I was talking with a friend about this recently and people have survived some of the worst atrocities that humankind can endure without choosing to end their lives early. One of the examples that we hit upon was the grisly images of the concentration camps during the Holocaust. People imprisoned, tortured, forced to watch loved ones killed, experimented on, and starved until their bodies were a husk of their former selves, yet the will to live and survive overcame the direst of conditions. We discussed other similar calamities that would seem to be a time when a human being might choose to end their life rather than continue to endure, yet most of them did not.
Then we looked at people like Kate Spade, Anthony Bourdain, and Robin Williams. They were not faced with the kind of impossible physical conditions described above, in fact, quite the opposite from all appearances. One might say that they had it all; fame, fortune, possessions, travel, etc. yet all three of them decided that death was better than living.
Mental illness and depression must certainly be a powerful force to contend with. Thank goodness I'm too stupid to be mental...lol!
"We're just two lost souls swimming in a fish bowl -- year after year..."