The American Association of Suicidology asked about new things that have been done to prevent suicide in 2013. This was some of my response. You ask, “What have you done in 2013 to help prevent suicide?” I just saw a client who had recently been discharged from a well-known local private psychiatric hospital. She is the second suicidal patient who told me the same story. They both experienced condescension and judgment from the staff. Essentially they were told to “get over it” and “quit belaboring their problems”. They were told they both needed an antidepressant and to try to stop

Knowing Who to Call –  Commiseration with the Right People Four weeks ago I met with a patient who told me that the night before she met with me she was an “11” on a scale of 1 to 10, with ten being the highest degree of suicidality. She was trying to do it all alone. And she has severe chronic pain. We talked about the psychobiology of suicide1 and how she can start being in the driver’s seat of her life. In order to do that she needs to ask for support from the right people, hopefully from peers

Why is it so dang hard to ask for help?  What has happened in this world that we have become so self-sufficient that we no longer allow our friends or anyone to do for us? Well, I think there are 2 sides to this peculiar coin. “Heads” says we should be our own determiner. We should be independent because true independence means you’ve “made it” in this world. You don’t need anyone’s help. You can make it on your own. But all you need to bust that bubble is a situation where suddenly you can no longer “do” for yourself.

I just this week watched on TV the film, “Don Quixote”. I remembered in strange reverie that this was one story I could relate to in my struggle to stay alive in the early 70’s – the height of my suicidality. I would sing along with the movie’s song lyrics desperately in search of my own destiny, something faithful and worthy to follow. “I am I, Don Quixote, the Lord of La Mancha, my destiny calls and I go”.  I longed for the knowledge that something besides death would call to me.  I felt like Quixote did, alone on a quest that had no

Why do we try not to cry? Especially as a therapist we try not to get overly emotionally involved with our clients’ traumas. It looks and seems unprofessional. We should be trained, educated observers not participants. After all, if we delved into each client’s life, joined them in their emotions, feeling what they feel but not knowing really why but just feeling, we’d have no defense against it all piling up on us, burying us in our own as well as their despair.   But I find myself welling up in tears routinely while counseling my veterans and active duty