About the Episode

UNSILENT Season 2, Ep 2 - "Surviving TripleSuicide Loss: Part 2" with Danielle. In Part 2 of this 3-part SPEAK, we get to know more about Danielle, a survivor of three suicides in her family. She shares about her coping strategies, how we can be youth mental health advocates, and the importance of seeking out networks of peer support. We thank Danielle for her honestly, her heart, and her conviction to mental health advocacy. Catch up on Part 1 of her story here ➡️ youtu.be/X0w5BC60w6U.

ICYMI - In Part 1, Danielle shares about the lived experience of being a survivor of three suicide losses in her family. She talks impact of these losses, her own mental health journey, and tackles the often-asked questions to survivors of "What should we say? What can we do? What could you have done?"

Be sure to visit nostigmas.org/unsilent to watch, listen to, and read all of our conversations this season. We are survivors, thrivers, advocates, and Allies. We see you. We love you.

BE UNSILENT 💚

Episode Notes

Thank you for being here. To go beyond the show, consider leaving us a positive review and sharing wherever you listen to podcasts! Follow us and reach out on social media @nostigmas. We'd love to connect with you. To learn more about NoStigmas and how we can team up to fight stigmas, visit nostigmas.org.

Special Thanks To…

Guest: Danielle Donelson danielledonelson.substack.com

Helpful Links and Resources

NoStigmas Website: nostigmas.org

Meet the Team!

John Panicucci | Video Editor

Lance Bordelon | Marketing Coordinator

Maggie Seagraves | Marketing Assistant

Jacob Moore | NoStigmas Founder & Unsilent EP | @jacobmoore

Music

Another Day Of Moon by BatchBug | soundcloud.com/batchbug

Music promoted by free-stock-music.com

Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported License

TRANSCRIPT:

[00:00:00] Danielle: When younger people, teenagers, or younger people in, in college have those experiences where all of a sudden, their ability to see in the past or see in the future that there's ever gonna be any hope or any difference. Um, that's part of the direness of the situation and why the, we may look at it as your problems, you know, are, are limited or trivial or, or whatever that, that's why it's such a grave serious. Take mental health and to take that emotional development seriously.

[00:00:32] Lance: Hi, my name is Lance and this is UNSILENT: A S.P.E.A.K. Series by NoStigmas that champions mental health advocacy, and challenges, stigmas that all too often prevent people from getting the help they need. We're so happy you're here.

[00:00:44] And in today's second part of our three part conversation, we get to know more about Danielle's coping strategies and how she manages her own mental health. And she also shares a little bit about what she thinks it takes for us to be our best advocates for others, especially the youth in our lives. And she also shares the importance of seeking out network and connecting with others.

[00:01:02] Be sure to check out part one of our three part conversation. To get to know more about Danielle and her story. We're so thankful to Danielle for sharing her story with us and being so honest and open and vulnerable. Thank you again for being with us. And remember to break these stigmas, we must be UNSILENT. Let's dive in.

[00:01:17] TRIGGER WARNING: Today's episode contains in-depth conversations around suicide, suicidal ideation and suicide loss. It's okay. If you need to skip this one, do what's right for.

[00:01:34] Danielle: I have, uh, realized, like I said, that this is, this is a. A series of losses and, and a, and a huge undertaking of my ultimate question of how do I deal with intergenerational trauma and loss. So there's not one set thing and I'm still working on it. Of course. Um, but I will say that there are a few things that have been very helpful for me.

[00:01:56] EMDR therapy was one that was very helpful to me. I, I have done psychotherapy C B T cognitive behavioral therapy before, but. MDR helped me to address that our trauma and our experiences get stored within the body. So it was a way of, of therapy to help release trauma from the body that I found incredibly difficult to explain very humbling for an English, uh, person.

[00:02:24] Who's a wordsmith, but it, it, it was life changing for me. I've. I have sought out ways to take better care of my, my gut health, because I did experience PTSD and heightened levels of cortisol. I tried to reset my body and take better care of, of my microbiome, of my, my gut health of trying to attend to healing a vagus nerve.

[00:02:51] I started to learn about the fact that. Your gut is actually called your second brain. That there's a lot of reasons why we call it. I have a gut feeling. So I started to take better care of, of, um, of my, my microbiome of my gut health, which really influences your mood and your anxiety, you know, your mental health in that regard, I practice hot yoga and I've, I've learned that cardiovascular exercise with the release of endorphins is also something really, really important for me to tend to my mental.

[00:03:22] And I recently have discovered a biofield tuning, which is something that has been very interesting, but it is some, um, energy healing that acknowledges that our bodies are electric biomagnetic electric beings. And that's something as, as well as. Um, I journal a lot. I write through my experiences as someone who is an English professor and a cultural rhetoric and believes in stories and embodied, lived embodied experiences, and the ways that sharing those, hearing those, telling those holding space for those can be tremendously healing.

[00:03:56] Those are some of the things that. That I have done. I have sought out support groups. I didn't really find that it was a place for me, although I think that's wonderful for people who, um, who need that community and, and emotional support has been invaluable in my, in my journey. I think that I have read a lot of books about epigenetics, about emotional inheritance, intergenerational trauma, as well as grief and loss, because I had so many all at once.

[00:04:28] And I sought out other people's stories and I didn't necessarily find anybody who had two suicide within the immediate family. Um, and that was part of my reason to want to talk about and share my own story, but also to try to build connections and learn from people's experiences of grief and loss and how they coped and managed have all been a real, have all been very, very important parts of my journey and.

[00:04:56] I, I really believe that some of the ways in which I was being directed and, you know, surrendering just, I need help. I need healing. I'm putting my story out there. I'm seeking out support of, of who, who can, can share their, their insights and their experiences of how they've coped with their loss. Um, I'm very, very thankful for technology and online spaces that, that offer that kind of support and that kind of information.

[00:05:24] because I, I contrast that to the family members of mine who, you know, even have an aunt who had completed suicide, who I think so often how with smartphones, with the internet, we have such a wealth of both information and community support at our fingertips. And I certainly am incredibly thankful for that.

[00:05:44] And I've made use of that in my journey over the last couple of years, I, I grew up and my family is from a very, very rural, small, very rural area. I would say that in many ways, a good 10 to 20 years behind, uh, times and certainly psychiatric care mental health help in such a remote area is very, very limited in that, you know, we're a big country.

[00:06:10] There's a lot of rural areas that, that affects a greater portion of the American population than maybe we, you know, think about or. As often as, as we need to, as, as horrendous, as, as COVID has been all of the deaths and all of the grief and trauma of the pandemic, perhaps one of the better areas is that with the reflection of the numbers in our statistics, with, with depression, with alcohol abuse, with all of the things we we've started to realize how important mental health is.

[00:06:46] Um, I, I. Startled, but slightly, um, relieved. When I read that, you know, that then the pediatric association was, was declaring it and, and, you know, a national health, public health crisis that we need to start paying attention to people's mental health. So while that's scary, I think that that can be a really important moment for us to, to.

[00:07:12] Further our journey in destigmatizing mental health, because there's a lot of really great things that have happened, but there's also a lot of ways in which we still have a lot to. We have a long ways to go. We have a, a lot to think about in how we still differentiate some sort of physical condition from some sort of mental health condition without realizing that they are one in and of the same.

[00:07:39] So I. Grappling with that and further. Seeking to further educate ourselves on why that is the case. Why physiologically a mental condition, a mental illness is going to affect a person's body as a physical condition. Those trainings, that awareness, that advocacy is really, really important for working to continue to destigmatize the issue of, of, of mental health as some sort of.

[00:08:08] A lesser or some sort of serious, a character flaw, a weakness. We have so much scientific research to back up that that is just not the case. There are so many areas, even what I mentioned with like the gut health, um, ways in which we now understand that. We, our bodies cannot be relegated to specific organs and mental health conditions.

[00:08:31] Mental illnesses do not just exist within the brain. Uh, they're part of the body at large. And, and until we understand that and approach that in this very connected, we are , this is a serious, a serious situation. And, and take that to heart. I think that educating ourselves on that and advocating for that is a really, really important thing because until.

[00:08:53] Do that work and, and have more of that mindset and our collective cultural framework. We're going to be continuously limited with, with the mindset that this is, this is not a physical condition. This is something you ought to be able to do something about. I think that that's important holding that space.

[00:09:12] I, I think in terms of both that, that training, but I also think. I think that teachers and, and, and counselors are, are, you know, they they're trying, and they're doing some really important, important work. Um, they're certainly, you know, , they, they have their hands full with still dealing with COVID with all of the things of being underpaid and overworked.

[00:09:35] So I certainly don't wanna add more to, to, to their plate, but I do think that educators, um, in a general. They don't have to be counselors or therapists, but recognizing that, that your students are whole beings and that they are also grappling with, with mental health and perhaps mental illness. I think sometimes we, we, again, we'll compare our experiences.

[00:10:00] We'll see them as immature or know it alls, or have it have situations where we think they're sit their, their mental. Wellness or their mental health episodes are not as serious or as grave as adult concerns. And I think that that can be dangerous. Dangerous way to approach the situation. And I think we see the repercussions of that when, you know, tragically, teenagers will, you know, complete suicide after being bullied or college, students will complete suicide after not being able to live up to some sort of standard that they want with their grades or with their performance in a sport.

[00:10:40] And, and I think recognizing that to treat people. and what they are in, in enduring their life stuff is, is, is important. I, I think it's a good idea to, to, in whatever way to address mental health and the potential of, of mental health episodes, mental illness with, with your students and make sure that even though you, the owners did not be entirely on the educator.

[00:11:10] We can do things that re refer them to, to counseling centers, to suicide prevention lines, to, to show that we're holding space, that those things are important to treat them as whole beings, rather than just, you know, empty vessels in our, in our classroom that we're imparting our knowledge onto. And that our class is the most important.

[00:11:31] And I'm not a parent, but I, you know, certainly, certainly just holding space for mental health and mental wellness. Is a really important thing that we can do as, as leaders and adults and mentors and parents and teachers. My mother was an educator and she had struggled with, as I said, you know, depression, um, exi, anxiety, PTSD, and in severe insomnia for, for many years.

[00:11:57] And one of the things she used to say to colleagues and you know, her friends who had, who had, who had children who were undergoing these mental health crises was. They also don't have a lot of life experience to recognize that when they're in such a dire state, it's ever going to be any different. And I don't fault students for that.

[00:12:20] I don't fault younger people. I was one of those younger people who was holding onto her words, you know, like a fine thread, but it is so true part of what is so dangerous and insidious. So scary about a mental health episode. Severe depression is. You have no grasp that you're ever gonna feel differently.

[00:12:42] And that is a very, very scary place to be in mentally. I've experienced that within the last few years. And I had an additional 15 years of experience having lived through those times to recognize that. I'm not always gonna feel this way, but when younger people, teenagers, or younger people in, in college have those experiences where all of a sudden, their ability to see in the past or see in the future that there's ever gonna be any hope or any difference.

[00:13:13] Um, that's part of the direness of the situation and why though, we may look at it as your problems, you know, are, are limited or trivial or, or whatever that, that's why it's such a brave serious. To take mental health and to take that emotional development seriously, I'll also say that people are very, a lot of people, even, even teenagers and young adults are very good at hiding their pain.

[00:13:38] They're very good at hiding their, their severe depression, their suicide ideation, their suicide tendencies. It's not always the person who appears most need of mental health, health, and support. And. Addressing that stereotype. And, um, I think is another important thing that those educator should address.

[00:14:06] Lance: We say, thank you again to Danielle for sharing her story with us and being so open and honest and vulnerable, and to go beyond the show, you can always connect with us @nostigmas on all social media platforms and at www.Nostigmas.org. Thank you again so much for joining us today and remember be UNSILENT. We'll see you next time.

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