'It’s literally life-saving.' Kansas teens support each other through mental health struggles

Chad Harrell was a preferred athlete, good scholar, and rising senior at Blue Valley North High in the summertime of 2017. One night he was late and his dad and mom grounded him. His mom, Sylvia Harrell, checked on him earlier than she went to mattress and located him useless in his room. He had taken his personal life.

“Had I had any inkling, this wouldn’t have happened,” Sylvia Harrell stated in 2018. “I would have been outside his room. I would have fired up my radar to look for it. We were blinded because Chad Harrell wasn’t making bad decisions. The only bad decision he made is appalling.”

Harrell was one of five suicides during the 2017-2018 school year in Johnson County’s high-performing Blue Valley School District. Across Johnson County, teenage deaths nearly doubled in 2018 after a general upward trend in recent years.

In response, six districts launched a new suicide prevention program called Zero Reasons Why. Now in its fourth year, the program is based on three pillars: communicating more openly about mental health and suicide; Building non-judgmental community support and engagement for mental health; and education about suicide prevention consistently and earlier.

111622_Ziegler_MishaRaichura_Zero Reasons Why Participants in Teen Mental Health Program.jpg — Misha Raichura alerted an grownup when certainly one of her buddies opened up about dying by suicide. She later realized that her good friend felt betrayed. Zero Reasons Why seeks to assist youngsters navigate the sophisticated implications of mental health points.

Students discover methods to unfold the message

Misha Raichura, now 18, began Zero Reasons Why at Blue Valley West a couple of years in the past. Now a senior, she dedicates extra time to the marketing campaign because the chief of a “teen council,” certainly one of dozens of peer-to-peer hangout classes the place highschool college students share what is going on on of their lives. She speaks at occasions about teenage mental health, akin to a current Bollywood fundraiser by Seva Dance, a non-profit group that teaches Indian cultural dances.

Zero Reasons Why sponsors its personal occasions: “Yellow-Outs,” the place college students put on yellow signature t-shirts with the marketing campaign emblem; Information and wristband tables in school soccer, basketball and monitor and discipline occasions; and banner captions for college kids to write down messages about their mental health experiences.

Raichura is especially taken with reaching youngsters in center faculty, which is when she observed her buddies had been stressing out about grades, competitors, and peer strain.

“I had a few friends in seventh and eighth grade who didn’t come to school for the day at all excited,” she stated. “You would ask them, ‘Are you going to this or that activity?’ and they’re just like, ‘Uh, I don’t know.’ They have no interest in anything that is going on.”

She said the program helped her decipher messages that suggest a child is at risk. “Normally they would not use the phrases ‘depressed’ or ‘take my life,'” Raichura said. “It could be extra like, ‘I’m so finished with this, I’m simply going to finish all of it.’ Or ‘Thank you for being an excellent good friend whereas it lasted.’”

But when Raichura confided in an in depth good friend that she is likely to be considering self-harm, she turned to an grownup. Then she realized that the talks do not all the time go as anticipated.

“A couple of times this person felt betrayed and didn’t want to talk to me anymore about how they were feeling, which left them completely alone,” Raichura stated. “In the back of my mind I felt like I had done something wrong by telling an adult.”

What she realized was easy methods to let adults know she’s anxious with out sharing all the main points of texts or conversations, messages that somebody may suppose they’ve shared confidentially.

Ava Shropshire (proper) has discovered that the Zero Reason’s Why marketing campaign linked her with other youngsters throughout a troublesome transition to a brand new metropolis. Her brother Joshua additionally participates in this system.

Ava Shropshire, 17, not too long ago relocated to Overland Park from Texas. She is homeschooled and not too long ago joined a youth council. She stated the tales shared on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter gave her a way of group and luxury whereas adjusting to a brand new place.

“I’m not the only one going through this. I’m not weird or crazy,” she stated. “Even just scrolling through my social media, I can see a story and it’s like, ‘Oh I needed that today,’ and it’s a reminder that I’m not alone.”

Nationally, suicide continues to be the third main reason for dying amongst individuals aged 10 to 24. It is the second main reason for dying in youngsters between the ages of 10 and 14.

If you or somebody you recognize is in disaster, name the Suicide Prevention Line at 9-8-8 or textual content or chat on-line at 988lifeline.org/chat.

Students like Shropshire stated a part of what they want is extra skilled professionals and sources to coach adults.

“We made some videos specifically for adults,” Shropshire stated. “And I went to the Statehouse and spoke to some adults in power. Now we need to see adults stand up because it can be difficult for teens to advocate for more community resources. Zero Reasons Why cannot cover all areas of need.”

Shropshire, who is black, said she would also like to see more diversity among participants and sensitivity to how different families and cultures approach mental health and parenting.

A young man wearing a sweatshirt is smiling and looking at the camera. His reflection can be seen in the window behind him. — Rahul Chavali was nervous about telling his dad and mom he was going to get some Bs in school as a result of he was feeling remoted and anxious in the course of the pandemic. Through Zero Reasons Why, he realized others felt the identical manner and gained the arrogance to speak to his dad and mom.

Rahul Chavali, 17, was afraid to talk to his dad and mom when his wonderful grades slipped. A social sort, upbeat and agile, who enjoys going to the fitness center and taking part in the drums with buddies, he has been feeling unmotivated and distracted in the course of the COVID-19 lockdown.

But listening to that his friends shared comparable fears gave him the arrogance to share his experiences together with his mom and father, who got here from a small village in India.

“So in her mind, it was always about working in a better place,” Chavali stated. “The shift is like, there are still issues that you may encounter and there are still ways you can help your own mental health. You just have to be able to talk about it.”

Expansion to other areas

Statistics on suicide prevention are difficult to collect: if something doesn’t happen, there are no numbers to reflect it. But Johnson County officials say the number of deaths from suicide among people under the age of 19 has declined: 9 in 2018 and 2019; 6 in 2020; 7 in 2021; 4 to September this year.

Perhaps more meaningfully, 911 calls are up 125%. That means more and more people are looking for help.

Another indicator of success is the expansion of Zero Reason’s Why into Sedgwick County and a four-county area of central Kansas and into Jackson County, Missouri.

At Hoisington High in Barton County, Kansas, which has a population of about 2,500, Kynlie told Crowdie before getting involved last year that she would never disclose her depression, knowing how quickly gossip spread in the small community.

“I knew I seemed like I had all of it collectively and everybody else seemed like they’d all of it collectively,” she said. “I could not inform which certainly one of us faked it.”

However, she said Zero Reason’s Why storytelling campaign, social media presence and education efforts are making it safer for everyone to open up.

“We discuss in regards to the successes we have had,” she stated. “But we have received some criticism. People who tell us it’s not important for us to discuss it. That we should go ahead and find out something else. It is not a waste of time in any way, shape or form. It’s literally life saving.”