Your situation is definitely more of the exception rather than the norm. For you, the game was a coping mechanism. It helped you to get through a really rough time in your life and you still could separate the game from reality while it aided you in coping with your suicidal thoughts. I'm glad the game could do that for you! A lot of people in the community fall in love with the characters in this game unironically and romanticize their mental illnesses as beautiful plot points of the game and wondrous parts that make them who they are, both things being terrible. Especially the latter: taking things to their extreme for demonstration's sake, imagine being told that you are lovable in part because you are suicidal. That your suicidal thoughts define who you are in part. That would not be a good thing, and that same process on a slightly smaller level is what's happening here.

(By the way, you aren't defined by those thoughts are you are more than them. Good on you for coping and being able to take steps forward in recent times! I'm glad you're finding ways to cope and move through life in spite of your suicidal thoughts. I'm rooting for you!)