I was struck by this 4+ min TED Talk today about the importance of dialogue around suicide.

I’ve been touched (we all have) by suicide in a variety of ways and I have struggles with how to handle it.  One friend committed suicide after years of a debilitating illness and I get sick at the thought of her having to have done it alone.  Another friend killed himself after a severe (though we didn’t see it) battle with depression and I get sick at the thought that I didn’t dialogue with his mother afterwards.  I didn’t know how.  My students have a vast history of suicide attempts and I have openly dialogued about it, yet still- some retried.  Others have committed suicide slowly through addiction and high-risk behavior.  There is no easy fix-it, but the answer does lie, I believe, IN THE DIALOGUE.  How else can we learn.  Stop.  Turn around.  Embrace.  Listen.  Draw it out.

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