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Suicide Prevention
Aug. 13th, 2014 10:27 amLot of talk out there about suicide right now, thanks to Robin Williams. I'm horribly sad that such a bright, amazing, and by most accounts kind & generous person died this way. That he felt there was no way out but to opt out of living, after having given SO MUCH to so many people. I am grateful it's started a conversation about mental health, depression, & suicide.
But WOW, for the first time in my life, I think I understand why some people use the term "armchair activist" in a pejorative way. I have always been favorably inclined to the very young, very vocal people shouting about their particular pet issue on Tumblr & Twitter. If nothing else, they're raising awareness, & many of them are not only doing that. Many of them are involved in wider movements to address the issue they feel strongly about. I've used the phrase "Tumblr Aunt" to describe my fondness for all the social justice warriors raising awareness of so many important issues, & I'm grateful to them for doing it.
Please understand as you read the rest of this: this was written by someone who knows & understands what it's like to prevent a suicide, but not someone who has ever had suicidal thoughts. I cannot speak to that, & would not take the mic from those who have been in that dark place.
But right now I feel like an old lady out on the porch wanting to yell at these kids to get off my lawn. I have to wonder how many people retweeting the suicide hotlines & saying "You're loved & needed in this world" have truly participated in suicide prevention? Do they understand what it takes to actually prevent a deeply, chronically depressed person from killing themselves?
I do. You see, I understand on a visceral level what it's like to prevent a suicide. I have done it several times that I'm aware of, and I KNOW there are times I've done it when I wasn't aware. I have also dealt with the aftermath of suicide attempts in my career as a critical care nurse.
What it takes to prevent a suicide isn't a hotline or a pithy captioned photo on Facebook or a blanket reassurance on Twitter that this person loves all 3,000 followers on their Twitter list & doesn't want them to die. What it takes is a deep, continuous relationship with a suicidal person, and that's one hell of a lot less comfortable than the previous options. A suicide hotline is a tourniquet. It stops the hemorrhage in the short term & it may prevent that suicide from happening TONIGHT. A person who is depressed & has become suicidal, though, rarely stops at once. They're going to go there again. Many times, depending on life situations, mental health maintenance access, and other influences. Preventing suicide requires an ongoing commitment from you as the person dedicated to preventing it.
I'm almost not sure suicide can be decreased in a general, mass population way. There are many diseases that CAN be decreased just through awareness of risk factors, such as we've seen happen with lung cancer. Unlike lung cancer, however, suicide is not caused by the same thing in every person. The triggers are incredibly personal, and the situations are extremely specific to each person at risk for suicide. Unlike many diseases faced by public health advocates, I'm convinced suicide prevention has to happen on a very personal, one-on-one way. It has to be about the day-to-day presence of a reassuring, supportive person or group of people who affirm the worth of the suicidal person.
Edited to add: It's been pointed out to me that a lot of folks may assume I'm lumping online relationships in with the blanket RTs & captioned photos. That's absolutely not the case. If you're the kind of friend who lives across the country & carries on a long-distance friendship with someone via technology (many of my friends & I call it "living in each others' pockets), that's a relationship. I'm not discounting that because you're not sharing the same air as someone. I'm also not not knocking actual conversations that start with the blanket tweets & witty pictures.
There are many things we need to do to ensure better mental & emotional health care in this society. We have to erase the stigma of emotional & mental disorders. We have to ensure access to mental health care providers to EVERYONE. And to really prevent suicide, we have to BE the networks & relationships for those people with depression & other mental health disorders.
But WOW, for the first time in my life, I think I understand why some people use the term "armchair activist" in a pejorative way. I have always been favorably inclined to the very young, very vocal people shouting about their particular pet issue on Tumblr & Twitter. If nothing else, they're raising awareness, & many of them are not only doing that. Many of them are involved in wider movements to address the issue they feel strongly about. I've used the phrase "Tumblr Aunt" to describe my fondness for all the social justice warriors raising awareness of so many important issues, & I'm grateful to them for doing it.
Please understand as you read the rest of this: this was written by someone who knows & understands what it's like to prevent a suicide, but not someone who has ever had suicidal thoughts. I cannot speak to that, & would not take the mic from those who have been in that dark place.
But right now I feel like an old lady out on the porch wanting to yell at these kids to get off my lawn. I have to wonder how many people retweeting the suicide hotlines & saying "You're loved & needed in this world" have truly participated in suicide prevention? Do they understand what it takes to actually prevent a deeply, chronically depressed person from killing themselves?
I do. You see, I understand on a visceral level what it's like to prevent a suicide. I have done it several times that I'm aware of, and I KNOW there are times I've done it when I wasn't aware. I have also dealt with the aftermath of suicide attempts in my career as a critical care nurse.
What it takes to prevent a suicide isn't a hotline or a pithy captioned photo on Facebook or a blanket reassurance on Twitter that this person loves all 3,000 followers on their Twitter list & doesn't want them to die. What it takes is a deep, continuous relationship with a suicidal person, and that's one hell of a lot less comfortable than the previous options. A suicide hotline is a tourniquet. It stops the hemorrhage in the short term & it may prevent that suicide from happening TONIGHT. A person who is depressed & has become suicidal, though, rarely stops at once. They're going to go there again. Many times, depending on life situations, mental health maintenance access, and other influences. Preventing suicide requires an ongoing commitment from you as the person dedicated to preventing it.
I'm almost not sure suicide can be decreased in a general, mass population way. There are many diseases that CAN be decreased just through awareness of risk factors, such as we've seen happen with lung cancer. Unlike lung cancer, however, suicide is not caused by the same thing in every person. The triggers are incredibly personal, and the situations are extremely specific to each person at risk for suicide. Unlike many diseases faced by public health advocates, I'm convinced suicide prevention has to happen on a very personal, one-on-one way. It has to be about the day-to-day presence of a reassuring, supportive person or group of people who affirm the worth of the suicidal person.
Edited to add: It's been pointed out to me that a lot of folks may assume I'm lumping online relationships in with the blanket RTs & captioned photos. That's absolutely not the case. If you're the kind of friend who lives across the country & carries on a long-distance friendship with someone via technology (many of my friends & I call it "living in each others' pockets), that's a relationship. I'm not discounting that because you're not sharing the same air as someone. I'm also not not knocking actual conversations that start with the blanket tweets & witty pictures.
There are many things we need to do to ensure better mental & emotional health care in this society. We have to erase the stigma of emotional & mental disorders. We have to ensure access to mental health care providers to EVERYONE. And to really prevent suicide, we have to BE the networks & relationships for those people with depression & other mental health disorders.
