Should a suicide letter always try to be comforting to family that reads it?

[Rose57]

I am pretty sure I'm gonna finally CTB soon. I am in so much physical pain after being injured 7 years ago. The entire seven years my family insisted my concussion symptoms were psychosomatic and not real. They blamed me for my health issues and said I was weak and a huge burden to them in my sick health. My mom repeatedly tells me that my health issues make her life hell hence why I feel so desperate to CTB. I even asked if she felt I made her life hell in front of my sister's boyfriend recently and she confirmed that she still felt that way about me. I feel I'd actually be doing her a favor by killing myself. She only loves me when I'm healthy.

When my dad got life threatening heart surgery and was in the hospital for three weeks she would search for me in the house just to torment me. She'd tell me to admit my pain wasn't real and I was faking it. I would refuse to say that about myself and she would grow angrier. She ended up kicking me out of the house and told my family I was a selfish, lazy brat who deserved it. This is despite the fact that I had just graduated from college and finished traveling abroad. I was so ambitious. I wanted to continue my education and get a Phd or start a non-profit. So I definitely don't feel I'm lazy. That was the one time my Dad actually defended me and the effort almost killed him because of his deteriorating heart valve. My mom told him she wanted a divorce when he stuck up for me even though he was on the brink of dying and needed to just relax and heal.

My Dad doesn't want to upset my mom because he knows she will divorce him if he chooses my side. So he always tells me I don't need any treatments for my injuries and that I can choose to get better through will power. He'll defend my mom if she yells at me. When I have a setback, he'll yell at me even though my disability is noise and light sensitivity. So it's like they are sticking a finger in a bullet hole wound on purpose.

My sister refuses to help me in any way when I need help doing normal everyday things like texting friends when my vision is bad. None of my family members will text for me when I have setbacks with my vision so I've been often trapped at home with no communication with any of my friends for months. They made me feel so helpless, trapped and isolated when it would only take five minutes a day to send a few texts. My sister treats me like I'm worthless and is mad if I even ask how she is. When my health gets a little better and I can go out places, I'd ask if she wanted to go to the beach or museum for fun but she would always refuse. Then she would tell me I just use her for favors and nothing more when the reality is that I have always tried to foster friendship between us but she is not interested in me being in her life. She has always been jealous of me because I got good grades and praise while she almost failed most of her classes and was grounded when we were growing up. She also resents me because she felt my Dad loved me more since I am his biological daughter. She's not a friendly person to most others as well. She made me her maid of honor at her wedding because she doesn't have any close friends. I say this to try to soothe my pain by pointing out to myself that I'm not the only one she is unpleasant to.

If I had a family that believed in me and supported me in sickness, I would not commit suicide this easily. I would fight hard for life and always feel I had some place safe and loving to be.

But do I express this to them in a suicide note? Or do I just say that I couldn't handle the pain and that I needed to find peace in death? And that I love them and wish for them to not be sad or worried about me and to always live life to the fullest?

My gut tells me it would be best to either leave a loving note or nothing at all. But I also feel the need for them to understand my pain and the reasons behind my suicide. Is there a way to do both?

 

[x~Sophia~x]

I'm sorry your mother is so evil to you and refuses to acknowledge your physical pain. I feel that even if a professional medic was to explain to her that your pain is very real, she would still refuse to acknowledge it and help you.
Is there a chance you could move out and perhaps house share with friends, it's so sad that you feel the only way out is to ctb, you've worked so hard with your studies and it's likely you will have a fabulous future ahead of you. It is so unfair that your parents are treating you so badly and it sounds very likely that your mother has a serious mental illness.
As far as leaving any kind of letter for them, I wouldn't bother, they don't deserve any explanation from you, they deserve to be consumed by guilt for the rest of their lives... but I doubt they will.

 

[WeepingWillow]

Wow you are way kinder than I am. If I had to suffer with that lot I'd tell them to consume a bag of dicks followed by drawing my best rendition of an extended middle finger. For what it's worth I do hope that you can find some relief and get away from all the negativity that surrounds you. Best wishes Rose.

 

[Rose57]

I'm sorry your mother is so evil to you and refuses to acknowledge your physical pain. I feel that even if a professional medic was to explain to her that your pain is very real, she would still refuse to acknowledge it and help you.
Is there a chance you could move out and perhaps house share with friends, it's so sad that you feel the only way out is to ctb, you've worked so hard with your studies and it's likely you will have a fabulous future ahead of you. It is so unfair that your parents are treating you so badly and it sounds very likely that your mother has a serious mental illness.
As far as leaving any kind of letter for them, I wouldn't bother, they don't deserve any explanation from you, they deserve to be consumed by guilt for the rest of their lives... but I doubt they will.

I would live with friends but all except one of them is single, lives alone and has no kids. She said she does not want to live with me because she would have to listen to music and the tv with ear buds or headphones. She prefers listening with regular speakers. Thank you for your kind words.

 

[Symbiote]

I say leave them clueless and guessing with no closure. They don't deserve it because they have tormented you for most of your life. Realistically, they'll feel sad for a bit, but sadness turns to anger again when they think you're lazy for taking the easy way out of life.

 

[Neowise]

My gut tells me it would be best to either leave a loving note or nothing at all. But I also feel the need for them to understand my pain and the reasons behind my suicide. Is there a way to do both?

My way to write a suicide note would not be exactly loving. I'd just calmly explain my motivations without trying to comfort the readers nor pointing fingers and them to make them feel guilty. I don't know if I would make my mother feel guilty in her note since she is the one that brought me here, I'm not an evil person. But all in all I think I would try to stay mostly neutral.

So I think writing a letter that explains your pain and reaons without making people feel guilty is possible. A suicide note to family and friends does not always have to be comforting, however. It is your / our choice which style we use for writing our last words.
The actual question is: what do you want your family to feel for the rest of their lives? I think that is a question only you can truly answer.

 

[Rose57]

Thank you so much for all your suggestions. What if I explain how much their full support would have meant to me? And ask that they help others with brain injuries and and noise induced hyperacusis after I'm gone to make it up to me? I really don't want them to feel guilty the rest of their lives but I do wish they would have helped more.

 

[Gromit-CTB]

If you are going to leave a note you could as you say "pay forward" to others that suffer, might be something good to come from situation and could also help family deal with everything.

 

[the-exit-plan]

Thank you so much for all your suggestions. What if I explain how much their full support would have meant to me? And ask that they help others with brain injuries and and noise induced hyperacusis after I'm gone to make it up to me? I really don't want them to feel guilty the rest of their lives but I do wish they would have helped more.

i like this idea.

it is sad they don't seem to care for you how i believe a family should.

maybe a 'do for others what you couldn't/didn't do for me' thing is the way to go.

but, for me, i would say that the pain of the way you have to live is unbearable and that is why you chose to go and if they choose to take that statement personally, then that is their conscience telling them how they treated you was wrong.

i hope it all goes well.

 

[demuic]

Thank you so much for all your suggestions. What if I explain how much their full support would have meant to me? And ask that they help others with brain injuries and and noise induced hyperacusis after I'm gone to make it up to me? I really don't want them to feel guilty the rest of their lives but I do wish they would have helped more.

I'm confused, your family doesn't sound like very caring people, I'm not sure anything you say would really effect them, or that they would care about random others with the same condition when they couldn't even care about their own family member. But you know them best. Do you think they're good and care about you deep down?

I'm very sorry you are treated so cruelly while you're in pain.

 

[GoodPersonEffed]

Your parents sound so much like mine.

My mother was the abuser, my father was the enabler. Anyone who didn't go along with her interpretation of things suffered. My father rarely stood up for me, he was not a protector. When I finally demanded accountability for the abuse, I was discarded from the family.

Whenever I was sick or injured, my mother would go on the attack, and she would interpret my responses according to her version of things. When I broke my wrist, I was being oversensitive and dramatic. When my back seized up and my parents had to take me to the pharmacy, my mother started verbally abusing me in the parking lot for I don't even remember what, and I had to tell her to back off, remind her that I was in a lot of pain, which pissed her off but she shut up. She is not empathetic or nurturing. If I brought up the past physical abuse, my father would snap that it wasn't that bad and to just get over it, which I suspect is how he dealt with the extreme abuse growing up that he has only vaguely alluded to. Any time he is asked to step up, including by my mother for certain things, he will snap, "What do you want me to do about it?" Usually followed by something like, "There's nothing more I/we can do" or "You're making me less of a man." If someone actually does step up to protect or to self-protect, then he gets very angry at them. I think they both have PTSD and were gaslighted growing up, I don't think they know how to function in reality, and whoever refuses to function in the false narrative and chooses reality gets punished.

Even the look on my face my mother would interpret as having a different meaning, totally different intentions than what I felt, and she would get angry and verbally attack me, threaten violence. Just super controlling and not at all aware of reality nor willing to listen to any other perspective than her own. It's like both my parents have filters that warp anything I do or say if it's not in agreement with their false reality. It's crazy-making.

I spent decades trying to figure out some way to get through to them, especially to my mother. Maybe if this happened to me, she would finally understand or care for me, maybe if I said something this way, she would finally understand. Nope. Even if she occasionally got it, she would revert back to her patterns rather than use it to adjust going forward.

I wanted to soothe my parents about my suicide, but it came from a deep and unmerited sense of responsibility for taking care of their feelings. But no matter what I write, no matter how I explain it, they will perceive it as something I'm doing to them, that I am wrong, not normal, irrational, oversensitive, etc. -- basically, pure projection.

I was the scapegoat. I was the blame for all problems in the family, in their marriage, for any emotions or discomfort they felt. Occasionally other people would try to compassionately and rationally intervene, and my parents would remove me from that person and tell me that they weren't going to change, I was. Well, neither of us did.

Based on my own experience and what you've written, I don't think a letter will make any difference. If your mother were to read it and have a light bulb moment that you really had been suffering, she would not be able to manage the cognitive dissonance that she was wrong, and she would come up with a different interpretation that makes you wrong, unaware, too lazy to try to live, dramatic, etc. If your father were to read it and accept reality, your mother would take it as a rejection of her, and there is a longstanding agreement between your parents that his emotional needs are met as long as he cedes control to her. In the end, my father even ceded his most valued virtue of honesty to my mother -- when she discarded me with his support, she eventually posted a photo of her and I together as her Facebook profile picture and was speaking for me in the comments as if we were still in touch. That means they had a false public narrative, and there's no way she could have pulled it off without him also lying, and there was nothing more he hated than a liar. But to stand up to her would have meant losing her, because she always set it up as either-or's -- it's either her or me, you do what I say or get out, it's my way or the highway.

In spite of being shunned and all the craziness afterward, I've struggled with the rationality of not writing to them, and the internal push to soothe them and tell them it's not their fault, which is true. But wtf? They've betrayed me in most of the ways possible. They need to fucking soothe themselves. Whatever suffering they experience, it will be in an utterly different narrative than reality, and I can't control that.

However, you are still in contact with your parents, and I empathize with your dilemma. The only thing I can think to recommend to you is the BIFF method for (mostly) written communications with high conflict people. It's a very short book, but it basically says that a communication with a high conflict person should be about five or six sentences at most, and the communication should be Brief, Informative, Friendly, and Firm. Here's an example:

Dear parents,

I have been suffering whiplash and hyperacusis since the theme park ride seven years ago. I sought every means available to recover and have not found any support or relief. I am no longer able to bear the symptoms, and so I chose to end them. I care very much that you will experience grief, but unfortunately I could no longer prioritize that over my own suffering. I wish for your happiness and well-being, and hope only the best for you.

With love,

Rose57

Notice there's a difference between explaining the reasons versus trying to explain your self, which will never get through and just reinforces their sense of entitlement and power over you.

Sending lots of compassion and comforting hugs if you want them. Sending support for sanity, too.

 

[Weary Soul]

I very much relate to your illness and the way your family does nothing to help, if not make it worse.

A few weeks ago, I thought that I would be as kind as I could when I wrote my letter. I did not want to potentially leave a legacy of pain in my wake.

But.

I changed my mind.

The person who permanently damaged me (caused a brain bleed from assault - my ex) is dangerous. So now, I am planning to write out everything he did.

Not so much cause I want revenge, but because he is dangerous to society in general.

I doubt they will believe me anyway, cause he is a liar like nothing I have ever seen before, but IMO, hopefully someone gets it and is not injured like I was.

Otherwise, it is simply going to state what I want done with the little I have left.

<3

 

[nothungryanymore]

My gut tells me it would be best to either leave a loving note or nothing at all. But I also feel the need for them to understand my pain and the reasons behind my suicide. Is there a way to do both?

Your gut is telling you what you know is best, while your head is reasoning with it. The situation you've been put through sounds awful, and you deserve more love and support, and also, as well as you think you know your family, there may be other factors at play motivating their behavior - whether in their head, past traumas, issues with family dynamics, etc. - that have nothing to do with you. This isn't said to defend them, only to explain that the way they treat you doesn't mean they don't love and care about you. I know because I am the sister of someone who ctb'd, and while I fully support and trust the choice my brother made, I know I could've been a better sister. I wasn't there for him when he needed me and I brushed off a lot of what he told me because at the time it was too difficult for me to handle, emotionally. I know he thought I didn't care about him, but I did. I loved my brother so much, and I still do and always will. His suicide e-mail to me made no mention of how I behaved, though. Not how I wasn't there for him, or how I treated him. Only that he "hoped he'd been a good brother", and even if he was lying he said "you've been a good sister". It was all love, and he explained the pain he had been in - but he didn't further explain what the pain was from or who or what caused it. The e-mail he sent to our dad, with whom he also had a strained relationship with, was almost identical to mine, while the one to our mom was much more loving. I understood the reasons for this without him needing to explain it.

It's unfortunate, but my brother's death - his absence - and his beautiful letter, is what made me fully comprehend my shortcomings as a sister. Had it been a vengeful, mean e-mail, I would have likely been traumatized and possibly even hated him. I think the pain it would've caused would've been irreparable and likely would've caused our entire family to be done in, bringing him down with the ship so to speak. Instead, we've all worked hard to see how we failed him, and though it can't help him now, it's made us more sympathetic and softer people, in general.

I think if you are strong and firm in your decision to ctb for yourself and your own reasons, that's all you need to say.

A final thought: your last letter will forever be a reflection on you, not the people around you no matter what information you provide. Your words will be the last thing many will think about, and is a huge part of your legacy. How do you want to be remembered?

 

[Rose57]

Your gut is telling you what you know is best, while your head is reasoning with it. The situation you've been put through sounds awful, and you deserve more love and support, and also, as well as you think you know your family, there may be other factors at play motivating their behavior - whether in their head, past traumas, issues with family dynamics, etc. - that have nothing to do with you. This isn't said to defend them, only to explain that the way they treat you doesn't mean they don't love and care about you. I know because I am the sister of someone who ctb'd, and while I fully support and trust the choice my brother made, I know I could've been a better sister. I wasn't there for him when he needed me and I brushed off a lot of what he told me because at the time it was too difficult for me to handle, emotionally. I know he thought I didn't care about him, but I did. I loved my brother so much, and I still do and always will. His suicide e-mail to me made no mention of how I behaved, though. Not how I wasn't there for him, or how I treated him. Only that he "hoped he'd been a good brother", and even if he was lying he said "you've been a good sister". It was all love, and he explained the pain he had been in - but he didn't further explain what the pain was from or who or what caused it. The e-mail he sent to our dad, with whom he also had a strained relationship with, was almost identical to mine, while the one to our mom was much more loving. I understood the reasons for this without him needing to explain it.

It's unfortunate, but my brother's death - his absence - and his beautiful letter, is what made me fully comprehend my shortcomings as a sister. Had it been a vengeful, mean e-mail, I would have likely been traumatized and possibly even hated him. I think the pain it would've caused would've been irreparable and likely would've caused our entire family to be done in, bringing him down with the ship so to speak. Instead, we've all worked hard to see how we failed him, and though it can't help him now, it's made us more sympathetic and softer people, in general.

I think if you are strong and firm in your decision to ctb for yourself and your own reasons, that's all you need to say.

A final thought: your last letter will forever be a reflection on you, not the people around you no matter what information you provide. Your words will be the last thing many will think about, and is a huge part of your legacy. How do you want to be remembered?

Wow, thank you for these insights. Yes, I know deep down they love me and losing me will be the hardest thing that ever happens to them. So I don't want to rub salt in their wounds. A few days ago my dad took me to the neurologist and guided me into the building so I could keep my eyes closed against the bright sun. He didn't complain at all and was very understanding.

My parents will bring me takeout, help me with laundry, etc so they are not all bad. Just the things I mentioned above really hurt. And the last time I had a setback my mom wouldn't. text me and would yell at me but when I could talk again was very loving so I'm not sure why she acts the ways she does sometimes.

It totally makes sense that a sweet loving letter from your brother actually made you see your own faults. I'm so sorry for your loss. Thank you for telling me your story.

I very much relate to your illness and the way your family does nothing to help, if not make it worse.

A few weeks ago, I thought that I would be as kind as I could when I wrote my letter. I did not want to potentially leave a legacy of pain in my wake.

But.

I changed my mind.

The person who permanently damaged me (caused a brain bleed from assault - my ex) is dangerous. So now, I am planning to write out everything he did.

Not so much cause I want revenge, but because he is dangerous to society in general.

I doubt they will believe me anyway, cause he is a liar like nothing I have ever seen before, but IMO, hopefully someone gets it and is not injured like I was.

Otherwise, it is simply going to state what I want done with the little I have left.

<3

I'm so sorry to hear you were injured by him. He definitely doesn't deserve to be comforted in your final letter. I wish we could all heal from our injuries and live normal lives

Your parents sound so much like mine.

My mother was the abuser, my father was the enabler. Anyone who didn't go along with her interpretation of things suffered. My father rarely stood up for me, he was not a protector. When I finally demanded accountability for the abuse, I was discarded from the family.

Whenever I was sick or injured, my mother would go on the attack, and she would interpret my responses according to her version of things. When I broke my wrist, I was being oversensitive and dramatic. When my back seized up and my parents had to take me to the pharmacy, my mother started verbally abusing me in the parking lot for I don't even remember what, and I had to tell her to back off, remind her that I was in a lot of pain, which pissed her off but she shut up. She is not empathetic or nurturing. If I brought up the past physical abuse, my father would snap that it wasn't that bad and to just get over it, which I suspect is how he dealt with the extreme abuse growing up that he has only vaguely alluded to. Any time he is asked to step up, including by my mother for certain things, he will snap, "What do you want me to do about it?" Usually followed by something like, "There's nothing more I/we can do" or "You're making me less of a man." If someone actually does step up to protect or to self-protect, then he gets very angry at them. I think they both have PTSD and were gaslighted growing up, I don't think they know how to function in reality, and whoever refuses to function in the false narrative and chooses reality gets punished.

Even the look on my face my mother would interpret as having a different meaning, totally different intentions than what I felt, and she would get angry and verbally attack me, threaten violence. Just super controlling and not at all aware of reality nor willing to listen to any other perspective than her own. It's like both my parents have filters that warp anything I do or say if it's not in agreement with their false reality. It's crazy-making.

I spent decades trying to figure out some way to get through to them, especially to my mother. Maybe if this happened to me, she would finally understand or care for me, maybe if I said something this way, she would finally understand. Nope. Even if she occasionally got it, she would revert back to her patterns rather than use it to adjust going forward.

I wanted to soothe my parents about my suicide, but it came from a deep and unmerited sense of responsibility for taking care of their feelings. But no matter what I write, no matter how I explain it, they will perceive it as something I'm doing to them, that I am wrong, not normal, irrational, oversensitive, etc. -- basically, pure projection.

I was the scapegoat. I was the blame for all problems in the family, in their marriage, for any emotions or discomfort they felt. Occasionally other people would try to compassionately and rationally intervene, and my parents would remove me from that person and tell me that they weren't going to change, I was. Well, neither of us did.

Based on my own experience and what you've written, I don't think a letter will make any difference. If your mother were to read it and have a light bulb moment that you really had been suffering, she would not be able to manage the cognitive dissonance that she was wrong, and she would come up with a different interpretation that makes you wrong, unaware, too lazy to try to live, dramatic, etc. If your father were to read it and accept reality, your mother would take it as a rejection of her, and there is a longstanding agreement between your parents that his emotional needs are met as long as he cedes control to her. In the end, my father even ceded his most valued virtue of honesty to my mother -- when she discarded me with his support, she eventually posted a photo of her and I together as her Facebook profile picture and was speaking for me in the comments as if we were still in touch. That means they had a false public narrative, and there's no way she could have pulled it off without him also lying, and there was nothing more he hated than a liar. But to stand up to her would have meant losing her, because she always set it up as either-or's -- it's either her or me, you do what I say or get out, it's my way or the highway.

In spite of being shunned and all the craziness afterward, I've struggled with the rationality of not writing to them, and the internal push to soothe them and tell them it's not their fault, which is true. But wtf? They've betrayed me in most of the ways possible. They need to fucking soothe themselves. Whatever suffering they experience, it will be in an utterly different narrative than reality, and I can't control that.

However, you are still in contact with your parents, and I empathize with your dilemma. The only thing I can think to recommend to you is the BIFF method for (mostly) written communications with high conflict people. It's a very short book, but it basically says that a communication with a high conflict person should be about five or six sentences at most, and the communication should be Brief, Informative, Friendly, and Firm. Here's an example:

Dear parents,

I have been suffering whiplash and hyperacusis since the theme park ride seven years ago. I sought every means available to recover and have not found any support or relief. I am no longer able to bear the symptoms, and so I chose to end them. I care very much that you will experience grief, but unfortunately I could no longer prioritize that over my own suffering. I wish for your happiness and well-being, and hope only the best for you.

With love,

Rose57

Notice there's a difference between explaining the reasons versus trying to explain your self, which will never get through and just reinforces their sense of entitlement and power over you.

Sending lots of compassion and comforting hugs if you want them. Sending support for sanity, too.

It saddens me that so many people seem to have difficult family. It truly makes life so much more difficult. I wish I could take away your pain. Thank you for the tips on how to write a short letter to them. I will keep that all in mind.
.

 

[Quiet Desperation]

I am pretty sure I'm gonna finally CTB soon. I am in so much physical pain after being injured 7 years ago. The entire seven years my family insisted my concussion symptoms were psychosomatic and not real. They blamed me for my health issues and said I was weak and a huge burden to them in my sick health. My mom repeatedly tells me that my health issues make her life hell hence why I feel so desperate to CTB. I even asked if she felt I made her life hell in front of my sister's boyfriend recently and she confirmed that she still felt that way about me. I feel I'd actually be doing her a favor by killing myself. She only loves me when I'm healthy.

When my dad got life threatening heart surgery and was in the hospital for three weeks she would search for me in the house just to torment me. She'd tell me to admit my pain wasn't real and I was faking it. I would refuse to say that about myself and she would grow angrier. She ended up kicking me out of the house and told my family I was a selfish, lazy brat who deserved it. This is despite the fact that I had just graduated from college and finished traveling abroad. I was so ambitious. I wanted to continue my education and get a Phd or start a non-profit. So I definitely don't feel I'm lazy. That was the one time my Dad actually defended me and the effort almost killed him because of his deteriorating heart valve. My mom told him she wanted a divorce when he stuck up for me even though he was on the brink of dying and needed to just relax and heal.

My Dad doesn't want to upset my mom because he knows she will divorce him if he chooses my side. So he always tells me I don't need any treatments for my injuries and that I can choose to get better through will power. He'll defend my mom if she yells at me. When I have a setback, he'll yell at me even though my disability is noise and light sensitivity. So it's like they are sticking a finger in a bullet hole wound on purpose.

My sister refuses to help me in any way when I need help doing normal everyday things like texting friends when my vision is bad. None of my family members will text for me when I have setbacks with my vision so I've been often trapped at home with no communication with any of my friends for months. They made me feel so helpless, trapped and isolated when it would only take five minutes a day to send a few texts. My sister treats me like I'm worthless and is mad if I even ask how she is. When my health gets a little better and I can go out places, I'd ask if she wanted to go to the beach or museum for fun but she would always refuse. Then she would tell me I just use her for favors and nothing more when the reality is that I have always tried to foster friendship between us but she is not interested in me being in her life. She has always been jealous of me because I got good grades and praise while she almost failed most of her classes and was grounded when we were growing up. She also resents me because she felt my Dad loved me more since I am his biological daughter. She's not a friendly person to most others as well. She made me her maid of honor at her wedding because she doesn't have any close friends. I say this to try to soothe my pain by pointing out to myself that I'm not the only one she is unpleasant to.

If I had a family that believed in me and supported me in sickness, I would not commit suicide this easily. I would fight hard for life and always feel I had some place safe and loving to be.

But do I express this to them in a suicide note? Or do I just say that I couldn't handle the pain and that I needed to find peace in death? And that I love them and wish for them to not be sad or worried about me and to always live life to the fullest?

My gut tells me it would be best to either leave a loving note or nothing at all. But I also feel the need for them to understand my pain and the reasons behind my suicide. Is there a way to do both?

Really sorry to hear about all the stress and unpleasantness that you have to tolerate just to keep going, on top of your injury. That must be very difficult.

As to the note, I can provide the perspective of someone who has written and delivered a note then backed out due to SI (poor planning, I know). No matter what you write or how kind you are, and regardless of how awfully they have treated you it will hit them like a ton of bricks. I called up my family after to tell them I was okay and they couldn't stop crying hysterically. As in I couldn't calm them down or get a word in edgewise.

The note I sent them was provided to the authorities and then later used against me as proof that I should be committed. Having seen your post in the partners thread I know you are local to me, and I can also tell you that you don't want to be committed here. Like most psych holds I've heard described, it was actively harmful to my mental health and the trauma bond with my fellow inmates was more helpful than was the staff.

Ultimately, the decision of whether or not to leave a note or what to say in it are all very personal decisions and I won't try to influence you one way or another. You should do what you feel is right for you. What I will suggest is that you not follow my example, so that the note would be found or delivered only if you are certain to be gone. I found that part much more difficult to experience than all the planning and actual execution.