This Is Important

Today is Bell Let's Talk Day, part of Bell's charitable Let's Talk program dedicated to supporting mental health.  If you're not familiar with the program, please check out their website.  Bell and their partner organizations are doing impressive work to improve mental health services and to combat the pervasive stigmas around mental illness.

As many of you know, this is a cause near and dear to my heart.  I have struggled with depression for most of my adult life and many other family members and friends have also been affected by mental illness.  But mental health is something we should all be talking about, today and every day.  As noted on the Bell Let's Talk website, according to the Canadian Institute of Health Research, 1 in 5 Canadians will experience a form of mental illness at some point in their life.  That's a lot of us.  That's a lot of people who need our understanding, kindness and support.  Another fact: 2 in 3 people suffer in silence fearing judgment and rejection.  This may not be surprising when you consider that only 49% of people say they would socialize with a friend who has a serious mental illness (both facts from the Canadian Medical Association, via the Bell Let's Talk website).  May I take a moment to say that you other 51% are missing out: we are awesome.

The fact that I want to bring the most attention to today, though, is this one: Approximately 11 people end their lives by suicide in Canada every day (Canadian Association for Suicide Prevention).  11 people EVERY DAY.  These are people in our families.  These are co-workers.  These are our young adults.  These are people we see in our community.  These are people we don't see.  

We need to do better.  Fortunately, initiatives like Bell's Let's Talk program are calling attention to the importance of mental health first aid, training that is just as important as physical first aid.  As noted in this article in The Washington Post, it is possibly more important.  Given the statistics above, there is a pretty good chance that, at some point in your life, you will encounter someone who is experiencing a mental health crisis and needs your help.

So, when that happens, what will you do? 

A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to participate in a suicide alertness training program called SafeTALK, created by LivingWorks.  It was an excellent program and I want to encourage you all to look into taking it or something similar available in your area.  Don't make the mistake of thinking that because you don't think that you know anyone experiencing a mental illness, you won't need this training.  The truth is that at any time, any of us could be the one person that that family member, that co-worker, that young adult, that person in our community, that stranger we don't know, invites into a conversation about their mental health concerns and possible suicidal thoughts.  

This does not take the place of attending a full training program and I wish to make clear that I am not a representative of this program, but I would like to use this space to highlight a few of the key things I learned at the SafeTALK training as you may find them helpful.  The TALK in the title is an acronym: Tell, Ask, Listen, KeepSafe.  

Tell - A person with thoughts of suicide may make invitations to you (consciously or not) to speak about their concerns and suicidal thoughts.  These invitations may be explicit or they may not be; often, they are not.  You may get a sense that they are possibly having suicidal thoughts based on what you see (i.e. being moody or withdrawn), what you hear (i.e. talk of having no purpose or being a burden), what you sense (i.e. desperation or hopelessness), or what you learn about by speaking with them (i.e. that they are experiencing abuse or rejection).   

Ask - The first step to helping someone is to ask about these invitations.  SafeTALK recommends saying this: "When someone is [INVITATIONS], they are sometimes thinking about suicide.  Are you thinking about suicide?"  (For example, "When someone is missing work, worrying about things, and withdrawing from friends and family, they are sometimes thinking about suicide.  Are you thinking about suicide?"). It is important to understand that you cannot plant the idea of suicide in someone's head, and the phrase "thinking about suicide" is preferable to "thinking about harming yourself" because it is clear and direct.  Include the specific invitations that are leading you to ask them whether they are thinking about suicide.  

Listen - If the person says that they are having thoughts of suicide, SafeTALK recommends replying as follows: "Let's talk about this.  I am listening.  This is important."  Make it clear that you are available to listen to them and to help, and that their concerns and feelings are important.  And then listen.

Importantly, if the person denies that they are having thoughts of suicide but your gut feeling is that they are in danger, move ahead to the next step anyways.

KeepSafe - If you yourself have not completed suicide intervention training (please note that this is a more advanced training program than suicide alertness training), then you need to get them connected with someone who has.  Tell the person: "We need extra help.  I want to connect you with someone who can help you KeepSafe."  Then make that connection.  Call your local suicide crisis centre or another identified community support, or someone you know who has completed suicide intervention training and would be available to help.  Take them directly to a counselling centre or hospital.  If you believe that the person is in immediate danger, call emergency services (in many locations, this would be 911).  Stay with them until you have completed that connection.  

(I wish to emphasize again that the advice listed above is not intended to take the place of attending a suicide alertness training program and it is not representative of the complete SafeTALK program.)

So, here are some next steps:

• Look into suicide alertness and suicide intervention training programs in your area. Yes, it will require taking some time out of your daily life to attend. Yes, some of the programs cost money. But if you help to save a life, I believe you'll think of it as time and money well spent. (It is possible too that your employer will help you with the time and cost, or perhaps you can encourage them to bring in training for your entire staff...look into it). Look it up now while you're on the Internet. LivingWorks, linked here and above, is an international organization and a good place to start, but if they are not offering training in your area, keep looking.
  

• Look up the KeepSafe connections in your community: those individuals, organizations, crisis lines and emergency services that are trained and available to provide proper suicide intervention and professional help. Compile a list of their contact information. Keep it handy. Don't put this off. Make time for this task this week. It is my understanding that in Canada, 911 is a nationwide emergency service and free to dial from any phone. Here is a link to find a crisis centre near you.
  

• Think about how you can help to support a suicide-safe community. Consider these 5 simple ways to help.

These are not easy conversations to have, and mental illness, and the stigma surrounding it, are not easy things to battle.  However...

This is important. 

This is so very important.

Wear the Purple Shoes

Pop these puppies on your feet and get a move on. Because depression? Ain't nobody got time for that.

The episode recap for the last two weeks of my life would read something like this: Last straw meets camel's back.  Shit meets fan.  Much flailing and sorrow and angst.  Fade to garbled mess where a somewhat put-together woman once stood.

I joke, as always (and I think it's a good thing that I've not lost my sense of humour), but the fact of the matter is that the combination of a long, cold winter and some unexpected and less-than-favourable events dredged up a once-dormant darkness in me that I had been struggling to keep at bay, unloving thoughts that had been coming in whispers I could swiftly silence.  

Then one morning last week I woke to a full choral ensemble, The Unkindnesses, performing a playlist of self-hatred at deafening levels.  They sang some of the old standards.  You are Alone and Always Will Be.  Nobody Loves You.  This Pain Will Never End. 

And then, just as they launched into a rousing rendition of They'd Be Better Off Without You, a strong voice gently commanded:

"Get.  Up." 

I got up out of bed, pain settling like dust in my wake.  I walked to the closet to get dressed, scanned the hangers and selected the softest of all grey sweaters.

"It feels like a hug," the voice noted, pleased, as I pulled the sweater over my head. 

"Surround yourself in love," it continued.  I reached for my favourite scarf, an expanse of rich purple dotted with small white hearts, and wrapped its warmth around my shoulders.  "And wear the purple shoes."

We all know the Golden Rule:  Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.  I hereby propose the Silver Rule, no less important:  Do unto yourself as you would do unto others.  As kind as you are to others, be kind to yourself.  As forgiving as you are of others, be forgiving of yourself.  And listen for the voice in you, the voice of self-love, when it speaks.  Fight to hear that loyal voice amidst the cacophony of contempt.  The more you listen, the more it will talk.  The more it talks, the more it will shout.  Give it a megaphone and drown out that dismal choir.

I got through that day, and the ones since, and will get up and get through many more, with purple shoes on my feet helping to move me forward, with soft, grey hugs and the arms of my dear ones encircling me, surrounded by love.  And you can too.

The Darkness and the Light

Despicable me

This is a picture of me taken in March-ish 2000, at my university department's annual end-of-year celebration.  There was much to celebrate: my classmates and I had just completed the final year of our program and would soon be graduating.  I remember that as a fun night, as we danced and laughed and reminisced about our four years together.

The thing is, this is also a picture of a girl who desperately wanted to die.  

This picture was taken during the worst period of my depression, when I would cry myself to sleep hoping not to wake up, and cry again in the morning when my wish hadn't been granted and I had to face another day.  When I would hear about tragedies - a fatal car accident, a cancer diagnosis, a pedestrian hit by a bus - and wonder why it wasn't me.  Wondered, if there was a God, why He didn't take me when I clearly wanted to go.  Those poor victims, I'd think.  They probably wanted to be here.  

In this way I was, what I would call, passively suicidal.  I courted death but didn't take the matter into my own hands.  But I think that was only a matter of time.  In fact, I would say that had I not received the right help when I did, shortly after this photo was taken, I don't think I would have been around 6 months later.

All this to say two things:

There's this idea some have, I think, that when someone is "really" depressed, it is obvious.  That they're slovenly and distracted and crying all the time and not eating and failing their classes and missing work.  And sometimes that's true.  And sometimes someone will notice.  And sometimes someone will do something to help.  But often, all too often, depression hides its face and stalks in silence, slowly unraveling a person and a life bit by bit.  Because to call attention to itself would be self-defeating.  Depression plays a game of Statues: when someone's looking, it freezes and does everything within its power to remain undetected, something at which it is highly skilled, but as soon as backs are turned and you're alone again, it makes its move.  Hush hush hush, it whispers in your ear when people are around.  Don't tell.  Then as soon as they're gone, it hisses: I will destroy you.  

For depression to survive, it needs its victim to keep quiet.  It's a disease that convinces its victim that it does not exist.  

Think about that for a second.  What a terribly vicious circle.  An abuser who slaps you because you won't stop crying.  A beast sharpening its claws while insisting you're not on the menu.

The girl in this picture who wanted to die got out of bed every day and got dressed and went to every class and got good grades.  I don't think anyone knew, other than my partner at the time who was as supportive as you can be to a person who screams in your face and cries uncontrollably as soon as the front door is closed.  I was once proud that no one knew.  As a Drama student, I thought that the deception that I was happy and all was well was my greatest performance.  But again, that pride was the depression talking.  How can it keep playing if you throw the game?

Hush now, it says.  Don't let them find out how terrible you are.

See, that's the crux of it, that's the thing that someone with depression is trying to keep quiet.  The "truth", as told to you by a hugely persuasive voice that claims authority and who are you to argue because you are a horrible person who doesn't deserve to be here.  

Which leads me to my second point.  There's another idea that some have that suicide is selfish.  I can understand why people say that.  I can understand how those left behind wonder how their loved one could do this to them, could leave them in such pain.  

I can't speak for those who have left. I don't know the particular brands of torment their minds created for them.  But I can tell you that at the height of my illness, when suicide suited up and presented itself as my only saviour, this insidious disease was, in fact, telling me that taking my life was the only way I could redeem myself:  I would save the world from how terrible I was.  I knew that my family and friends didn't see this "truth" about me, but I believed that it was only a matter of time.  I knew that they wouldn't understand, I knew they would be hurt, but I believed that I would cause them more pain if I stayed.  Suicide was the lesser of two evils, my existence being the evil that was insurmountable.  My one gift to the world would be to subtract myself from it.  

So what then?  How do you recognize this beast if it is stalking you?  How do you turn in time to see it move?  How do you notice that it has made another its prey, if it stays so silent?  By no means do I have all the answers but I offer these thoughts for whatever small bit of help or comfort they may provide.

To the last point first, to those who could serve to help others going through this pain:  Be kind.  Not just when a moment presents itself but actively seek out opportunities to treat others, all others, with kindness.  We could all do with more kind words and actions in our days, and for those being subjected to a steady stream of self-hatred, the need is great and your kindness may be the only little bit of it that they receive, or the only little bit of it that gets through.  It may not topple the mountain but it may make the smallest of cracks.  Invite those sitting on the sidelines to join in; whether or not they do, the invitation offers a connection and a choice, two things that can seem vastly out of reach.  Get to know those around you and if you sense that someone might be in need of some help, talk to them and help get them help.  Ask for others to support you in doing that, in finding the right resources.  We have a responsibility to look out for each other.

To those for whom any of my story rang true, those who think they are worthless, who feel that all is dark:  I promise you that there is light.  Your dark thoughts are not you.  You have been hijacked by an other that is self-serving.   Once you catch it moving you'll be able to throw the game by seeing this beast for what it really is:  a sheep in wolf's clothing.  It is nothing without you.  Which means you hold all the power.

This is not to underestimate the work to be done to get it off your back; it can be a difficult journey (for me, the journey included four years on medication and six or so in therapy, and I have to remain vigilant even now).  But you can do it.  There is love and support around you, and help available, and you are stronger than you think.  If I accomplish nothing else with this website, with this life, I hope to stand in testament to the fact that you can make it through, and find peace and health and a life you love.   And immeasurable amounts of joy.  You deserve it.

Me.

And one day you'll look back and the darkness will serve only as a memory which helps the light shine even brighter, and the journey from there to here will have been the great emboldening of you.

And you may even find yourself on a sunny August afternoon pulling your car over on to the shoulder, hopping a fence into a farmer's sun-soaked field, spinning around until you're dizzy and smiling from ear to ear.

And feeling free.