Episode #114: Dealing with Teen Suicide Featuring Jackie Simmons
“What statistics have shown is that when one person takes their own life, it negatively impacts in a big way, an average of 20 people.”
Jackie Simmons
Author | Speaker | Co-founder of the Teen Suicide Prevention Society
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According to the Center for Disease Control, one in four teenagers is struggling to stay alive with over 25% of American young adults are struggling with suicidal thoughts. In Canada, suicide is the second leading cause of death among youth and young adults (15-34 years).
Suicidal thoughts can be passive or active and can leave individuals feeling overwhelmed, hopeless, and unsure where to turn for support. With the rates of suicide attempts rising, especially amongst teens, programs that focus on stopping suicide are needed now more than ever however most prevention programs start once a teen's known to be "at risk."
Often, suicidal thoughts simply means that the person is experiencing more sadness and pain than they know how to manage. A key to suicide prevention is being open to having the conversations and being there as a source of support to stop the suicidal thoughts from being stuck in our heads.
It’s completely natural to want to put a stop to pain and unhappiness and its in that moment, suicidal thoughts might surface when you can’t envision a way out from the distress. But you do have options for getting support with handling these thoughts.
“We realized the problem is not preventing suicide, there's all of these programs out there. It's about preventing suicidal thinking from getting stuck inside someone's head and becoming what we call the negative echo chamber.”
Jackie Simmons is on a mission to stop teen suicide and is intent on making it a thing of the past. This TEDX speaker and co-founder of the Teen Suicide Prevention Society is also a mindset resilience master who teaches conscious retriggering.
She joins Audley on The Audacious Living Podcast to discuss how and why she established the Teen Suicide Prevention Society, the importance of having conversations with our teens about suicide and suicide prevention and the four key questions we can ask to start the conversation.
Jackie Simmons is up next on The Audacious Living Podcast!
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