Third annual Whitney's Walk
By
Kim Carollo
Posted: Saturday, July 29, 2006 at 5:30 PM
More people die by suicide than from
homicide in the U.S., and it's the eighth leading cause of death.
To raise
awareness of those facts, more than 1000 people took part in a
suicide prevention walk.
Whitney's
Walk is in honor of a local teenager who killed herself.
Friends
and family of people who died by suicide joined others concerned
about the cause.
They also
came out to draw attention to the struggle with mental illness, and
how it can lead to suicide.
They
walked more than three miles to spread the word that suicide hits
hard in central Illinois.
Organizers
say teenagers are especially vulnerable, and prevention efforts
should start in the schools.
"There are
a lot of kids that are affected by this and that's why we need so
badly to get these programs such as Teen Screen and Yellow Ribbon
implemented into the schools, because it's a good way of identifying
at-risk teens, and it's early detection of that,” said Katie McKown,
an organizer.
Mental
health professionals say events like Whitney's Walk provide a
support system for people dealing with mental illness.
"They're
coming together so that other families can survive their troubled
family members' mental illness without having to deal with the
tragedy of suicide,” said Katie Jones, Director of the Mental
Health Association of Illinois Valley.
Here are
some of the warning signs of suicide:
-
Undiagnosed depression is the leading cause of suicide
-
Watch
out for personality changes, like withdrawal or aggression
-
A
personal crisis could also trigger suicidal thoughts.
-
Hearing someone say things like, "I hate life" is also a red
flag.
|
