I’m living sad days (I lost last week my eldest son through heart attack, and nobody had a presentiment about his bad heart) and I feel the nearness of the "Grim Reaper”. Reading a few stories from the summer Anthology (Escape) and a lot of others, I was remembered of the importance of the suicide’s thought of young people, gay and straight. That’s the reason of this topic.
It has been widely reported in the media that gay and lesbian youth are at higher risk to complete suicide than other youth and that a significant percent of all attempted or completed youth suicides are related to issues of sexual identity. However, there are no national statistics for suicide completion rates among gay, lesbian or bisexual persons, and in the few studies examining risk factors for suicide completion where an attempt was made to assess sexual orientation, the risk for gay or lesbian persons did not appear any greater than among heterosexuals. With regard to suicide attempts, several state and national studies have reported that high school students who report to engaging in homosexual or bisexual activity have higher rates of suicide thoughts and attempts compared to youth with heterosexual experience.
Tiger has already brought in the Gay Authors Teen Spot in his topic “Gay Teen Suicide Prevention, Please read to possibly save a life! “ what could be done. I researched also what is done for successful suicide prevention but he closed his topic. The best site of those he brought are IMO this one: read this first .
In Switzerland, the association STOP SUICIDE has launched a guerilla marketing action to efficiently prevent suicide and to raise public awareness for the problem of suicide amongst young people. The message of the action is: “Want to jump one last time? Go to stopsuicide.ch” and has been written on the most popular of the diving boards at Lake Geneva.

I’m sure what these sites are doing is important, but I couldn’t imagine somebody with such thinking in mind going on Internet to search help. Mostly their pains are hidden and even their close friends or relatives are often not aware of their feelings.
I hope sincerely that such problems don’t concern at the moment anybody of us, but I want to remember all of you to always look around you, observing the mood of the people you frequent, and not hesitate to make contact , to ask and if possible to offer your help.
Hearth attack has nothing to do with suicide. But I’m sure that if we had be more attentive of the first signs of his state, (tiredness, stress) my son would be still alive.
Old bob

If you are having suicidal thoughts, please do not discuss them in this topic. Seek help immediately! Call 1-866-4U-TREVOR or 1-800-SUICIDE.

First, I'd like to say that I'm sincerely sorry for your loss. You've made some great points. I've posted many of the symptoms in the Gay Teen Suicide Prevention topic. I have not known many who have completed suicide, and I do not want anyone here to feel that it's the only answer. There is plenty of help out there. Several links and numbers are listed in the thread and two of the numbers are repeated above.

Most countries, even homophobic ones, have teen helplines that help children to cope with various problems. I do not say that they include sexuality in their counselling, but, it always helps to talk to someone. Moreover, with the changing times, many of these psychologists are now open-minded enough to accept the sexuality of their clients (I would not call them patients)



BeaStKid

I'm so very sorry for your loss, Old Bob

My thoughts and prayers are with you and your family.


This is indeed a very timely and relevant topic. It's very tragic, downright heartbreaking, to read these reports and hear these statistics


I agree; that is a very good site and I hope everyone does take heed of it.


Hmm...I guess you may be right, but personally I think such people would be very likely to search the internet for help. I think the relatively anonymity and the general less judgmental tone make the internet an ideal place for people to seek help with this issue. I may be completely off-base - I've never suicidal or even anywhere near pre-suicidal - but I think if I were in this situation the internet would be one of the first places I would turn for succor. In that way I'm very optimistic that websites such as that, and resources and links such as the ones posted, can do a lot of good; I only hope my optimism isn't ill-founded.


I agree, that is excellent advice!

As I said, I've never been suicidal myself, but I've known a few people who have. Fortunately, they all survived. I won't be arrogant enough to believe that it had anything to do with me, but I generally believe that having some support and someone to talk to is very helpful and comforting.







Take care everyone, and do indeed be attentive to your situation and that of those around you,
-Kevin