My Favorite Suicidal Jokes
- Jesse Lawrence
- 6 days ago
- 5 min read
I’m open about the fact that I was seriously depressed when my chronic illness set in. Twisted humor eased my worst thoughts when I thought I’d die a slow, painful death, ruining the lives of those around me. Suicidal humor did the trick when I considered ending things.
If you’re suffering from depression, I won’t bother with platitudes that you’ve heard and read too many times. It sucks, full stop.
I cut suicidal jokes from my novel DAY AFTER INFINITY because beta readers thought it was too much. They didn’t believe anyone would want or need that kind of humor. At the time, I couldn’t talk about my depression with anyone, so they thought I was just being cruel. Also, I knew that friends, family, and eventually my kids might read it, and I didn’t want them to see that side of me. So, I removed those jokes.
Sharing my evil thoughts helped.
My jokes expanded past suicide to all the worst parts of humanity, which is what I thought I was. Maybe I'll write about my experiences with them someday.
So, hold on to your razor blades. This post is about to get seriously dark, like after they turn off the incinerator.
MY FAVORITE JOKE
Rather than
This is my absolute favorite suicide joke. I owe a great deal to whoever came up with it. It nailed my funny bone at exactly the right time. This is the tamest version of the ones running around out there.
A grandma was walking along a bridge late at night when she spotted a guy standing on the railing, shaking as he looked down at the water so far below.
She said, “Hey, mister. You don’t want to jump.”
“Yes, I do,” he said.
“Hear me out, son. What happens if you survive? You might end up paralyzed, on a breather for the rest of your miserable life. There are a million better ways to die.”
“I guess you’re right,” he said.
She pulled the gun out of her purse and shot him dead. “There you go. Problem solved.”
Murder/suicide jokes put things in context.
ONE LINERS
It's always good to have a quick joke to cheer yourself up when you need a quick jolt of humor.
Why did the chicken cross the road? To get to the suicide.
My wife asked, “What’s better than staying up late and talking all night?” I answered, “Suicide.”
Why didn't my wife attend my funeral? She wasn't a mourning person.
One suicide bomber to another: "Dude, I hope we have a blast tonight."
I woke up from a coma, so my wife changed out of her black clothes and, irritated, remarked, “I really cannot count on you for anything, can I?”
A kid decided to burn himself alive. His dad watched with tears in his eyes. He put his arm around the mom and said, “That’s arson.”
When I die, I want to die like my grandfather, peacefully in my sleep, not screaming like all the passengers in my car.
Why do men commit murder suicide? Because suicide murder just doesn't work.
My grandfather said, “Your generation relies too much on the latest technology.” So he unplugged my life support.
He died of natural causes. One naturally bleeds out after slitting their wrists.
These jokes proved I wasn’t alone.
WHY THEY HELPED
Humor is the best medicine for the mind. Laughing releases dopamine, which makes you feel good.
When I contemplated suicide, I needed jokes that met me where I was. I couldn’t step into the shoes of a happy person. If I could have, I would have. Depraved jokes lightened a gravity of those thoughts.
Seeing a glimmer of happiness in the sickest humor gave hope that I could laugh at another twisted joke in a minute, in an hour, or tomorrow. It might’a been a weak hope, but it was there when I couldn’t see any other rewards in life.
I needed evil thoughts.
WRITING
I wrote some of the F’ed up humor I found into my books. I wrote a mind that relished in poking at a the character with every reason to be depressed. The process of tapping dark jokes into my keyboard gave me a chance to work through my feelings and trap them in a story. It gave me a way to share my feelings without talking to people directly, which I wasn’t prepared to do. As I’ve mentioned, writing is the cheapest form of therapy. By infusing humor that most people consider despicable in my fiction, I found a way to create characters I empathized with.
Why be a suicide bomber to get 72 virgins when you can live next to an elementary school?
MISCONCEPTION
Plenty of people will tell you that joking about suicide is a cry for help. It might be in most cases. I don't know. All I can tell you they were a sign of improvement for me. While my therapist, for whom I am eternally grateful, worked with me on certain aspects of my depression, I used every tool I could to keep from drowning. Suicidal jokes and other dark humor were the tools I needed to heal.
Studies have shown the benefit of suicide humor.
REVISIONS
As I revised DAY AFTER INFINITY and gathered input from readers, I softened the edges. Like I’ve written elsewhere, I write for myself, then revise and edit to share with others. Most happy people couldn’t relate to the extremes of my thoughts. They felt that nobody could be as twisted as that voice in my head that told me to hurt myself. It crushed those who could.
Pushing too far meant fewer people would read my words. It would only appeal to those who loved dark humor and misery porn, not a broader audience who I felt needed to hear the characters and their journey.
The extreme jokes distracted my early readers from the transformation I was trying to manifest for myself. It was as much a story about the relentless asshat in the main character’s head as it was about the main character himself. The allegory to my process of handling that despicable beast to create a whole human was more important to me than the individual jokes.
Removing them came with a side benefit. Wiping the worst of the worst from the manuscript felt like pulling out those pieces of me. It probably sounds corny, but it was what it was.
What's the difference between a me and a pizza? A pizza doesn't scream in the oven.
TAKE HOME
If you can’t see the humor in suicide jokes, you already committed suicide.
Pick up your next spam call and ask, “Is this the suicide line? Thank god. I was considering becoming a telemarketer.”
Dark humor is like food, not everyone gets it.
Me: "I just can’t anymore. I want to kill myself but I don’t have enough money to go to Japan to die in that forest." Teacher: "Do you accept donations?"
Knock, knock, Who's there? Me? Me who? Exactly.
Why weren’t there more than two handles on my casket? Have you ever seen more than two handles on a trash can?
What was the difference between my wedding and my funeral? At least you don’t have to see me again after the funeral.
As always, I appreciate your support of indie authors. In the name of putting myself out there, here are a few of my works.
