How is it possible to drown yourself?

Question

Like that man, Owen did in Eastenders. Surely, a human's natural instinct is to fight for breath and swim to the surface?

Answer 1

Suicide by drowning is not impossible, although it is not the easiest method. Most of the people who do choose very deep water, and are very determined to succeed. If they can hold their breath long enough to pass out, the next thing that happens is that the body breathes automatically. The water coming in triggers a spasm and the windpipe is blocked to prevent water entering the lungs. Because there is no air coming in, and none left in the lungs sufficient to maintain life, and because people do not naturally float- they die. Although in the old cartoons they showed people pumping water out of somebody, suicides and accidental drowning victims seldom if ever contain much water at all. They suffocate- they don't breath in water. Any water a person vomits up after a near drowning incident is water from the stomach that was swallowed. There is no water in the lungs- that's a myth.
Remember, suicides are not thinking or reacting logically. It would be just as against human instinct not to shoot oneself as well- but people do it all the time. They also hang themselves, take overdoses, suck up car exhaust or other gas, and cut themselves. It's desperation, not logic.

Answer 2

How To Drown Yourself

Answer 3

You are right. Humans do fight to stay alive.

It is possible if the water is deep enough to drown without any instruments to keep you down.
You have to dive deep enough that you can't make it back in time to take a breath. Once you breath in air you start to panic and start gasping for air. Usually you will loose perception of direction also because of the lack of air in the brain by that point.
Personally, it sounds like a horrible way to die.

Answer 4

This Site Might Help You.

RE:
How is it possible to drown yourself?
Like that man, Owen did in Eastenders. Surely, a human's natural instinct is to fight for breath and swim to the surface?

Answer 5

Take a deep breath of water into your lungs. The rest is automatic.

Also, people who choose to drown themselves as a method of suicide usually don't know how to swim. So they drop themselves into the water at a point far from land and with the sufficient conditions, they will drown unless some orca or dolphin saves them.

Answer 6

I would think drowning would be one of the most difficult methods (logistically) to kill yourself, because as you said the natural reaction would be to try and survive. that being said, accidental accidents happen all the time so there are ways of doing it.

Immobilize yourself someway, consume a large amount of alcohol, swim out farther than you can swim back, weigh yourself down with something....

Answer 7

If you tie weights to your feet you'll more than likely drown before you can get free.

Answer 8

it is actually easier to die from near drowning than it is from actual drowning. Get some water in your lungs, and you can easily suffocate hours later, while on the surface.

Answer 9

My friend went and did it quickly. I am wondering how. Instead of going into a nursing home with a diagnosis of dementia.

Answer 10

yes, you would have to make it so you couldn't get out. like, you would have to swim into a deep lake or the ocean and swim down and keep swimming down until you ensured that you couldn't make it back to the surface in time. or...you would have to tie something heavy to your foot or something.