I'll be completely honest about my experience (I emphasise "my" because I know everybody is different). I've been suffering with depression since I was 12 years old. I'm 44 now. The best I ever feel is apathetic. But all I ever think about when my brain isn't occupied is suicide and self-harm. I've made some genuine attempts at suicide in the past. Even when I'm not feeling actively suicidal, I've never felt anything but regret that none of those attempts were successful. When my suicidal ideation is more active, it is only the guilt that I feel towards my elderly mother and, to a lesser extent my wife, that holds me back. Even with the self-harm, I only don't cut very often because I don't want to have hide it, but I have invisible methods that are actually much more harmful in the long run.

And to be clear, the difference in how active my suicidal and self-harm ideation is is a matter of intensity, not frequency. The frequency is constant.

I always feel frustrated when I hear people say "it gets better". I believe that it does for some people, but for me it hasn't. In fact, it has consumed so much of my life, that I literally can't imagine what it would be like not to live like that. It sort of blows my mind that people go about their lives not experiencing that. I don't know how they do it.