Is it just me? Climbers Checking Out

Suicide rates have risen in recent years, increasing 21 percent from 2000 to 2012 for Americans at least 16 years of age
The CDC report is perhaps the largest U.S. study to compare suicide rates among occupations. But it is not comprehensive. It only covers 17 states, looking at about 12,300 of the more than 40,000 suicide deaths reported in the entire nation in 2012.

Does anybody else think the numbers are higher amongst longtime climbers?

Can’t think of one significant chess player who has taken their own life.

On January 17, 2008, he died at age 64 from renal failure at the Landspítali Hospital (National University Hospital of Iceland) in Reykjavík. He originally had a urinary tract blockage but refused surgery or medication.

but I'm personally not prepared to linger in some state of declining and diminished quality of life

Physician-assisted suicide is now legal in six states plus Washington, D.C. Fortunately, the public is coming to realize that we need to have some choices about our quality of life and that living in terrible physical pain with no plausible end in sight makes life no longer worth living.

Not to minimize the greed of drug companies and the doctors who get kick-backs for prescribing un-needed addictive drugs to their “patients,” but how much of our “opioid crisis” could be considered “physician-assisted suicide?”

Is there something about climbing and the total dedication to it and that lifestyle, that depresses many climbers, when they later attempt to grapple with other realities in life?

Could you crank a boulder problem in the sky, 500 feet off the deck, with no rope? Ever practiced the idea, rehearsed those moves in your mind? Did you start to get used to the idea?

Is the thought of the cold barrel of a pistol in your mouth really so different? Don’t climbers practice abberant thoughts?

Does anybody else think the numbers are higher amongst longtime climbers?

I often wondered how Dad felt about the end of his life, if sometimes when laying in that bed he may have pondered the choices he made and options he'd had. For him, sticking it out and pulling from himself that "just another few feet" as he did on the El Cap solo was likely the only route which didn't compromise HIS Truths.

His words above - and his choice in how he died - indicate the depth of his consideration, as well as empathy for other choices...

“There are very clear connections between work stress and depression, as well as other psychological symptoms,” psychiatrist Dr. Igor Galynker at Mount Sinai Beth Israel told Moneyish.

He explained that while small doses of acute stress (working toward occasional deadlines, or giving a big presentation) can cue your fight-or-flight response in a good way to boost performance, chronic stress (journalists on constant deadline, or police officers in the line of fire daily) is linked to depression, heart disease, high blood pressure and type II diabetes.

Other workplace traps that can trigger depression include:

-Feeling like you have no control. You have no say in making any decision or changing the work culture, and you don’t feel comfortable talking to your manager or employer about it.

-Job insecurity. You could be fired or laid off at any time, or fret getting axed if you address workplace issues.

-Irregular work hours and poor sleep. You can’t rely on a consistent schedule, and you’re not getting enough rest to recharge.

-Work-life interference. You’re texting and emailing with your employer outside of work hours, and you’re struggling to maintain family relationships, or care for children or sick parents.

-Workplace discrimination or harassment. Hostile work environments and threatening interactions with coworkers and superiors are associated with higher risks of depression.

-Values that don’t align. You legit abhor where you work or who you are working for, or you’re doing something you have zero interest in.

The association between sensation seeking and suicide attempts was moderated by substance use problems."

Roberts defines the character traits common in the fraudulent climbers but then goes on to point out that the truly successful climbers have exactly the same traits.

The drive that makes them successful is the same that motivates the fraud.

tippy toeing on the edge

The greatest lesson I've been trying to learn is to not define happiness by what I do, but to try cultivate that happiness in how I am and think. That is, it is all in my damn head, not out there in the elements.

...even driving my tractor is rewarding.

the continuous drain on our mind-body resources of the existential angst of the uncertainty of our precarious existence