyone who touched me and asked them to let me die. It must have been quite the sight to my mother.
With one of those hospital bottles, they put some liquid through my nose and kept asking me to swallow it. It was very unpleasant. They put tubes that went all the way down to my lungs that were very uncomfortable and hurt when I pulled one of them out. They put a thing inside my penis, all the way to my bladder, and pulled it out so that it bled and semen leaked. "To clear the pathways", or something. I think they said I suffered severe dehydration? I don't remember the details. There was also a needle in my arm and stuff in my blood.
I kept fading in and out of consciousness, saying a bunch of nonsense but getting gradually more sober each time.
After finally waking up after some 12 hours or so my body still hurt whenever and wherever touched. I sadly contemplated my failure and to my utter rage someone had already posted about it.
After being sent home, the left side of my body remained swollen and hurting for the next 3 days. The inflammation persisted for nearly a month and I could not sleep at night due to the constant pain. It was really unpleasant.
The aftermath:
- Scars in my head where hair no longer grows (no idea how it happened but it looks hideous). Confidence dropped to negative.
- Nerve damage.
I lost the movement of my biceps and my left arm was pretty much useless for 6 months. I also could not stretch the fingers of my hand. And the muscle in my leg responsible for turning the leg inwards also died.
The arm nerves healed mostly but the leg one did not. Consequently, I cannot do any form of exercise that causes impact to the joints (like running). Due to the atrophy of the muscle, one leg became shorter than the other and when I run all the impact is concentrated in one of the hips. It causes inflammation and leads to pain.
Not to mention the visual disfiguration of having one arm "emptier" than the other and an inclined torso because one of the legs is shorter.
In the end, I was really upset, sad and angry for having survived. How could I have been so stupid as to think that 2 pans of charcoal would suffice?
I do not mean to discourage you but I wouldn't recommend this method unless you have:
- enough budget to buy a lot of charcoal
- a room that can be completely sealed
- enough time to not be found
- a way to knock yourself out to not experience any of the process (maybe some strong medicine)
