Saving Young Lives through Conversations on Guns and Mental Health

Amid the heavy burden of today's societal pressures – from the lingering effects of the pandemic to the omnipresent weight of social media – our youth are wading through unprecedented mental health challenges. In today's podcast, we sit with Dr. Kurt Michael (Senior Clinical Director) from The Jed Foundation (JED), diving into the urgent topic of youth firearm suicidality. As a former academic dedicated to establishing mental health clinics in rural schools, and a gun owner himself, Dr. Michael brings a wealth of experience to the table, sharing why gun violence prevention is not just a policy issue, but a personal one. Together, we explore the heightened suicide risks for young people, particularly in communities where firearms are more accessible, and Dr. Michael helps us see the resilience and hope in these young fighters, and how simple measures like responsible gun storage can be a lifeline.

Further reading:
It's Okay to Say Suicide (JED)
How to Cope With Safety Threats in Your Community or the World (JED)
What’s the best way to talk about gun violence with kids? (JED)
Asking Saves Kids (Brady)
Preventing Youth Suicide (NASP)

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:08

This is the legal disclaimer, where I tell you that the views, thoughts and opinion shared on this podcast belong solely to our guests and hosts and not necessarily Brady or Brady's affiliates. Please note this podcast contains discussions of violence that some people may find disturbing. It's okay, we find it disturbing too. Hey, everybody, welcome back to another episode of Red Bull and Brady. I'm one of your hosts, jj.

Speaker 2: 0:47

And I'm Kelly, your other host.

Speaker 1: 0:48

And today, Kelly and I are sitting down with Dr Kurt Michael of the Jed Foundation To talk about something that is really difficult but really important, which is the reality of kids and firearm suicidality.

Speaker 2: 1:03

Yeah, and, as you know, 2024 progresses. This is something that we think isn't going to be important to every single person this year. Even if you're like I don't know anyone, just keep listening.

Speaker 1: 1:15

Exactly, Even though Kelly and I maybe don't count as youths anymore which was really hard to hear.

Speaker 1: 1:20

It's really important because we do have young people in our lives that we love, right? So this is so, so vital for us to keep learning and keep working with. Thanks so much for joining us, kurt. I'm wondering could you tell our listeners just a little bit about yourself? You know I'm really curious about what your work is at Jed, but you know, I guess, leading up to that, how you came to work in gun violence prevention and mental health work, how you came to be at Jed.

Speaker 3: 1:48

So my title at Jed is Senior Clinical Director and I would say, prior to that, probably relevant to know, I'm a licensed clinical psychologist and I spent probably close to 24 years as a professor of psychology and I would say for most of that time I worked in schools outside the university community, mostly in rural Appalachia, and my work there was to develop embedded school mental health clinics, again mostly in rural schools, where in some of these communities, if they're going to get mental health services, if they didn't get it from us, they generally went without.

Speaker 3: 2:31

These are areas of reduced access, all kinds of barriers, you know lack of insurance, lack of qualified providers, transportation barriers, economic stressors, just to name a few.

Speaker 3: 2:43

And again, because the suicide rates in some of these rural communities were actually much higher than average, we were really, out of necessity, needed to develop programming that's very consistent with the Jed Foundation's comprehensive approach. So, as much as I had been doing that work for, you know, 24 years, I think once I learned more about the Jed Foundation, probably midway through my career at App State, it seemed like a really perfect alignment with, you know, what I had been doing, with what I was hoping to achieve by coming over to the Jed Foundation. So it was a bit of a risk for me to leave a tenured, distinguished faculty line and then come over to a nonprofit, but I felt like it was a great decision. You know as much as it's kind of a weird time I did this during the pandemic. You know my wife wasn't particularly thrilled with the prospect, but for me to make that move was a bit of a risk. But again, I think I remain very satisfied with my decision to move over again, chiefly because the work is so similar, right.

Speaker 1: 3:57

Well, and then you have that rural experience as well. I mean, I think on this podcast just a result of Kelly and I having grown up in cities and work in cities we tend to focus on, maybe, urban areas, but this is also affecting kids in rural areas too.

Speaker 3: 4:09

Almost all of that time I'd been working in these rural communities. You know I'd worked most of the time with families that you know they almost regularly had a lot of firearms and so to make those situations safer we had to innovate, oftentimes on the fly, to make our interventions responsive to that known risk to those young people. So we had been doing this work for a long time. So, again, because Jed really prioritizes what we broadly refer to as mean safety or promoting mean safety, again it was a good fit for me.

Speaker 1: 4:48

And I wonder if you could tell us a little bit too about Jed. You know what is this foundation. That's so great that you walked away from a 10 year position. Which folks outside of academia you don't do that. That's like saying no to a.

Speaker 2: 5:01

I don't know.

Speaker 1: 5:02

I want to call it a lottery ticket because it's not as fun to get tenure as a district with lottery, but still.

Speaker 3: 5:08

Yeah, no, that was a hard earned thing. You know that. 10 years not an easy thing at all. But no, I would say that what became obvious to me, I guess, is I got to know the Seytow, particularly. Jed is named Jed Seytow. He actually died by suicide in 1998.

Speaker 3: 5:26

So really the, the genesis, the origins of the Jed Foundation are in honor of Donna and Phil Seytow's son, jed, who again died in 98. And so the foundation was initiated in the year 2000. So they've been around for a long time and so I guess, to put a more personal spin on it, because I had an opportunity to know Phil mostly on the phone, and also the CEO, john McPhee, became kind of a no brainer for me because I really related to the Seytow's lived experience as to losing a child to suicide and so that really pulled at me pretty strongly. And so I guess it's really a more of a personal choice to come over and join the Jed Foundation, because the mission is clear. It's based on the pain of suicide, loss and the, I guess, the inspiration of working with a nonprofit or a family specifically that knows that pain in a way that few people can understand or experience, and so it was a pretty personal thing and because of its history, of being so long-standing and so committed to the issue, I felt like it would be a mistake not to join the Jed Foundation.

Speaker 3: 6:42

So when, you know, jed's parents visited the university where he was attending at the time of death, they had talked about okay, so what would? What would happen? You know what would a blueprint look like to serve young people as a mental health safety net? And so I think they went to the literature you know and found some models that were properly evaluated, found to be effective, and they decided that a model that had been tested in the Air Force was probably a good start, and so they basically adapted that particular approach that contains seven core elements as a way to develop sustainable systems, policies and procedures to reduce suicide and to protect the emotional well-being of not only college students. But eventually, as you might be aware, we began to move into the high school space and eventually all the way down to kindergarten levels, so district level programming, also around the time of the pandemic.

Speaker 3: 7:48

So we've been doing that work for the past four or five years and so we try to develop systems to address the issue of protecting emotional health and preventing suicide from kindergarten up through the age of 30 approximately. It's not to say we're not open to working in populations that are broader than that, but I think that's our main focus.

Speaker 2: 8:10

I mean thanks for kind of sharing so much of the background too, because I want to elevate the family for what they did for their son in terms of his legacy and making such a huge change for such a long period of time. And you talked about the mission of Jed is to not just be about suicide prevention but also emotional well-being, and I know I personally hear a lot, especially after the pandemic you hear a lot of chatter around the kind of youth's emotional well-being. But I'm wondering what are some sort of concrete examples that would help us understand what the state of youth mental health is at the moment?

Speaker 3: 8:45

Yeah, there's so many things happening and I think to say it's a crisis would be an understatement. So I think there's a lot of stressors that are impacting young people, including economic stress, housing insecurity, what's going to happen in their futures, sort of this 24 seven glut, information that's coming at full speed at them through social media, various platforms, about the state of the world, racial injustice, climate change, what their future may or may not look like, complete uncertainty about the things that previous generations didn't really have to think as much about. So I've got grown kids, but I certainly feel like we've put young people in a really awkward position where we've made a lot of mistakes as older generations and they're kind of left holding the bag. So I feel guilty about that, honestly, just as a parent honestly.

Speaker 3: 9:44

And so I just think that there's so many things happening, whether that's increases in suicide death rates or higher rates of depression, anxiety, etc. Trauma war, it's just really full speed 24 seven. So I would say, you know, take your pick. I mean there's so many things happening. So, again, I often marvel at the same time at the resilience of young people, so I'm strangely confident that they will find ways to solve these very complex problems. But I wish that wasn't true.

Speaker 2: 10:22

I think for a lot of us there, to your point, are things happening that we don't even know about, or platforms that we don't even know about and kind of slightly, you know, drilling down on something you mentioned, which is the different impacts on mental health, we know that that can take a lot of forms it could be lack of sleep, it could be a lot of things. But in terms of suicide, something that we've seen at Brady is that even people that are really young people between 10 years old and 19 years old are vulnerable to firearm suicide, which is something that is always associated with it. And I'm wondering if you talk about the risk of firearm suicide among young people.

Speaker 3: 11:00

Yeah, sure, well, I mean it is, as you probably know, it is the most common method of suicide death overall. And so that's obviously, I think, I think, point number one that we know that if you look at different methods of suicide or methods of attempt, that is the most common method of suicide death across the board. So obviously, for that to be true, I think, argues that we need to be a lot more responsive to that particular risk factor, whether that's in, you know, regardless of where you are, if you're in a rural community, actually the risk is higher, for example, if you live in a high gun owning state. That's also another risk factor. So there's all these different sort of contributing factors that make it less likely or more likely, depending on where you happen to live in the world. If you live in a community with a lot of unlocked firearms I'll just give you one example, maybe two that come to mind If you live in the state of Wyoming, the average household has 11 firearms. If you're in Montana, that number is about seven or eight. So I hope that gives you some context about what I'm describing. So and this is another thing that's true If you are a adolescent who lives in a rural community.

Speaker 3: 12:20

Not only do we think there's evidence that there's a higher likelihood there'll be a gun accessible, but the perception of easy access tends to be about twice as high among rural teens. There was a study that was published out of Colorado where you looked at the youth from the more rural communities in Colorado and their perception of easy access was around 36% of those youth. If you compared those numbers to the youth in Colorado who did not live in the rural communities, it was around 18%. So it's still high, but again, double the rate if you live in a rural community, if that makes sense. So again, that's perception. And then there's actual access which we by looking at, let's say, handgun deaths or firearm deaths I should say so in rural Appalachia if you look at the total number of firearm deaths, whether that's homicide or suicide in some of these rural communities, 80% of those firearm deaths were deemed to be suicides. So again, it really matters kind of where you live and what's around you and what's in your environment.

Speaker 3: 13:35

And so, like I said before, when we were doing this work in rural Appalachia, a regular feature of the families we served was when you ask the question can you tell me how many firearms you have in your home, or how can we come up with a plan to store those firearms more securely and safely? Typically, we're talking about multiple firearms and I would add a little bit additional layer to that. So not only are we talking about hunting rifles, for example, which is pretty normal, pretty common, we're also talking about self-defense firearms. They feel like they need a self-defense firearm and so typically we have to develop policies and procedures, clinical interventions, that account for both types of firearms. Maybe a third type would be like a family heirloom, or firearms that are used for competitions, for example, or shooting sports competitions. So we typically would ask about firearms for three different purposes.

Speaker 2: 14:39

It's just fascinating because so often the perception is that cities are awash and guns that's where you kind of have to be concerned. And then you have shown that in the data, at least in terms of perception of how easy it is to access the gun, there's actually a rule of vibe. I think it goes to your point about how powerful it is to have data and evidence.

Speaker 3: 15:00

Yeah, totally. And so, again, our broad messaging is always about responsible gun story, and so we know that, on average, the latest stat that I can recall from looking at broad surveys of percentage of gun owners who safely store all their firearms that's in the low to mid 40% range. Grafasi et al was a study that was published in 2000 from Johns Hopkins that shows that in terms of average rates of storage, that's about what we're looking at. So obviously we need to get better. That's a fairly low number. I mean, that's a lot of unlocked firearms out there, right. So you know, our main objective is going back to Jed and some of that comprehensive approach is how can we just basically, in a very non-judgmental way, promote responsible gun storage across the board? We have to do better.

Speaker 3: 15:59

Now, I know that. You know I don't know if it's obvious to you I'm a gun owner, hunter myself, and I was taught safe gun storage when I was yay, high, and so one of the first things you learn in hunter safety, I took my son to the same class when he was I think he was probably he was seven or eight when I took him to a hunter safety class. The first lesson they teach you is muzzle discipline right. That means you always know where your firearm is pointed at all times and you never pointed at someone. I mean plain and simple. And so I don't know if you know.

Speaker 3: 16:36

I don't think that's necessarily gone away, I think it often doesn't get talked about enough, but I think you know there's. It's pretty straightforward to include a module and some of these hunter safety classes, gun safety classes, on the importance of doing this for not only suicide prevention, obviously, but just generally not having access to firearms for anybody who might use it without authorization or inappropriately or in an unsafe way. I wish we would do a better job, sort of like. When my kids were young, the expectation was you made sure that all the chemicals that you had in the house were under the sink and there was a way to. It wasn't like you. It was impossible to get under the sink, but you know those little clips you put on the cabinets that would prevent you know-.

Speaker 1: 17:31

Yeah, your child safety locks, your general-. Yeah, yeah, okay, there you go, yeah thanks for reminding me.

Speaker 3: 17:36

Yeah, exactly I mean. So why that somehow is not part of our general kind of universal precautions. That really defies explanation. But I think it's kind of the same thing, or like why we put a barrier around our swimming pools when we build our swimming pools, why not require the same kinds of things, or at least encourage that with every gun purchase, or why that's somehow missing. If it is, I think is part of the problem that somehow that has not been normalized. I mean otherwise, if it were normalized the study from Grafasi and others would tell a different story and unfortunately it's lower than it needs to be, so-.

Speaker 1: 18:24

It's that combination of it being a politicized issue and still a taboo issue. I think Americans still have a hard time talking about suicidality and then especially suicidality among children and teens. I think that's why I think it's so great that that's Jed's focus, because I think folks have a very hard time. I think Suicide is still very much thought of kind of a thing affecting older white men and no one else.

Speaker 3: 18:47

Right, yeah, it's, the rates are concerning, and it's true, I mean still the highest risk group overall are older white men with firearms. I mean clearly, but all the other groups racial, ethnic groups are closing the gap and that's not good. In other words, it's becoming more acceptable to have firearms and that idea that having a firearm makes you feel safer, that's not good either.

Speaker 3: 19:17

Especially if you're not storing those firearms. It should go hand in hand. If you have a firearm, that should be fully respected is something that can cause greatest bodily injury or death, and I don't think that escapes the mind of most families, especially when you remind them. And so back to this kind of discussion of families. I gotta say it's never felt politicized in the work that I've been doing all these years. It feels like it's terrifying for families with a child who's at risk for suicide when you tell them that firearm is posing a significant risk to your child. I don't think there's ever been a time that I can remember clearly where families object to that, and I mean, what's their object to when you're really emphasizing look, the whole point of this is to prevent your child's death. And when you put it that bluntly again, I've had maybe one parent, in all the thousands of times I've done this, get up and storm out of the office, like that's literally happened once.

Speaker 3: 20:21

Now what was, I think, even in that particular case, what was good is that the dad who walked out, the mom didn't, and so the dad was yelling at me and saying I was a proxy for the government and all these things.

Speaker 3: 20:37

And the mom said, when the dad left who incidentally lost his older son to suicide only about 19 months before that, and we were simply talking about ways to be protective of his younger son who was at risk for suicide that the mom said okay, what do you want me to do? And so we said, okay, here's what we'd recommend. And so we recommended a series of steps to safely store I think in that particular case, I think they had at least five or six long guns, couple of shotguns, three hunting rifles, several handguns, a couple of revolvers, a couple of some automatic handguns, and we set about a plan to safely store everyone, including what she described to be the gun that they kept for self-protection. We helped her find an affordable separate lock box. They had a gun safe. Actually, they didn't use it as often as they should. It was one of those things where they had a gun safe in the basement and they you know, just as a gun owner, I wouldn't do it this way.

Speaker 3: 21:36

but they left the gun safe door open with the key, you know, in the tumbler, and I said, well, how about we close it, lock it, put the key somewhere, and for the self-defense firearm, let's get you a separate device. I think we were able to get that family a small biometric safe for the self-protection firearm. So it was a multi-part plan that took, you know, not just one conversation. We had, I would say, a series of conversations and now that I think of it, I remember the dad eventually, and reluctantly, rejoined that conversation, but you know, when he was convinced, I guess, that we weren't, you know, trying to confiscate his firearms, which was not our goal. You know, Our goal was to come up with a voluntary solution to store the firearms in a way that was protective right.

Speaker 1: 22:34

I think that that reformatting of this is no different than say, if we were getting like a medicine to your child, right, that this is us having a mental health response to a mental health crisis. This is all that this is. I mean, it's a big all, but that this isn't a judgment on your parenting. This isn't a judgment on your politics. This isn't a judgment on your life. This is just how do we keep your child safe, which, if you're here talking to us, that means that you care, right? So I think that that's a great way to present it.

Speaker 3: 23:04

Yeah, we wanna keep them in the room. I know that I have witnessed providers talk rather insensitively about gun access and I've seen providers make, I think, predictable mistakes and the way they go about the intervention. And I would say that it's a big part of Jed's approach to help training people how to have these conversations in a way that's again not adversarial, not confrontational and not about confidence. Now are there situations where I've got a situation that requires additional steps. Let's say you have a child who you deem to be basically subject to medical neglect, for example, or they, let's say the caregivers, will take their child to their mental health appointments. If they do that repeatedly and they're at risk for suicide, for example, that might meet the qualifications for medical neglect, but we wouldn't start there. In other words, we would always start with voluntary solutions to get buy-in, because for some of these interventions to be effectively sustained, we wanna start there. And so, yeah, are there times where we have to take extra measures?

Speaker 3: 24:28

If there's a domestic violence situation, certainly, but I would argue that those are much less common than the conversations I'm mentioning before.

Speaker 3: 24:39

Right, and I think, as part of the informed consent process, when I work with all my clients and patients.

Speaker 3: 24:46

They know in advance that if there's something that is deemed to be a legitimate threat to self or others, they already know in advance that I'm gonna take special care to address those issues as they come up. So when it has to come up, I'll usually remind them. Remember, when we did the informed consent process and you were told and you agreed to the fact that I was going to take this seriously in the fact that if the health and wellbeing, safety, security of self or others are at risk, I'm gonna take extra measures. I'm gonna break confidentiality and see to it that we can get a better sense of how to be protective, and that might include stepping outside this confidential relationship right? So I just wanna point out that all of those elements or tools I would say that we can make come to life when we need them. We use those too, but I think that the chief model from a preventative standpoint is voluntary and trying to bind to a person's willingness to promote safety and to not be adversarial, if that makes any sense.

Speaker 1: 26:04

No, it makes perfect sense, and I think it just then, too, highlights like what I'm thinking of when I hear you speak on. This is why it's so important for there to be different actors in the gun violence prevention community or all acting together, and so ultimately it's just. I think it just goes to show that you need multiple people in multiple spaces working simultaneously, because I think the message maybe comes much better from you in this instance.

Speaker 3: 26:26

Yeah, no, I think that's that actually aligns well with even some of the data points from credible messengers and the Kravasti study that gun owners often like to talk to other gun owners or active duty military folks if you're a veteran or law enforcement or folks that have some working knowledge. Now I will say this that in all the work that I've been doing over the years, like training mental health providers, you don't have to be a gun owner to be conversant and effective in talking about guns. You just have to know a few things, and so part of that training process can include you know, safety training on firearms. That way at least you know what the components of a firearm are. If you talk about some creative ways to reduce access, if that includes dismantling the firearm even temporarily to make it inoperable to be protective, so you can kind of create a little bit of a safe distancing from that lethal method while the person is trying to recover from some type of mental health crisis. So I also want to point out that some of the more successful partnerships that I've worked on over the years I'll give you Utah as a case example that there was a very diverse group of coalition members in Utah that's been around for a while, that helps support the passing of House Bill 41 instead of Utah.

Speaker 3: 27:56

You might be familiar, but that basically, is something that Jett has been involved in, where we. So the law is basically this that if a child in a school, a public school, if it's made aware that a child is at risk for suicide or even been subjected to bullying or some type of situation involving suspected abuse, then that family is then given information that's credible on reducing access to lethal means, not just firearms but dangerous medications as just two examples, and Jett helped produce some of the materials on how to do sensible things to store medication safely at home. Same for firearms. And so I think it's not really coercive, it's not required as dissemination of information, and the way you go about it I think needs to be specific and nuanced. But it's an example of when coalitions work together in arguably a pretty red stage like the state of Utah, where these things are more of a community collective, if you will.

Speaker 3: 29:11

That involves all kinds of folks epidemiologists and the gun-owning community and shooting sports organizations that all come together to come up with sensible ways that are acceptable to many on how can I store my firearms more responsibly right. So I suggest you take a look at that bill if you have a minute, and I do think it has to be delivered in a particular way. I think you have to be aware of the messenger. I don't think everybody can just sort of hand them out and say here you go. I think it does need to be kind of, you know, walk people through it a little bit, and I think it's a totally sensible approach that doesn't have to be politicized at all.

Speaker 2: 29:55

You mentioned earlier the ways that young people are sort of inundated through just sort of a relentless barrage of information about really hard things, one of them being gun violence, and today we're recording and there was a mass shooting. We see so many mass shootings reported in the media, I imagine on the local news. Young people are also exposed to gun violence that doesn't make national headlines and so if you're a listener and you have a relationship with a young person might be your child, your niece, mentee, whatever are there any sorts of practical things that adults should keep in mind when talking to a young person about gun violence?

Speaker 3: 30:39

Yeah, no, it's an important area and I think Jed's done a really great job of actually coming up with direct recommendations how to go ahead and talk to young people about these issues, to talk about them in ways that are honest and supportive and action oriented. I've helped contribute to some of the writings of these things and I think they're really practical and sensible. But, yeah, I think there's a good way to do it and there's probably not so great way to do it, and so we've tried to provide some pretty tangible guidance. But, yeah, I think there is a good way to do it, and I think one of the things we don't want to have happen is for young people to feel like it's a good idea to sort of squash your feelings about it. Find really sensible ways to emote and get support and talk about it.

Speaker 3: 31:34

I think we have all kinds of campaigns that support the promotion of help seeking. Seize the awkward campaign is one that comes immediately to mind. Another one that we like to focus on is it's OK to say suicide, for example. So these are campaigns that are broad and, I think, very supportive and known to be protective, given all the uncertainties in our world, and so we want to be out front. I think we do a really good job in the media space and so, if I can say, one of the positive aspects of that social media part is, I think the Jet Foundation. One of the things that I think they do probably better than a lot of other things is show up in the media space about what to do in the face of all these different threats to emotional and mental health. So I think we're probably one of the better resources out there. If I can say so in this space. I know I'm kind of biased that way, but no, I'm often blown away by just how great the information is and the vetting that goes into it.

Speaker 2: 32:42

I think a lot of us are sort of grappling with it ourselves and sometimes that can be a source of the difficulty is trying to feel like you have to have all the answers. So I love the idea of just embracing the awkward and the difficulty head on.

Speaker 3: 32:57

Yeah, I think there's kind of you know no easy way to have a hard conversation.

Speaker 3: 33:03

We do want to emphasize the importance that you know, most young people probably don't view going to professionals as a first choice, and so the importance of reaching out just to your colleagues, friends and peers and family as a first step in some cases is what's needed. I'll just remind you of a finding and a study that we knew from back in the 60s and early 70s. So there is this study that reinforces the value of just simple caring context. So this particular study is done for survivors of serious suicide attempts, and they were hospitalized, and so they randomized the intervention to folks to receive a postcard expressing just basic support for that individual sometime after discharge, and a group of folks that didn't receive this particular postcard. And, by the way, the intervention itself is just simply a handwritten postcard in the mail where it says you know, hey, kurt, it's been, you know, a few months since you left the hospital. We're just checking on you to see how you're doing. If you want to call us, here's my number. You know sincerely, megan.

Speaker 3: 34:20

And that's literally the extent of it.

Speaker 3: 34:23

And then they followed those individuals for a period of like five to six years and they looked at suicide death rates in those two groups, that is, what percent of those patients who were discharged died in a five to 10 year period after discharge, versus those that did not, the folks that received that caring contact or that postcard.

Speaker 3: 34:49

The death rate was low in both groups, I'm happy to say, but it was half the rate in the group that received the postcard versus the ones that did not. So what we've done in all the years since is, in terms of standard practices of managing suicide risk over time, we do the simple things well right. So if that means that simply receiving a phone call, a text you know somebody's reaching out saying how you doing, how are you feeling, what's going on, it doesn't have to be technical, it doesn't have to be complicated, it just has to be, you know, authentic and caring. If that makes sense and if that simple act can reduce suicide by half in this particular study and it's been replicated by the way, I think our campaigns around Seize the Awkward it's okay to say suicide are kind of. You know, I think the foundation of that is based on some of these studies I'm referencing. Does that make sense?

Speaker 1: 35:57

No, it absolutely does and I think again, it just highlights the like. As you said, credible messengers, and sometimes peer to peer, is all the credible messenger that you need, or someone that you know is earnestly interested in you on a personal level.

Speaker 3: 36:10

Totally, and you know, it really defies some people's fears that if I talk to someone about my feelings, of my suicidal thoughts, that it's going to end me up in the hospital. And that's just not. That's not actually what happens Usually. What happens is people feel better, they feel a sense of relief that you've named it, and if they are legitimately concerned about suicide, then we can give them the help that they need right, rather than just stay quiet and suffer in silence, right, right.

Speaker 1: 36:46

But if we've got any young people who are listening to this, who are concerned for themselves or others or their parents, you know where can folks find these resources, where can, where can folks find out? You know more about Jed, more about your work beyond. You know the links I'm going to put in the description of this episode.

Speaker 3: 37:02

Yeah, I mean the Jed website is is you know a site to behold and I would say that's a great source of information overall. I would also say that getting help does not have to be complicated and it often isn't. And I think you know what most people experience when they talk honestly about what's going on with them. They mostly experience a sense of relief and a feeling that wow, I'm. You know it's so impactful when you know we respect people's lived experience.

Speaker 3: 37:35

I guess that's what I would say most is we're all in this and let's just support each other and reach out to each other and focus more on what makes us a little different. And so that's what I would say. You know, let's focus on our similarities. Yeah, we've got differences, I mean, that's obviously true, but let's join hands up about things that we jointly struggle with and support each other, and again, it doesn't have to be expensive or complicated.

Speaker 1: 38:06

I'll say here, here to that it's so true, and I think that's why what you're doing is so, so vital. So please, everyone, check out the links in the description of this episode. Go see Jed, see the resources that we have in Family Fire and just you know, keep, keep trying. Hey want to share with the podcast. Listeners can now get in touch with us here at Red, blue and Brady via phone or text message. Simply call or text us at 480-744-3452 with your thoughts, questions, concerns ideas, cat pictures, whatever.

Speaker 2: 38:40

Thanks for listening. As always, brady's lifesaving work in Congress, the courts and communities across the country is made possible thanks to you. For more information on Brady or how to get involved in the fight against gun violence, please like and subscribe to the podcast. Get in touch with us at BradyUnitedorg or on social at BradyBuzz. Be brave and remember. Take action, not sides. Thank you.