World Suicide Prevention Day is Today
Love each other right now. That's an order
The trigger warning here would be in the title, but just to triple check, I talk about suicide here.
Once when I was in college I wanted to die so badly that I stood on Lisbon Street in Lewiston, Maine and tried to decide which car to jump in front of.
A small car? A truck? A solo occupant? Two people inside? Definitely not one with a family.
I couldn’t decide.
There were lots of reasons I felt that way at the time and one of those reasons was my seizure medication had thrown my entire body and brain totally out of whack. At one point, I was insisting that elephants were dancing with King Kong outside the window of my off-campus housing.
But honestly? The reasons don’t matter any more. What mattered was the pain. What mattered is that I wanted to die because I thought that I hurt too much to live.
One of my newest friends, Eric Stamper, got me through it. He was an angel boy for me.
That and I felt too badly for the driver of the car.
And, yeah, I didn’t want to get paralyzed. The plan didn’t seem fool-proof enough.
And, I also thought about God and life and existence being a gift even if it is a TERRIBLY difficult gift sometimes.
But, for quite a few minutes, I stood on the side of the road and hurt and thought about ending the hurt and how I could do that without hurting too many other people. I couldn’t think of a way, or make a decision, which is part of why I am still here.
Sometimes I still get terribly sad.
I so rarely talk about this, but lately on social media and the internet, in friends-locked posts and in private messages and in conversations on the phone, I have seen so many people feeling the way I did when I was college student standing on Lisbon Street. I am very lucky. I have never felt that way again, but I remember the feeling. I remember it really well, too well.
And I also realized that it’s hard to talk about it even though so many people have felt that way too. But it isn’t shameful to hurt. It isn’t shameful for the pain to be too much for you to handle alone and anyone who says it is? Well, they are full of crud. Sorry. It’s true.
THE FACTS
According to the World Health Organization, over 350 million people on Earth have depression or 5% of the population. A massive chunk of those cases are in the U.S. And two-thirds of those people never get help, or ask for it.
And depression is the leading cause of suicide. And suicide is the third most common reason that teens die.
And I like teens way too much to be cool about letting such a cause of death not go on notice.
According to the CDC in the U.S., “Many factors can increase the risk for suicide or protect against it. Suicide is connected to other forms of injury and violence. For example, people who have experienced violence, including child abuse, bullying, or sexual violence have a higher suicide risk.”
Those thoughts can be decreased by connections with others, having easy access and safe access to healthcare, including therapy.
“Suicide rates increased approximately 36% between 2000–2022. Suicide was responsible for over 49,000 deaths in 2022, which is about one death every 11 minutes,” the CDC writes. “The number of people who think about or attempt suicide is even higher. In 2022, an estimated 13.2 million American adults seriously thought about suicide, 3.8 million planned a suicide attempt, and 1.6 million attempted suicide.”
“Suicide affects people of all ages. In 2022, suicide was among the top 9 leading causes of death among age groups 10–64. Suicide was the second leading cause of death for ages 10–14 and 25–34. Some groups have higher suicide rates than others. Suicide rates vary by race/ ethnicity, age, and other factors, such as where someone lives. By race/ethnicity, the groups with the highest rates are non-Hispanic American Indian/Alaska Native people followed by non-Hispanic White people. Other Americans with higher than-average rates of suicide are veterans, people who live in rural areas, and workers in certain industries and occupations like mining and construction. Young people who identify as lesbian, gay, or bisexual have higher prevalence of suicidal thoughts and behavior compared to their peers who identify as heterosexual.”
According to the National Survey on Drug Use and Health between 2008 to 2010 at least 8 percent adults (18–22) had a major depression (depressive episode) in the year prior to be questioned. That’s a lot. That’s a lot of beautiful humans hurting and in pain.
And if you’re feeling like you need help, this brings you to a links page for resources in the U.S., Canada, Australia, the U.K., Sweden, and Belgium
WHAT TO DO WHEN SOMEONE YOU LOVE IS HAVING THOUGHTS OF SUICIDE
Those strategies in the infographic above can help.
Actually, making change in your community can help a lot though it take a longer time.
What kind of change? Make a community that protects itself, that supports itself economically and with heart and logic, where coping and problem solving skills are focused on, where people lift each other up, don’t stigmatize each other, and care.
That is a main thing. You’ve got to care about other people and then make the changes necessary so that care is part of the community.
More immediately?
Here’s what you can say if you think a loved one might be having suicidal thoughts. It’s more about the listening, really.
Watch the full talk here: http://t.ted.com/yNcjp1j
National Suicide Prevention Hotline: +1–800–273–8255
Trevor Project: +1–866–488–7386
Love each other? Everywhere. You don’t need a number or a website for that. You just need a heart.