Last night my daughter and I visited my niece in the juvenile psychiatric ward of the hospital.  She looked better than I thought she would, but that doens't say much.  One family member asked me later if she looked suicidal.  I wanted to say no, because she laughed a little, she talked a little, and when we played Apples to Apples she was involved in the game, but what does that mean?  There are plenty of stories where the family says the person was just laughing or talking about the future yesterday and now they're gone.  

On more than one website I found that suicide is the 3rd leading cause of death in teenagers, right after traffic accidents and homicide.  In 2005, that was 1,513 kids in the U.S.  It's hard to statistically verify how many suicidal attempts are made, but with the information collected, one sight determined there are about 25 attempts for every suicidal death.  It's hard to know what to do with this kind of information.  It's the kind of thing I feel bad about and then put aside because I don't feel like there's anything I can do, but it's hard to ignore when someone in your family is at risk.  I can't get the imagine out of my mind from last night, watching twenty teens sit in a circle talking about their goals for the week, one of which is to think about something other than death.  Jenna and I are going to visit again this week, but more than that we talked about how we could try to get involved more in her life.   

A little love goes a long way.  I have two friends who are actively helping a couple of teens and I don't think these friends realize how much they are doing for these girls. A lot of parents just don't have the capacity to meet the emotional needs of their children.  I'm not saying they are not responsible.  That's another long post.  But it simply doesn't happen and those kids feel unwanted, unneeded, and unloved.  These teen girls have reached out in small ways and my friends have done two things in response; one, noticed these teenagers need some love and attention and two, taken time out of their busy lives to listen to them.  Listening to someone and really hearing what they say can be more than just time well spent, it could be a lifesaver.