A safe place to talk openly about mental health & illness
This post isn't about saying that suicide is something people should choose, or that it's a good choice, or that it's a choice that they want to have on the menu. I'm writing this because, while it's much more complicated to get into the element of choice, I believe that it's inaccurate to say that… Continue reading Is Suicide a Choice? (Regardless, It’s Not Selfish)
For Pride Month, I wanted to talk about an important mental health issue facing LGBTQ+ youth. Suicide is the second-leading cause of death among North American youth, and the level of risk is even higher in LGBTQ+ youth. That's not good. Stats Here are a few stats for LGBT youth: LGB youth attempt suicide five… Continue reading Suicide Risk Among LGBTQ+ Youth – A Pride Month Post
Today is World Suicide Prevention Day. It's also National Suicide Prevention Week and National Suicide Prevention Month (that's a lot of awareness!). I thought it would be a good time to talk about suicide attempt survivors. The term "suicide survivor" isn't generally used for people who've lived through suicide attempts. Rather, it's the term used… Continue reading Suicide Attempt Survivors: Yes, We Do Exist
I recently wrote about whether the wording "committed suicide" was likely to be an effective target for anti-stigma messaging. A commenter mentioned that in their home country, suicide was a crime up until quite recently. That got me curious, so I did some digging to find out where attempting suicide is illegal to this day.… Continue reading Where Is Attempting Suicide Illegal?
I saw a post recently by another blogger about stigmatizing language that people should avoid. One of the things he mentioned was "committed suicide," which is something that comes up regularly in discussions of language use related to suicide. I'm not convinced that it needs to be as big an issue as people make it… Continue reading Is “Committed Suicide” Worth Making an Issue Out Of?
The Balance Between Life and Death is a novella by Elizabeth Holland, who you may know from her blog Anxiety and Liz. The intro says "This novella focuses on the importance of putting your mental health first. A reminder that you never know what someone is hiding beneath their smile." The protagonist is a young… Continue reading Book Review: The Balance Between Life and Death
Let's say you're scrolling through your Twitter feed. You see a tweet that makes it seem like that person intends to imminently act on suicidal thoughts. What do you do? Unfortunately, there isn't really a good answer. I've been on the reporting side on one occasion. Someone had posted on their blog, which was shared… Continue reading How Should Social Media Handle Reported Suicidal Posts?
A blogger I knew died by suicide on yesterday. She scheduled a blog post and a Twitter share of the post to go live after the fact. One of the things mentioned in her post was that her plan was to be struck by a train. Today I was looking at the Twitter comments in… Continue reading Guilt Is Not a Suicide Prevention Strategy
Do antidepressants increase the risk of suicide? There are certainly people out there who are very vocal in insisting that they do. However, as is so often the case, the loudmouths don't tend to be especially well informed. The FDA black box warning Since 2004, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has required a… Continue reading Antidepressants and Suicide Risk
Today is World Mental Health Day (the 27th annual), and this year's focus is on mental health promotion and suicide prevention. Suicide awareness is a big part of this. The message from the president of the World Federation for Mental Health, which organizes World Mental Health Day, states: "The object of making suicide prevention the… Continue reading Suicide Awareness Isn’t Enough for Prevention