Seemingly exponentially, we are more and more often receiving news of celebrity-related suicides. In past few months, the suicide deaths of fashion designer Alexander McQueen, Andrew Koenig from “Growing Pains,” and most recently Marie Osmond’s son, Michael Blosil, highlight a numbing and disturbing sequence of too-young people taking their own lives. The light being shined on this most dark of topics is unsettling.
We can transform this news for a purpose higher than headlines. It should become a clarion call to save lives.
While these deaths receive major media attention, tens of millions of men and women in the U.S. will struggle with suicidal thoughts each year. Research indicates that thoughts of suicide occur to the majority of people at particular moments in their lives. Unlike many other conditions that actually affect fewer people, suicidal thoughts often go unaddressed. Suicide remains one of the most mysterious, difficult to understand, and troubling pieces of our psychological and biological makeup.
Our natural limitations mean that we may never understand the vast dimensions of suicidal behavior. Simultaneously there are real signs that communities are assembling the courage to try to bring the subject to light and search for meaningful, evidence-based treatments to address a seemingly intractable issue.
One powerful instance of a community successfully grappling with this issue right here in Colorado is the Second Wind Fund (SWF). Solving one major piece of the suicide prevention puzzle, SWF has turned the usual approach to mental health treatment services upside down by making it possible for uninsured and underinsured teens at risk for suicide to have unprecedented access to professional counseling. Integral to this model is quick intervention and hopefulness.
Financially-strapped, suicidal youth often must turn to managed mental health care and then wait weeks for a first counseling appointment. Then they are limited to three or four appointments spaced a month apart. In marked contrast, SWF used community support to create a system by which uninsured or underinsured youth are guaranteed access to licensed, professional counselors within a week, and then every week for up to 20 free sessions.
At this point, about 500 youth are served annually in their own neighborhoods. Kids who don’t control their own finances but who are nonetheless struggling with real life-and-death thoughts now have professional help on a par with insured youth.
Data collection has shown that the vast majority of youth following through with SWF services experience decreased suicidal ideation, and not one of the over 2,000 youth referred to SWF has been lost to suicide.
SWF started in Colorado after four teenagers took their own lives at a suburban Denver high school during the 2001-2002 school year. The model has expanded to nine affiliates, covering much of the state. Galvanizing support from a broad range of corporate interests, faith communities, civic organizations, and families, the program started with thousands of private donors, and now governments are starting to take notice of the startling results and pitch in too.
Over 350 schools and other agencies have utilized the program, which is now often used as a first choice for schools seeking help for their suicidal students. Expansion of the highly replicable program to communities outside of Colorado is beginning now.
SWF’s remarkable story isn’t just the story of a successful young nonprofit, but the underlying hunger that the general public has to do something about this issue. This is despite the fact that headlines focus on individual suicides rather than root causes and effective treatments. In a few short years, SWF’s Denver affiliate has created the largest suicide prevention event in the nation, now drawing over 3,000 people to its annual walk/run/ride event — an unprecedented showing in support of this oft-taboo topic.
The message? First, suicidal thoughts are treatable, and there is nobility in seeking help. Second, community-wide discussion about suicide isn’t something that needs to be forced — it’s actually desired. Third, lost in the policy debate is the fact that sometimes health-access issues, even mental health access for kids, can be solved through community energy rather than in the halls of government.
Let’s glimpse at these headlines, spend a moment of silence in memory of these people that we don’t actually know, say a prayer for the grieving families, and then look toward our communities, asking ourselves what we can do to immediately make a difference to offer real treatment to kids suffering their hardest days.
Jeff Lamontagne is founder and executive director of Second Wind Fund, Inc., and also founding director of Second Wind Fund of Metro Denver, Inc. He lives in Lakewood. For more information go to and . EDITOR’S NOTE: This is an online-only column and has not been edited.
