The Worry List

I want to be completely honest with you because I want you to be completely honest with yourselves:

I never ever thought that I would lose a child to suicide. It was not a possibility...never on my Worry List. And it’s not like I’m a mom who didn’t have a Worry List. I did -- it was extensive. I worried about it all:

Suicide wasn’t a consideration. That was something other families had to worry about. Does that sound familiar to you? How about this:

At Back to School Night several years ago, the Health and PE teachers shared that one whole unit in 9th grade is now dedicated to Mental Health. I was so glad. That was such an important addition to the curriculum. There are kids out there who will really benefit from that, I thought smugly.

And when my kids would get off the bus and tell me they heard on twitter that someone at a nearby school had taken their own life, I’d feel pangs of sadness...for the child, especially for the parents. But often, they would add details that would seem to explain the action --

“She was always in trouble.”

“His girlfriend broke up with him.”

“He’d attempted before.”

Oh, I see. As if...what? It all made sense then? No, certainly not. But those explanations gave me a reasonable justification to file those stories away, far far away from my Worry List – in the drawer labeled “Other People’s Problems,” in the folder marked “Too Bad.”

Isn’t this how we protect ourselves? It’s pretty clear from my list above that I could find any reason to worry as a mom. If there were some worries I could eliminate from my list, then I’d be better off, right? So I’d reassure myself with the Most Self-Righteous Statement ever uttered by a parent (I wonder if you’ve ever heard it said -- maybe said it yourself?)

“My kid would never do that!” and then, quickly, I’d follow it up with the runner-up in that category, “That will never happen to us!”

Yet, here we are. We lost a child to suicide. And there’s no simple explanation for Jay’s death. He wasn’t always in trouble. His girlfriend didn’t just break up with him. He hadn’t attempted before. So this is really hard to just drop into that Too Bad category.

Since we can’t file it away (and please trust me when I say I’m ashamed that I ever did), let’s just take a look at the facts.

This website suggests that the risk of death by suicide for teenagers in this country as of 2014 was equal to the risk of death by car accidents.

EQUAL.

The scary piece is that the mortality rate for car accidents is going down. The mortality rate for suicide? Going up. The two rates have met at a critical point of 13/100,000 for just this brief moment. Where will we go from here?

I didn’t know this information last year; I so wish I had. But I’m here to tell you now. Please consider it. And consider this:

For all the time we spend preparing our kids to maneuver a car safely down the road –- What if an animal runs out in front of you? What if your wheel dips off the pavement? What if you feel yourself hydroplaning? --- shouldn’t we, based on these statistics, spend an EQUAL amount of time talking with them about their own mental health, drilling them on possible situations they may encounter?

Prepare your kids for the fact that their bodies are changing  -- their brains are changing –  at a very fast rate. That transition through adolescence into adulthood can go smoothly, or it can result in some challenges. Imagine what some might look like and then suggest appropriate responses. 

Life can feel lonely sometimes. There are people all around but you may still feel disconnected, unimportant, unappreciated...  

                   You might feel like your emotions are all over the place... 

You may feel like you walk around with knots in your stomach all the time, even when there’s nothing to feel nervous about...   

                        We have a great life, a happy family. But you can still feel sad sometimes...

Help me understand what’s going on inside you. It’s not always that clear, even to your mom or dad. 

         If something seems “off,” please tell us. We can find you help to figure out what’s going on.

Start the conversation and revisit it often. Just in case. Prepare yourself and your children for the possibility of mental anguish and discuss solutions in case it ever arises.  Equip your children with words to say if they ever notice something’s not right. In so doing, you normalize mental illness. You acknowledge it is a possibility and you have a plan to manage it. Check out this amazing resource on ideas for getting started (sorry it's from the UK so resources may not be readily available. I'll keep looking for equally accessible and down to earth info from the US).

I’m not saying that all mental illness can be swept away with a few short conversations. I know that many conditions exist that are extremely difficult to overcome. But there’s little chance we'll ever make any strides to reduce those alarming suicide statistics if kids are unprepared to acknowledge a potential struggle or if they actively seek to hide their struggles because they are confused or ashamed about what they’re experiencing. So our best bet is to start conversations that will bring it out into the open.

Please...put suicide on your Worry List. Then do everything you can to ensure that it never touches your family.