Suicide Is Not A Cause for Public Fear

It's been a shitty week. For a myriad of reasons, I'm sure. General depression. Bruce's sentencing. Change of the weather. My lovely housemate moving and the ensuing depression of my cats. Work is always difficult.

There are good bits sprinkled in of course. Coming to church on Sunday was a highlight. I love my people so much. And I've been working on a new counted cross stitch of the Lord's Prayer. Been chilling on my couch watching movies or listening to Barbara Brown Taylor's "A Walk in the Darkness" (which is fantastic as she reads it for the audio version which is like a mini sermon every chapter).

But on Tuesday, something happened that pissed me off. UW Police sent out a warning that there was a woman who was suicidal and possibly armed. They evacuated 300+ people from the vicinity. They hunted (I'm aware of the verb I'm using) down the woman who had fled into a grove of trees. As the police were talking to her, she shot herself. Jean Gibson died yesterday. She was known to my homeless friends though not to me personally.

News: "Gibson was found by police and shot herself while police tried to communicate with her.   Gibson was taken to the hospital with life threatening injuries. UW Police say she died Wednesday from the injury and the case is still under investigation." (link to full story here)

Romeo and Juliet kill themselves for love (and other reasons to listen to teenagers)

"My child is yet a stranger in the world; She hath not seen the change of fourteen years, Let two more summers wither in their pride, Ere we may think her ripe to be a bride." -Daddy Capulet

Juliet is 14. The character is so often portrayed by a woman in her 20's or 30's that I worry that we miss much of the story. Romeo and Juliet are teens. They have so much passion. Juliet threatens to kill herself once, drinks a potion that might kill her or will ideally let her sleep for 72 hours, and ultimately takes a dagger to her own body. 

Suicide. Two attempts. One complete. And that's just Juliet. Romeo wants to die as soon as he hears that he is banished. He also threatens to kill himself unless someone can come up with a solution to this banishment which means he cannot be with his love. He drinks poison and dies by a sleeping Juliet's side.

QPR: like CPR for Suicide

In between worship services today we had a training on QPR - the CPR of suicide prevention. The idea is that as we talk about suicide as a culture and recognize those tell tale warning signs, the very high suicide rate will decrease. I even corrected a few of my own misunderstandings and myths during the workshop.

QPR stands for Question, Persuade, and Refer. You can get trained in an hour. The idea is that EVERYONE needs to get training on this, much like we as a culture have responded to breast cancer, HIV/AIDS, and heart disease.

Suicide has to stop being taboo. We all have to be bold and brave and ask that question that feels crazy, "Are you thinking about killing yourself?" She assured us that no one has ever been pissed for being asked this.

So there's that.

Also, if you are thinking about killing yourself, please call 1-800-273-TALK or 1-800-SUICIDE. I'm here, too.

Depression in the Sunshine

I like to blame dark gray skies for my depression on the days when the sky is cloudy and gray.

Days like today? No excuse. The sun is out. It is gorgeous. It is warm.

It makes it more difficult to describe to people what depression is. But think of it like tree branches that creep up into a bright blue sky. Against a back drop of blue sky, they appear all the more dark and black. And they extend up towards the sky, reaching as high as they can, interrupting the expanse of blue.