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Promoting Hope, Preventing Suicide

Research and advice on preventing teen and adult suicide.
by Elana Premack Sandler, L.C.S.W., M.P.H.
Elana Premack Sandler, LCSW, MPH, is a public health social worker specializing in violence and injury prevention and adolescent health promotion. See full bio

Promoting Hope, Preventing Suicide

February 3, 2010

What’s the current mental state of the U.S.?

In this month's Wired magazine, author Ethan Watters asks: "What will we call our new, collective, global economic anxiety?"

Watters suggests that the frontrunner is "posttraumatic embitterment disorder," first noticed among East Germans following the fall of the Berlin Wall. Pervasive insecurity took hold once the society they had become accustomed to all but disappeared. Read More

January 20, 2010

What does the field of suicide prevention have to learn from resiliency research?

"Heartbreak and Home Runs" is the title of the cover story of the most recent issue of Psychology Today magazine. The article is about the power of first experiences. Read More

January 13, 2010

Avatar blues?

Can a movie about a utopian society cause us to question the meaning of life? Sure. But to the extent that we contemplate suicide? Wow.

That, apparently, is the power of "Avatar," the film that allows viewers to experience the world of Pandora almost as if they were there, but not quite.

And that seems to be the problem. Read More

January 6, 2010

PBS series explores science behind emotions

I remember hearing a friend in my college abnormal psychology class say: "Wow, I don't know anyone with any of these conditions!" and thinking: 'Wow, everyone in my family has one of these conditions!' Read More

December 30, 2009

The hardest story to tell

I've been reading two memoirs of suicide survivors, both women who lost a parent to suicide. The first, which I've completed, is "In Her Wake: A Child Psychiatrist Explores the Mysteries of her Mother's Suicide," by Nancy Rappaport. The second, which I just started, is "The Suicide Index," by Joan Wickersham, in which Wickersham organizes her father's suicide in index style. Read More

December 23, 2009

Memorializing in real life and real time

Last week, a friend of a friend died by suicide. This friend of mine found out about her friend's death via Twitter. "Of all places!" you may be thinking, but let me explain. My friend, Leigh, and her friend, Gideon, had connected online. Read More

December 16, 2009

A pebble in a pond

"A suicide death is like a pebble in a pond. The waves ripple outward." Read More

December 8, 2009

‘Be a man and get through it.’

Combat-related post-traumatic stress. The continued deaths of soldiers by suicide. The effects of being at war on a soldier's return home - including domestic violence and homicide. Even Oprah's going to be covering it - her show is soliciting stories from people affected by these issues. Read More

December 2, 2009

International suicide prevention

Sri Lankan villagers go from house to house encouraging folks to put lockboxes on their pesticides, as that is the lethal means of choice in that country. In Pakistan, there is no bereavement support for survivors of suicide, as suicide is so stigmatized as to be seen as unacceptable. Read More

November 25, 2009

A Dangerous Myth

Is there an increase in suicide deaths during the holiday season? It’s been clearly demonstrated that, no, suicides actually increase in other seasons (spring and fall). But, how many times have you read or heard that suicide increases around the holidays? Read More

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Self-Help Basics

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Most of us have things about ourselves we wish we could improve. Lasting change is difficult—many of our habits are deeply ingrained, and certain aspects of ourselves, such as core personality attributes, may be immutable. But many more things can be changed.

Go to the Self-Help Basics page for more on Self-Help including:
  • Being Your Best Self
  • Becoming More Mindful
  • Self-Reinvention
  • Building a Healthy Relationship
  • Becoming Happier
  • Setting and Achieving Goals
Go to Self-Help Basics

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Heartbreak and Home Runs: The Power of First Experiences

How early life experiences shape our character.