Suicide Prevention Student Essays

In the middle of September, the Malta American Legion Auxiliary announced they were sponsoring a Suicide Awareness Essay and Art Contest and asked local schools to submit their student’s works. What follows is some of the essays written by Dodson School students in Francine KillEagle’s class.

Editor's Note: Students asked that their essays run anonymously unless otherwise noted.

My Thoughts on Suicide

Tiffany Cliff

Entering the high school world and still growing up in it, I hear and see a lot of suicidal stories about younger children, my age, or older that have committed suicide. I have always wondered why they would want to take their own life at such a young age. But as I get older and see more things on suicide and why it happens, I sort of understand why. I will never understand why people must go through so much pain from bullying or whatever gives them enough pain to take their own life. No one should ever have to deal with suicide in life because life still has a lot to offer. Suicide makes me feel sad for the people that dealt and are still dealing with it because you never know when someone is suffering deep down inside, and you don’t know when someone needs help and I think that is why suicide happens a lot.

I have a lot of hopes for suicide because I believe it affects many mentally. When dealing with things mentally that bothers you enough, I think you should talk to someone, but I know that it takes a lot to talk to someone about something that you are dealing with. It may help a lot talking to someone about your thoughts and feelings or even something that you are dealing with that affects your life. My hopes for people dealing with things like this is not having the first thought to just end your life. The first thought people should have been trying to talk to someone they’re most comfortable with. I believe that you are on this planet for a reason and suicide should never be your first solution. So, if you or someone you know that is having suicidal thoughts here is a hotline that can help 1-800-273-8255.

“Place your hand over your heart, can you feel it? That is called your purpose. You’re alive for a reason so don’t ever give up”- unknown

My thoughts, ideas, hopes and views on suicide

Nellene Messerly

No one should be put in so much pain to where they would want to end their life because someone else doesn’t like how they look, talk, dress, eat or walk everyone was made different and most of the time suicide isn’t because of a bully it’s because they’ll have mental problems with whatever is happening at home, the most suicides I’ve heard about was because something happened in a home they were raised in and most of the time they don’t have anyone to talk to. I hate suicide and it makes me feel really bad because they don’t want a life that god gave them and every time someone commits suicide there had been times where they could’ve had help but no one would give at least a hour to sit down and talk someone out of ending their life but instead of helping people like to point fingers and blame everyone else. My ideas are that our community can come together and help out with suicide to help prevent people from ending their lives by making a daily thing for everyone to do so that they’ll be so busy where they won’t have any time to think about any negative thoughts. I really hope that no one will ever feel like they don’t belong on this earth, i hope that more people will stop making others feel like that, i hope that more people will come aware of suicide and will do anything to help prevent it. I think that when people try to help others they don’t succeed because they will eventually stop and will give up because they feel as if they have no hope or confident in helping others that need it.

“I’m told to stay strong, keep fighting; but they don’t understand… I’ve already lost”

My Thoughts On Suicide

Kailee Henry

Growing up on an “Indian’’ reservation, I practically grew up with the word suicide. I have al-ways seen or heard news of people committing suicide. At first I couldn’t understand how peo-ple could do that to themselves. As I grew older I started to realize why people would do such terrible things to their own bodies. I started to see how terrible people were living on the rez. I became understanding and sorry to these people because it is really hard growing up with only learning how to give up so easily and to always hear people say that you will amount to nothing in your life. People go through so much in their lives. So much pain and heartache. What made me completely understand suicide and why people commit it is because I have a personal experience with it. A couple years ago I became mad, sad, and so depressed that I wouldn't eat or sleep. I would stay in my room and just lay in bed and think. I started to think about how life would be for everyone if I never existed in the first place. Those thoughts soon led to punishing myself which meant I would start to self-harm. I hated myself and my life so much that i started to think about suicide and only suicide. I wanted to not exist anymore. I was in such a deep hole that I couldn't get out of, but here I am today happy and healthy. Yes, I do have scars and wounds from the past but instead of thinking negatively about them i look at it all as motivation to never hate myself that much ever again. Having that experience has opened my eyes and ears about people who are struggling with depression and suicidal thoughts. Honestly i would love to help any and every one with this. My hopes that as a state we can lower the suicide rates and open programs that not only help people with their emotions but also teach others he signs and how to talk to someone who is struggling with suicidal thoughts.

My Thoughts About Suicide

Anonymous

“It’s not your job to like me, it’s mine”. I saw this as a meme on Facebook one day and it stuck with me. I think about some of my friends and family that have struggled with suicidal thoughts and I realized that it comes down to most of them wanting acceptance from other people and not loving themselves. I think if there was more help, especially in our State of Montana, on self-esteem and self-worth it would help with our suicide rates going down. A lot of people around our area, especially on the reservations, don’t have much for materialistic things and family life. They aren’t shown love sometimes because of the alcohol and drug addictions that are on the rise in our area that make the parents neglect their children. If the parents aren’t even able to show them, love, why would they be able to love themselves? A lot of suicidal thoughts come from feeling unloved and not knowing how to love themselves and thinking they have no purpose to be here. Some of these youth that is hurting are also going out of their way to hurt others or “bully”. This is a problem for those that are already struggling to love themselves also because it validates that they should not be here if others are saying things to them that they are already thinking. It’s all a cycle of hurt because hurt people will hurt others. I feel like if we had more programs around here to teach the youth to love themselves and not need acceptance from oth-ers, then the suicide rate would go down. I see adults doing the same thing and bullying each other, especially on social media. Social media is another tool that people use a wrong to hurt others. I feel like the suicide rate might have not been as high before the days of social media. We need to go back to treating others the way we would want to be treated and love each other and ourselves.

About Suicide

Anonymous

Suicide is a very bad thing to get into. If you are thinking about suicide you need to tell some-one. There are many people you can talk to about your feelings. You can talk to your parents, any teacher at the school, your principle, or on the phone to a professional. I hope people will stop doing suicide. That is what suicide is to me.

My thoughts on suicide

Anonymous

My thoughts on suicide are very emotional and I wish such a thing was never done. I can relate to some of the people out there struggling with life because I was diagnosed with depression just when I was a 9th grader. In 10th grade, I started to talk to a psychologist.

Now I’m a 12th grader and every day I slowly go back to the normal, happy, and upbeat person that I used to be. We can all eventually make the world suicide free if we know how to handle the stress that comes with life. Examples like family structures, grades, income, any type of insurance, and relationships those are the main causes of stress in my opinion. In South Korea they have the thought of getting good grades are everything and if you don’t do good in school your a nobody.

The rates of suicide for South Korea is 15.0 deaths by suicide per 100,000 for females and the males suicide rate is the third highest with 32.5 per every 100,000 deaths, according to the suicidal rate list. That was just one of the reasons why people stress over the little things in life and eventually it adds up. My hopes for suicide is to lead the upcoming generation out of poverty and suffering from being looked down on or people saying that they're worthless. I also hope to uplift the next generation out of this widespread of being glooming all the time.

One of my biggest wishes is for technology to die down a bit so this generation can have and spend more time out in nature then looking at a screen. The states should come up with a program to help kids get active and get their minds off things. I wish that we can abolish suicide soon.

My Thoughts On Suicide

Anonymous

Suicide; the act of intentionally causing one’s own death. Suicide is probably the scariest thing ever. I've seen people go through depression and have suicidal thoughts. Sometimes I wish some people knew how bad the simplicity of one word can hurt someone. Most times people say hurtful words without thinking, it can just slip out, but that is never an excuse. I know that most suicidal people nev-er say anything about being sad or depressed. Most times you just don’t even know they’re hurting. Someday I hope the suicide rate goes down a lot, but I don't think that will happen with the way people spread negativity and hate. I think we can prevent suicide by having more education and awareness. Everyone should learn about suicide and how it affects people. They should also learn about mental illness. Most suicidal thoughts are built up by depression, which is one of the worst mental illnesses. People should check on their friends every once in a while too. That would probably help a lot. You really never know what someone could be going through. All in all, these are my thoughts on suicide.