My morning speaking at Virginia State University

Suicide is a tough subject but the #2 cause of death on college campuses. In fact I wish I had some magic tricks for the college crowd. A friend of mine suggested eating fire. I thought that posed risk of burning my hair and maybe I’d rather be sawed in half. But that would require talent above my pay grade.

Today at Virginia State University, I told my story about Charles, shared my grief journey, and then we talked about coping strategies. For this we used post it notes and a white board. And for the healthy and unhealthy coping strategies, we used technology and the students entered their strategies on their phones.

A couple of questions on suicide.

At the end, I handed out two index cards.

One they needed to keep and on that I asked them to write two coping strategies they might use when things become stressful.

Two was one they’d leave me. I asked them to share a learning outcome.

Presenting to teens about mental illness and resilience