Many people probably spent this past Saturday relaxing with friends and family. I won’t lie, I did as well. I, like many others, spent Saturday, September 10, 2016, with friends, having fun, and generally going about my life as if it were any other Saturday. However, in the back of my head I remembered the hundreds of tweets I had seen this past week and realized how lucky I was to be in a good place, spending a beautiful Saturday surrounded by friends.
This past week was World Suicide Prevention Week. Unfortunately, many people were not aware of this. I happen to follow "To Write Love on Her Arms" (TWLOHA) on Twitter, a nonprofit dedicated to spread hope and help for people struggling with depression, addiction, self-injury, and suicide, so I was well aware that it wasn’t just any other week. They started a hashtag on Twitter called #IKeptLiving and would retweet peoples’ stories of survival and hope, in order to spread the idea that things do get better. I spent the week reading stories and tweets of strangers who all have their own story to tell. For this reason, among many others, I am a strong supporter of TWLOHA and all that they do to spread hope around the globe to people who are struggling.
World Suicide Prevention Day was something I had always known about since I became aware of non-profits like TWLOHA, Hope For The Day, and Stay Positive, Bro. When I mentioned it to a few of my friends they weren’t even aware that it was a legitimate thing. In all honesty, that made my heart very sad. There are people working endlessly to promote self-love and hope and this day is an extremely important day to them. On the contrary, there are people who aren’t even aware that it occurs. My question is how can we fix that?
According to DoSomething.org and the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, between 30,000 and 45,000 Americans commit suicide every year. Most people have been affected by suicide in some way, whether it be in their community or seen on the news.For this reason, I personally feel as if World Suicide Prevention Week and Day should be more prevalent in society. While there are many nonprofits working tirelessly to promote it, they simply cannot spread the information by themselves. This is a problem because unless you are familiar with these nonprofits or know someone who is, you probably won’t be aware of it.
In reality, it’s irrational to believe that the whole world could get behind World Suicide Prevention Day. However, I do hope that eventually it can get more traction in the media or around schools across America. It’s important to spread suicide prevention across not only the United States, but globally, and I firmly stand behind anyone trying to achieve that. Hope is a critically important value to spread around, especially to those struggling with depression or any other mental illness. Therefore, I hope that even if people weren’t originally aware of World Suicide Prevention Week and Day, they will still spread hope to those who struggle with these issues in their own way.
