Thank you. this is food for thought thoughts
if it were you by neogentrics now like i said
before we're definitely going to finish the communication
series uh as i find that it is apparently a very
very big topic one that a lot of people have
seemed to lost interest in or no longer pays
any attention to or they deem is not necessary
anymore but for the sake of the month september
I know we're coming to a close and I know it's
been a while since I've released a podcast. It's
been busy over the last couple of weeks. We're
going to go ahead and talk about the topic of
the month, which is the suicide prevention. September
is National Suicide Prevention Month. The thing
is, you know, with suicide, there's no single
cause. It most often occurs when, you know, stressors
exceed their current coping abilities of, you
know, someone suffering from a mental health
condition. I mean, it can be a different number
of things. You know, a person's mood can be represented
by a number of things. And it can cause a lot
of emotional or mental stress. Losing someone
to suicide or struggling with a mental illness
can feel like no one understands what you're
going through. And, you know, with that, they've
created what they call this color spectrum. Okay.
First being white. It's a loss of a child. Red
being the loss of a spouse or a partner. Gold,
loss of a parent. Orange, loss of a sibling.
Purple, loss of a relative or a friend. Silver,
loss of a first responder or military personnel.
Green, a personal struggle or attempt. Blue,
supporting suicide prevention. Or teal, a friend
or family of someone who struggled or has attempted
such. This color spectrum names a couple of reasons
and things that can cause a person to go into
that condition. With blue being one of the few
exceptions. I personally, myself, my favorite
color is blue. That's typically how I feel pretty
much most of the time, but I'm not down. I'm
supporting of suicide prevention as I've helped
a lot of people already prevent. And prevent
them from doing that. It's not a way out. It
may seem like the easiest way out, but it's not.
So, we're going to take a short break. And we're
going to talk about four main topics regarding
suicide. Alright? First being warning signs and
risk factors. Next will be the statistics. Follow
that with treatment. And some information for
journalists as well. Okay? We'll be right back.
So, talking about suicide, let's cover the first
thing, risk factors and warning signs. This brings
up that question, what leads to suicide? Like
I said before, there's no one single cause, and
I've listed a few examples with the color chart.
It often occurs when, like I said before, the
person who's stressing, It reaches their limit
or health issues converge and health issues converge
to create that kind of feeling of being hopeless
or a mental state of despair. It creates a type
of depression. And it becomes very common amongst
mostly young people in their teenage years. into
their 20s. And if left undiagnosed or untreated,
well, you get the idea. Conditions like depression,
anxiety, and substance problems, especially when
unaddressed, increase the risk for it. And yet,
it's important to note that most people who actively
manage their mental health conditions go on to
engage in life. Now, With that being said though,
there are warning signs. Something to look out
for when concerned for a person if they have
that mindset or may start presenting that they
are going to do it. This is, how do I put it?
You can see that their behavior has changed or
they're completely different. It's usually related
to a painful event, loss, or change, like I mentioned
before. Most people who take their lives exhibit
one or more warning signs, either through what
they say or what they do, or if they act like
they're about to... All hope is lost. Right?
So, let's look at the talk aspect. We'll pull
up a list here from the American... website for
suicide prevention, the American Society. According
to this, and I'm actually getting this from information
from respected officials. So, you know, it's
legitimate information. If a person talks about
killing themselves, feeling hopeless, having
no reason to live, being a burden to others,
feeling trapped, Or having unbearable pain. These
could be signs that they're heading in that direction.
If their mood changes. They're depressed. They
have a lot of anxiety. Loss of interest. Irritable.
Humiliation. Shame. Agitation. Anger. Relief.
Sudden improvements that have no explanation
behind them. or their behavior that may show
signs of risk, especially if it's related to
a painful event, a loss, or a change, like I
mentioned before, such as the increased use of
alcohol or drugs, looking for a way to end their
lives, such as searching online for methods.
You can see this in their web history. Usually,
even if they delete it, if you try typing something
in on their device, you'll see it in their previous
searches. With drawing for activities, isolating
from family and friends, sleeping too much or
not enough, visiting or calling people to say
goodbye for random and no reason whatsoever,
giving away prized possessions. Now, that one
should be a red flag for most people. Aggression,
fatigue, things of that nature. Now, there are
a lot of risk factors involved. with suicide
and there are a lot of characteristics and conditions
that increase the chain chances that a person
may try to do this um historical factors include
uh previous suicide attempts family history of
suicide if that's the case you definitely should
be watching them uh childhood abuse neglect trauma
uh being beaten things of that nature uh cutting
themselves or Hurting other people around them
because they can't do it themselves. This can
lead to that. There's health factors. Mental
health conditions, like I said before, such as
depression. Substance use problems. Bipolar disorder.
Now, don't get that confused. There are some
people who are naturally bipolar. Schizophrenia.
Some people are born that way. They can't do
anything about that, but there is treatment for
them. Personality traits of aggression, mood
changes, and poor relationships. Conduct disorder.
If they're normally not that way and they have
good conduct, then this is definitely a red flag.
Anxiety disorders. Serious physical health conditions
include pain. Traumatic brain injury. That last
one you should probably keep an eye out for.
But then if they've had a traumatic brain injury
at some point, the doctors are already monitoring.
The last would be environmental factors. If they
have access to lethal means, including firearms
and drugs, be aware. Prolonged stress, such as
harassment, bullying. Yes, bullying and harassment.
Even relationship problems or unemployment can
cause people to do this. Stressful life events
like rejection. Some people can't take it well.
Have gone so long and then that they finally
put themselves out there and they can't take
the action the results Divorce financial crisis
being one of the big ones other life transitions
or loss exposure to another person's suicide
or graphic Sensualization or basically how to
put this in layman's terms If someone else watches,
watch someone else commit suicide and they can't
take what they just saw and they don't know how
to process it, it could end up leading them down
the exact same path because the way they'll see
it is that's a way out. That guy took it. He
succeeded. Why can't I? So there's that. We'll
take a short break here and we'll move to the
next section. I've given you the causes. Let
me go ahead and get some quick data out of the
way. And I'm going to explain what it means so
you're not completely lost. Okay? So, you're
kind of wondering, okay, great, suicide prevention,
why should I care? Okay? And if I do care, why
is it even important? Why should it, why am I
even talking about it? Okay? Well, first things
first. While most of the data that's been presented
already is accurate to a point, the numbers actually
should be a lot higher than that. They shouldn't
be basically what they are. Now, this being said,
though, the reason why I'm bringing the point
to this is that because, well, one, I nearly
lost a friend to suicide, like I said before,
and I managed to get them to stop and reconsider
their life choices. This being said, suicide
is the 10th leading cause of death in the United
States alone. And, you know, every year, an estimated
45 ,000 Americans die by suicide. You know, and
for every 25 attempts, suicide costs the United
States at least a minimum of $69 billion annually.
With that being said, you know, the annual Age
-adjusted suicide rate, well, it's about 13 .4
per 100 ,000 individuals. I mean, how do I put
this? On average, there's 123 suicides per day.
For our own accounts, about 51 % of those suicides
are with some type of gun. Men die by suicide
3 .53... How do I put this? Men die 4 % more
often than women, okay? White males accounted
for 7 to 10 suicides in 2016. Like, the rate
of suicide is higher in middle -aged white men
in particular. Why? I don't know. I honestly
don't know. Like, I've been trying to figure
it out. You know, I'm not saying that other races
aren't that way. It's just that... Most of the
statistics, most of what they found to be true
was mostly for that particular race at the time.
And if you don't believe me, like I said, you
can go and look it up on the American Society
for Suicide Prevention. The rate of individuals'
death per year has gone up since 2007 by about
15 ,000. With that being said, the rates vary
per age range. Anyone who's under the age of
15, it's less likely that they're going to kill
themselves. But it seems that it stems between,
and it starts at the age of 10 going up. That
we have to really start worrying about our children.
Or any children in general. Running into any
traumatic experiences that. For whatever reason.
Could cause them to. Want to kill themselves.
Okay. So with that being said. I'm going to keep
this as short as I can. Back in 2016, the highest
U .S. suicide rate was 15 .7, was amongst whites,
and the second highest rate was 13 .37 amongst
American Indians, Alaskan natives as well. Much
lower and roughly similar rates were found amongst
Asians and Pacific Islanders, and black and African
Americans, ironically, was 6 .3. Note that the
CDC reported Hispanic origins separately from
the primary racial and ethnic groups of whites,
blacks, and so on and so forth, since individuals
in all these groups may be also Hispanic in nature
as well, since they are basically mixed into
almost every other race. That brings me to suicide
methods. In 2016, and this is when most of these
statistics were taken, and it's changed a lot
since then, firearms were the most common method
of death. by suicide, accounting for a little
more than about half of all suicidal deaths in
the first place. The most common methods were
suffocating, including hanging, and even poisoning
when they couldn't get access to firearms. But
I mean, in retrospect to about half of the time
it being that, poisoning was about 15 % and suffocation
25%, leaving about 8 % or so with some other
random attempt that they didn't really know what
it was until they actually did a diagnosis and
checked the bodies. Now, no complete count is
kept of the suicide attempts in America. However,
every year, the CDC gathers data from hospitals
on non -fatal injuries from self -harm, as well
as survey data, because when someone hurts themselves
and someone else finds out, more than likely
they end up in the hospital. Back in 2015, Over
500 ,000 people visited a hospital for injuries
due to self -harm, and the number suggested that
for every reported suicidal death, approximately
11 .5 people were in a hospital for self -harm
-related injuries. However, because of the way
this data was collected, they're not even able
to distinguish international suicide attempts
from non -intentional ones. Some of the injuries
may have been accidental. So, I mean, you can't
really tell the difference. But based on the
National Survey of Drug Use back in 2016 and
mental health, it was estimated that about 0
.5 % of the adults between the age of 18 and,
well, not between, about 18 years old and older,
we'll just say it that way, have at least made
one suicidal attempt and then didn't do it again
for some of them. This translates to approximately
1 .3 million adults. Adult females reported a
suicide attempt 1 .2 times as often as males.
For a breakdown by gender and race was not even
available at the time, so you can't even have
to worry about that. And based on the 2015 Youth
Risk Behavior Survey, 8 .6 % of youth... In the
grades of 9 to 12, reported they've had at least
one suicide attempt in the last 12 months. This
means that most of those attempts of people trying
to kill themselves start in high school. This
is the reason why I'm pointing this out. And
the irony in this is that girls attempted it
twice as often as the boys did. meaning that
they were more at risk. Approximately 2 .8 %
reported making a suicide attempt that required
treatment by a doctor or nurse or worse. Let
me put this in a nutshell. When it comes to suicide
and suicide attempts, there are rate differences
depending on demographic characteristics such
as age, gender, ethnicity, and race. Nevertheless,
Suicide occurs in all demographic groups. It
doesn't matter who you are. It doesn't matter
what race you are. It can still happen to you.
Okay? Now, one little fun fact before I end this
podcast, and I'm going to break this up into
multiple parts. Okay? On average, one person
dies by suicide every three hours. Okay? Now,
with that being said, in Texas alone, the number
of deaths by suicide isn't nearly as high as
some other areas. Matter of fact, its state rank
is 40 out of all of them. And there's 51 states.
The rate per population... And Texas versus the
National is 12 .5. The National is 13 .42. And
like I said before, the National, the number
of deaths by suicide was 3 ,000, about 3 ,400
something. The National is 44 ,000. So keep this
in mind. Just because your state doesn't have
a high rating for it, doesn't mean it's not possible.
And don't ever think you're exempt. Because it
can happen to anybody. With that being said,
though, enjoy the rest of your day, and I thank
you guys for listening. I look forward to part
two. I'll cover a little bit more information
on it, and then I'll talk about how to stop it.
All right. Enjoy the rest of your day. Again,
this is Food for Thought, Thoughts that Fit With
You by Neogentrics. If you like what you hear,
hit that like and subscribe button on any of
the platforms from the anchor .fm forward slash
neogentrics site. Have a great rest of your day.