{"id":953,"date":"2015-07-13T15:03:36","date_gmt":"2015-07-13T20:03:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/barkadacircle.com\/?p=953"},"modified":"2015-07-13T15:03:36","modified_gmt":"2015-07-13T20:03:36","slug":"a-life-worth-living","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/barkadacircle.com\/blog\/2015\/07\/13\/a-life-worth-living\/","title":{"rendered":"A Life Worth Living"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Early in the spring of this year, I had the privilege and the pleasure meeting the good folks who carry out the mission of the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.afsp.org\/local-chapters\/find-your-local-chapter\/afsp-illinois\" target=\"_blank\">American Foundation for Suicide Prevention<\/a> in IL. Volunteers from all over the Chicagoland region gathered to share stories and learn how to increase awareness for the cause. I had the opportunity to give the volunteers useful tips on how to engage others through storytelling. Today, I\u2019m launching my <a href=\"http:\/\/afsp.donordrive.com\/index.cfm?fuseaction=donorDrive.participant&amp;participantID=732957\" target=\"_blank\">personal campaign<\/a> to raise some funds so that I can join the volunteers when they walk to raise awareness for suicide prevention. The <a href=\"http:\/\/www.afsp.org\/out-of-the-darkness-walks\" target=\"_blank\">Out of the Darkness Community Walk<\/a> takes place on Sept. 26 at Grant Park in Chicago.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Helping us craft our message for <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/AFSPIL\">@AFSPIL<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/SuicidePrevention?src=hash\">#SuicidePrevention<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hashtag\/volunteers?src=hash\">#volunteers<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/barkadacircle\">@barkadacircle<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/RachelleJervis\">@RachelleJervis<\/a> <a href=\"http:\/\/t.co\/2QRTs96IVi\">pic.twitter.com\/2QRTs96IVi<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Alyssa Relyea (@AlyssaRelyea1) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/AlyssaRelyea1\/status\/576794268330823680\">March 14, 2015<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>Suicide is a serious public health problem that takes an enormous toll on families, friends, classmates, co-workers, and communities, as well as on our military personnel and veterans.\u00a0 According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in 2013\u2013the most recent year for which full data is available\u2013someone in the United States died by suicide every 12.9 minutes. This makes it the 10th leading cause of death for Americans, but unlike many other leading causes, suicide continues to claim more lives each year. Suicide is currently the third leading cause of death among young people age 15 to 24. The highest overall rates of suicide are for adults age 40 to 59.<\/p>\n<p>To know the reason for someone\u2019s suicide death is challenging. Research has shown that most people who die by suicide have a potentially treatable mental disorder at the time of their death. The disorder has often gone unrecognized and untreated. What we know about the causes of suicide is lagging behind that of other life-threatening illnesses because the stigma surrounding suicide has limited society\u2019s investment in vital research.<\/p>\n<p>The stories shared by volunteers at the gathering made me realize that even when our lives appear fine from the outside, locked within can be a world of quiet suffering, leading some to the decision to end their life.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_955\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-955\" style=\"width: 584px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"https:\/\/barkadacircle.files.wordpress.com\/2015\/07\/ted_suicide.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-full wp-image-955\" src=\"https:\/\/barkadacircle.files.wordpress.com\/2015\/07\/ted_suicide.jpg\" alt=\"Nadine Burke Harris, JD Schramm &amp; Guy Winch\" width=\"584\" height=\"175\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-955\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Nadine Burke Harris, JD Schramm &amp; Guy Winch<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<!--[if lt IE 9]><script>document.createElement('audio');<\/script><![endif]-->\n<audio class=\"wp-audio-shortcode\" id=\"audio-953-1\" preload=\"none\" style=\"width: 100%;\" controls=\"controls\"><source type=\"audio\/mpeg\" src=\"https:\/\/barkadacircle.files.wordpress.com\/2015\/07\/nicecast-archived-audio-20150713-1017.mp3?_=1\" \/><a href=\"https:\/\/barkadacircle.files.wordpress.com\/2015\/07\/nicecast-archived-audio-20150713-1017.mp3\">https:\/\/barkadacircle.files.wordpress.com\/2015\/07\/nicecast-archived-audio-20150713-1017.mp3<\/a><\/audio>\n<p>Listen to three stories that ask us to break the silence surrounding suicide, advocate for medical interventions to counteract the damaging impact of stress, and encourage us to take care of our emotions and our minds with the same diligence in taking care of our bodies.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Early in the spring of this year, I had the privilege and the pleasure meeting the good folks who carry out the mission of the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention in IL. Volunteers from all over the Chicagoland region gathered to share stories and learn how to increase awareness for the cause. I had the &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/barkadacircle.com\/blog\/2015\/07\/13\/a-life-worth-living\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">A Life Worth Living<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[2],"tags":[5,23,61,111,112,115],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/barkadacircle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/953"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/barkadacircle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/barkadacircle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/barkadacircle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/barkadacircle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=953"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/barkadacircle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/953\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/barkadacircle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=953"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/barkadacircle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=953"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/barkadacircle.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=953"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}