Community comes together to raise awareness of suicide prevention

Tuesday was the the second annual FCC Behavioral Health balloon release focused on remembering those who have taken their own lives and the impact suicide or suicide attempts can have on members of the community. Along with the release in the evening, members of FCC and other community organizations stood at the intersection of West Pine Street and North Westwood Boulevard with signs to bring awareness to suicide prevention efforts. They also held signs in May for mental health awareness.

Austin Armes, a local firefighter, spoke about suicide from the perspective of a first responder and addressed statistics about police, firefighters and EMS. As of June this year, he said, there have been 161 first responder suicides and about 60% go unreported. These numbers are above those for the average population, Armes said, due to the stress of the jobs and the kinds of situations first responders face.

“When I went through college, our book was five or six inches thick of all the stuff we had to learn to be a firefighter,” Arms said. “Of that only 10 pages was mental health, suicide awareness, PTSD and stress related stuff. To me, that’s a bad issue and a big thing that needs to be fixed. Critical incidents are situations like police involved shootings, when we come up on car wrecks and there’s death especially little kids, or if we can’t pull somebody out of a house and save their life. It’s estimated that a police officer in their 20 to 30-year career will come in contact with 188 critical incidents.”

Ashley Lutton, FCC program director, said programs such as this take several months of community organizations working together to find speakers and figure out what message they want to get across. For this event, it was about no more suicides, breaking the stigma around seeking help for mental health issues and to get people talking about the challenges they face.

Along with the FCC, the Butler County Community Resource Council and the John J. Pershing VA Medical Center contibuted to the event. The FCC office in Kennet is also hosting a similar event and Lutton said the two offices have been helping each other with it.

“We decided last year that we wanted to do something to make a big impact in the community,” Lutton said. “So we did the balloon release and it was just a huge event last year that we were like ‘how do we make it better?’ We brought in, like earlier with holding signs, we brought in community partners to hold signs with us. The more people you get to share the bigger it is.”

Lutton said this year’s event was bigger than last year’s, which she attributed to the community partners bringing in more people and awareness.

Rebeca Pacheco, executive director with the Butler County Community Resource Council, said part of their goal was to get the word out about an event they’re hosting in November for International Survivors of Suicide Loss Day.

“We have a mental health subcommittee that works on mental health, suicide awareness and also we do an autism conference every year,” she said. “But this time of year, we focus on suicide prevention activities.”

Meanwhile, Camie Warning with the suicide prevention department of the VA said they wanted to help with the event because suicide has been made a priority for the VA nationally because statistically 22 veterans a day commit suicide. So far this year, locally, there have been zero veteran suicides, which was not the case at this time last year.

Later this month, on Sept. 26, the VA is hosting it’s annual candlelight vigil for survivors of suicide or suicide loss.

Amy Taylor, one of the speakers at the event, discussed her suicide attempt and how she’s been going forward since it.

“At one point, my family was called and told ‘if you guys want to say goodbye, you need to come now,’” she said. “My ex-husband took that and he went and told my kids. My kids thought and were told ‘your mom didn’t make it.’ I can only imagine how my kids had to feel thinking that they didn’t have their mom anymore.”

Taylor said after her attempt she was in the hospital for over four months. Shortly after getting out of the hospital, she was in a wheelchair, Taylor was arrested for prior charges and spent three months in county jail. Due to being in a wheelchair, she said, she was seperated from the other inmates.

“That’s when I decided to take a negative and turn it into a positive,” she said. “I worked really, really, really hard to be able to stand and put weight on my legs. I finally took my first few steps.”

After another stay in county jail and one in prison, Taylor said, she entered Recycling Grace Women’s Center in Poplar Bluff. She’s now a graduate of the program.

“You can actually love yourself,” she said. “I’ve learned that and it’s an amazing feeling. It’s completely changed my whole perspective on life. Another thing that changed my outlook is that when I was in county the first time, one of the girls gave me a Bible. I started looking and I was like ‘no, I’ve done too much bad stuff. There’s somebody out there who’s better than me, that deserves God’s love more than I do.’ Turns out that’s not true. God loves me for who I am, the way I am, mistakes and all. He still loves me.”

Robin Callahan also spoke as a suicide loss survivor. When she was 15, her mother took her own life after struggling with drug addictions. Callahan said her mother made over 10 attempts and talked about being upset that they hadn’t been successful. However, after those attempts, the people in her life stopped listening, Callahan said.

“Several family members said ‘she’ll never do that’ and started to ignore her cries for help,’” Callahan said. “My message today is for us all to take the time and to take it very, very seriously any time we see any of the signs or symptoms. Please stop and listen. Just stop and listen. Take some time out of our busy lives and just take the time to listen to those neighbors, loved ones, family, friends, bothers, sisters. So many suffer silently.”

Armes compared depression and suicidal thoughts to fighting a fire, which he said takes a group of people to put out.

When there’s an alert for a fire, the alarm goes off at the station and the firefighters respond, Armes said. They’re getting into gear and listening for trigger words.

“She (Callahan) was talking about there are signs and triggers that her mother went through that people quit paying attention to,” he said. “It’s the same thing with us. There’s trigger words that let me know where I need to be or what I need to do.”

When going into a fire, Armes said, he has somebody at his back to help direct him toward the source of the fire and telling him where he shouldn’t go. He said this person is also important when suffering depression, somebody who knows your triggers and can guide you where you need to go.

Once the source spot is dealt with, Armes said, the firefighters start pulling down ceilings and looking for other hot spots that may need to be cooled down with water.

“In life, it doesn’t take just one person to help you,” he said. “It takes multiple people. It takes a family. It takes a community. Just like in firefighting, it takes more than two people to fight a fire.”

The National Suicide Prevention Hotline is a 24/7 toll-free number that is available to anybody in emotional distress. It’s number is 800-273-8255.