Today, September 10, 2014, the World Health Organization and the International Association for Suicide Prevention (IASP) co-sponsors World Suicide Prevention Day. To commemorate this day, the MSW@USC invites you to participate in the 100 Voices for Suicide Prevention campaign. Around the world, suicide is a major public health problem and is the leading cause of death for young people. Worldwide, nearly one million people succumb to suicide each year, a number that exceeds deaths from war and homicide combined. This year marks the 12th anniversary of World Suicide Prevention Day with the theme “One World Connected.” In honor of National Suicide Prevention Week, we hope you’ll participate in as many of these #suicideprevention events as you can. 

Last year, I participated in the National Suicide Prevention Blog Carnival with the written version of my post, What If I'd Said, "Just Drive?" This year, I stepped on a stage with my fellow cast members in NW Indiana to read that same piece before a living, breathing audience for Listen to Your Mother 2014. Many of the five years of Listen to Your Mother videos deal with topics of depression, including single parenting, postpartum and suicide, with common themes of survival and hope threaded throughout, because, let's face it, as wonderful as it often is, motherhood can be hard. It can also be tears-streaming-down-your-face hilarious, as evidenced by Liesl Testwuide of Hairpin Turns Ahead and Robyn Jackson Welling of Hollow Tree Ventures reading two of my favorites. I watch them whenever I need a laugh. Many days I've sought the laughter these delightful women inspire, especially after our collective laughter stopped recently when Robin Williams lost his battle with depression, and took his own life. Don't let that happen to you. Seek and celebrate the laughter, reach out, and if you're a survivor like me, I hope you'll get involved. 

For this special day of awareness and action, and for single moms everywhere, here's my video:

I find solace in my children. I find solace in getting involved in, advocating, and celebrating my local community. I find solace in reaching out and not being alone. There are many ways you can participate in what's left of today, this week, and the rest of this month. I love the #TheSemiColonProject, because it's geared to writers. This post by Denise Drespling explaining what the semi-colon means. And Denise has some great strategies for mental health wellness in her video on today's post. Follow along and Tweet your semi-colon, real or Sharpied. 

Here's mine:

National Suicide Prevention Week Schedule of Events:

Sunday, September 7, 7pm PT/10pm ET: MSW@USC’s community manager @GabyAcosta101 will serve as a special guest on the Suicide Prevention Social Media Twitter Chat #SPSM. Join her for a conversation about how we can leverage new media and virtual campaigns to raise awareness around Suicide Prevention. 

Monday, September 8: Today is the 100 Voices for Suicide Prevention Kick-off! Over 45 leading voices in the suicide prevention field have contributed guest posts, podcast interviews, PSA’s, and resources to help raise awareness in honor of Suicide Prevention and Awareness Month. We ask that you share this project to help promote the work that our collaborators are doing to prevent suicide in their communities. 

Tuesday, September 9: Check out the “You Matter” project. This early-intervention campaign aims to to facilitate human connections in order to promote positive mental health. According to the IASP, connectedness is crucial to individuals who may be vulnerable to suicide. Studies have shown that social isolation can increase the risk of suicide and, conversely, that having strong human bonds can be protective against it. Reaching out to those who have become disconnected from others and offering them support and friendship may be a life-saving act.

Wednesday, September 10: Today is World Suicide Prevention Day! Follow the International Association of Suicide Prevention on Facebook for updates on their WSPD events.

Thursday, September 11, 6pm PT/9pm ET: @MSWatUSC will be moderating the #MacroSW tweet chat to discuss ways we can synchronize suicide prevention efforts between individuals and organizations around the country. RSVP for this event here.

Friday, September 12: Join us for a #NSPW Follow Friday! Tweet and mention individuals and organizations who you want to recognize as leaders in #suicideprevention and awareness advocacy work.

Spread the Word On Social Media:

For Collaborators:

Sample Tweet: I’m joining @MSWatUSC & 45+ experts for the 100 Voices for Suicide Prevention campaign. Read my post here: http://bit.ly/100Voices #NSPW

Sample Facebook Post: I’m joining over 45 experts in the field and USC School of Social Work for the 100 Voices for Suicide Prevention campaign. Check out my submission here: http://bit.ly/100Voices #NSPW


For Advocates:

Sample Tweet: @MSWatUSC joins together w/ 45+ experts for the 100 Voices for #SuicidePrevention campaign. Read Now: http://bit.ly/100Voices #NSPW
            
Sample Facebook Post: “USC School of Social Work has built a collaboration with over 45 leading voices in the suicide prevention field who have contributed guest posts, podcast interviews, PSA’s, and resources. Share the 100 Voices Campaign to raise awareness for this critical issue: http://bit.ly/100Voices #NSPW

Keep the suicide prevention and awareness conversation going on social media using the following hashtags: #suicideprevention #NSPW #stayalive #youarenotalone #itgetsbetter #saynotosuicide #stopsuicide #unsuicide #twloha #loveislouder

Thank you for raising awareness with us!  

If you or a friend are considering suicide please call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255. It is free and confidential.

I’ve written often about my fear of failure, and my equally daunting fear of success.  These fears have sat equally sour in my belly since high school.  I’m afraid to be nothing, afraid of not fulfilling my purpose, but I’m equally afraid of how my life might change if I do succeed in doing what it is that same gut keeps niggling at me over and over, telling me I’m meant to do.

If only that gut spoke plain English.

But it doesn’t.  It speaks in code.  It speaks in hieroglyphics, in tongues at which I’m left to decipher and guess.

I know it’s always a mistake when I ignore my gut.  Lord knows, ignoring that flip in the hollow of my stomach before I got into a car with a guy I didn’t know when another guy I did know asked his “friend” to give me a ride home was a big mistake.  Did my “friend” know this was his bud's M.O?  I was too ashamed, so I never told.  How many girls had the bud done this to?  Had anyone else ever reported it?  Had there been some kind of secret handshake that passed between them?  Was my friend possibly in on it?

It was the 80s.  We chalked it up to a bad date—a bad choice, my own damn fault (which is complete and utter bull$hit, if you wondered!)—and we moved on. 

But you never really do.

You just learn, time after time, to question and question again your own intelligence, your own abilities.  You question your own gut’s messages about right or wrong, its whispers about do it or don’t do it, its twinges and twists and which way they mean for you to go. 

Speak English, damn you!

Just tell me, please.  What is it you want me to do?  Which answer is the right one to help me feed my family?

“Girgle, girgle,” crickets….

—sigh--

Somehow, when it's about your own life, Intuition can be a bitch, and Doubt, her master.

Then something I spent an entire weekend berating myself over for yet another failure, with perspective morphed into opportunity, into action, an honest to goodness aha!

I made a phone call.  I felt certain.    

What I thought I felt certain about became something else entirely.  A lunch turned into a three-hour meeting, into a tour, into another impromptu meeting, into a follow-up meeting next week.

I’m in awe, I’m awakened, and I have a vision that has never been clearer.  

Everything in my life has led up to this presentation next week, to this moment.  The dots connect, the failures make sense, every moment of the last two years of hard work and educating myself, the odd job, the “gifts” that seem not at all related, slip effortlessly together with a clang of realization.

All of this is to say that, my cooking demonstration planned for The Box Factory on December 11th has met with some challenges that make it impossible to pull off in the time-frame I’d allotted myself (so we'll do it in late January, likely that week before the Super Bowl).  

But please stay tuned for something that could be, that will be, bigger and better and incredibly exciting!   

I’m working on the presentation of my life this week.  So don’t think I’ve buried myself under a bush to lick at my wounds…I’m strategizing, I’m pulling it all together like never before.

I’m listening to my gut and writing down its every note, because for once its intentions are clear and beautiful as perfect harmony.  Which, when I remember what it felt like to sit in the middle of a choir of voices, brings me to tears, each and every time.  Heck, maybe one day I'll incorporate that into this little project of mine, too.


**If you didn't already, check out http://www.supportacappella.org -- who needs instruments?! Music ed for FREE!**

Just Write is a weekly writing exercise sponsored by Heather of the Extraordinary Ordinary, WHO ROCKS! Hadn't participated in awhile, but this reflection definitely fits.