OKLAHOMA CITY –<\/p>\n
September is Suicide Prevention Month, a time to raise awareness of the importance of mental health in Oklahoma. Trisha Koelsch, CEO of Calm Waters, joins News 9 to discuss having hard conversations and what resources are available at Calm Waters. <\/p>\n
\n How do we begin to address that Oklahoma is among the top 10 states for the highest suicide rate?<\/p>\n
Koelsch: Yeah, it\u2019s not a stat that we want to have. Right. Another one is, you know, we\u2019ve talked about it before that one in ten children will experience the loss of a loved one in their home. So either a sibling or a parent, this kind of goes hand in hand with that. And the second leading cause of that is suicide. You know, so that\u2019s tough. So that makes our average here in Oklahoma higher than the national average. <\/p>\n
\n What can we do to change it? <\/p>\n
Koelsch: We\u2019ve got to have those hard conversations. So when you start seeing the symptoms or someone is pulling back, if they\u2019re saying some things like, we would be better off without them in this world, or you\u2019d be better off without me or they start saying goodbyes like hey in case I don\u2019t see you again just know that I love you you know if you start seeing those types of signs and people are people talking about how they want to die that\u2019s the time to start having those hard conversations confront them <\/p>\n
\n What do you actually say to someone who might be contemplating suicide?<\/p>\n
Koelsch: Be direct. Ask them, are you considering suicide? And have a conversation with them. Don\u2019t get angry with them or upset. Feel for them and let them know that you care and that you\u2019re there to help. You don\u2019t wanna be too late so as soon as you see the signs be direct be upfront ask them the hard questions and make them talk to you. <\/p>\n
\n What support groups does Calm Waters have? <\/p>\n
Koelsch: We actually have a support group that is specifically for people who\u2019ve lost a loved one due to suicide. Yeah, so it\u2019s a great opportunity to come be around other people who are experiencing a loss similar to yours so that you have a community and you know that you\u2019re not alone. <\/p>\n
\n What\u2019s something that a lot of Oklahomans don\u2019t realize about either suicide, suicide prevention, or the impacts of it? <\/p>\n
Koelsch: I wish more people knew that? I wish more people knew to have the hard conversations because we always think someone else will or, oh, they\u2019re being dramatic or, oh, you know, we always come up with some excuse as to why we don\u2019t want to have hard conversations. But it\u2019s really important that we do.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"OKLAHOMA CITY – September is Suicide Prevention Month, a time to raise awareness of the importance of mental…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":624778,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[103,61,60,410,411],"class_list":["post-624777","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-mental-health","tag-health","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-mental-health","tag-mentalhealth"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/624777","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=624777"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/624777\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/624778"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=624777"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=624777"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=624777"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}