Part of escaping that hell, however, was dying to self and thinking of others. Not the "It's a Wonderful Life" realization of how much you've meant to folks (I was a stand-offish selfish jerk myself, hardly the stuff of the self-sacrificing Jimmy Stewart). Rather, it's a real appreciation for how much you yet can do to beat the clock and how awful it would be to continue making others suffer.
So, my experience was more or less like that of Scrooge and realizing I wasn't dead already after all ... that there still was time to make the rounds and gift others as best I could after the example of Christ.
I believe modern therapy (and medication) mostly keeps folks comfortably numb and perpetually focused on finding someone or something to blame and/or some means to rationalize or feel "okay" about one's plight as a way of maintenance of the problems they're "dealing with". But, absent a recognition of one's own obligations (and sometimes culpability through lack of self will or other failure), there's really no hope of substantively changing the equation because the person never actually takes control of their own life ... particularly the life of their mind (or soul).
I think history shows that those in control of same are able always to endure the unspeakable in oppression, hardship, torture and alienation that drive others to despair, insanity or suicide. It's true that history is a vale of tears. Better to place your hope in the enduring and true.
My finally letting go of the suicidal bent was rooted in nothing but the realization that was one bit of pain I could spare my folks ... having put them through the wringer for years. It was a start.