When is a suicide attempt a cry for help, and when is it a cry for attention? We may never know for sure, but one thing is certain: attempting suicide can make people dead tired, especially for a 50 year-old woman in the city of Zhongshan, Nandu reports.

Emergency services arrived at 10:40pm in the Antang neighborhood of Dayong District to see a woman threatening to jump off a second-story roof. Visibly agitated, the woman continually cried out but rejected any offers of help by emergency responders.

Firefighters were not able to approach the woman since the area was too dark to safely mount a rescue; turning on more lights was simply out of the question. As such, they decided not to take any further action. Instead, firefighters set up an air mattress below as personnel took shifts to watch over the woman should anything occur. It didn’t.

Instead, they found the suicidal woman had settled for dreamland over heaven and had fallen asleep on the roof. When firefighters approached the woman in the early morning hours and inadvertently woke her up, the woman got up and renewed her previous threats of suicide with fresh vigor now that she had gotten a good night’s rest.

Perhaps realizing that living on the roof is rent-free, a neighbor intervened. At 10am on April 15, a full 12 hours after the incident started, the neighbor successfully negotiated with the woman to come down from the roof.

It turns out the woman was upset because her personal ID and cash had been stolen and that she had been beaten up by someone. That being said, it’s still not clear what demands she was making while threatening to end her own life.

Photos: Nandu