September is National Suicide Prevention month, an annual campaign in the United States to inform and engage health professionals and the general public about suicide prevention and the warning signs of suicide. There’s not better way to bring light to this important topic than through powerful programming and author events.
Monica Wood, bestselling author of When We Were the Kennedys and One-in-a-Million Boy shares her personal story about the suicide attempt of her husband of 41 years. “People do just get completely overwhelmed with life sometimes and that is what happened,” Wood said. “And sometimes it’s just a perfect storm of things that can happen. If it can happen to him, it could happen to anybody.”
Alix Strauss, NYT reporter and author of Death Becomes Them, explores mental illness and addiction through the topics of suicide, hoping to end the stigma of discussing these issues openly, particularly among young people.
By the time you finish reading this piece, someone will have committed suicide. And 44,000 American die by suicide each year, making it the 10th leading cause of death in the US. That’s an average of 121 suicides per day. If you or someone you know is struggling, please call the National Suicide Prevention line: 1-800-273-8255.
