What an important conversation! We talk about teens, but so much of this conversation can be applied to any age. Anne Moss talks about coping and healing strategies, tools, and tips. One of her favorite coping mechanisms is what she calls Opposite Action. Listen in to find out what that means!

Mentioned Resources:

https://annemossrogers.com/

https://www.ted.com/talks/anne_moss_rogers_can_a_blog_save_lives

About the Guest: 

After losing her son Charles in 2015, Anne Moss Rogers has become an advocate for mental health awareness in schools. She also explains the workshops she leads for classes that build emotional healing and connection. Anne Moss talks about coping and healing strategies, tools and tips.

About Deana:

Deana Brown Mitchell is a driven, optimistic, and compassionate leader in all areas of her life.

As a bestselling author, speaker and award-winning entrepreneur, Deana vulnerably shares her experiences for the benefit of others. As a consultant/coach, she has a unique perspective on customizing a path forward for any situation. 

Currently President of Genius & Sanity, and known as “The Shower Genius”, she teaches her proprietary framework created from her own experiences of burnout and always putting herself last...  for entrepreneurs and leaders who want to continue or expand their business while taking better care of themselves and achieving the life of their dreams.

In 2022 Deana released the book, The Shower Genius, How Self-Care, Creativity & Sanity will Change Your Life Personally & Professionally.

Also, Deana is the Founder & Executive Director of The Realize Foundation. She is a suicide survivor herself, and vulnerably uses her own mental health journey to let others know there is hope. The Realize Foundation produces events and publishes books that let people know there are not alone.

“But I will restore you to health and heal your wounds” Jeremiah 30:17

https://www.realizefoundation.org/

https://www.facebook.com/RealizeFoundation

https://www.instagram.com/realizefoundation/

https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-realize-foundation/

https://www.youtube.com/@realizefoundation5598

https://twitter.com/ScarstoStarsTM

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I am honored today to have this conversation with Anne moss Rodgers, who lost her youngest son Charles on June 5 2015. So and I would love for you to tell our listeners a little more about your story.

Well, my picture of Charles is right there. And around the I'd say middle school, we started to notice that Charles's behavior started to change, we saw a lot of anxiety. And I can't say I saw a lot of what you would consider depression, like sadness, what I saw as an increase in risk taking, which scared me, um, his grades did start to drop a little bit. So we put him in private school. And this was, you know, a child who scored really high on IQ tests. So we didn't understand why that was happening. And later on, we saw sort of a change in friends. But I'd say that middle school went well enough. But I think his struggles for he was starting to struggle with that suicide in middle school, but he never told us. And this, we found this out later, sort of from little anecdotal evidence from his friends, they would just tell us stories while I remember this text he sent in the middle of a night and it said this. So it gets to high school. And that's kind of when the wheels started to fall off the bus. And we noticed big shifts in his behavior. But he was also the funniest most popular kid in school. And it was around his sophomore year, he is on the Homecoming Court. He's being escorted by his favorite teacher, Miss Fretwell. And I mean, what a great day for a mom, right. But our family life had been chaos, because he had started experimenting with drugs and alcohol. And we didn't know why. Now, the trolls, self medicating with drugs and alcohol, so that he didn't kill himself made a lot of sense. You know, it felt like it was the right solution. And when you're a teenager, I can understand that you don't like look in the future and see what kind of problems that might lead to. And his drug use started to escalate after after that homecoming court. And we didn't know why. And we couldn't get any answers locally. And I kept asking for a diagnosis. But I never said please give me a psychological evaluation. Because I didn't know those words, right. And I regret that I didn't know those words. And I regret that I just didn't push harder. They would take our money, they would tell us he was high risk, and then they wouldn't tell us what high risk now, you know, you can interpret that as Okay, he could get a drunk driving ticket, which in 2010, was what I thought maybe it could be. But I didn't know. And when I would call back afterwards to get clarification. They just didn't call me back. I mean, they've cashed my check. They were done with me.

And his school experience, we found advocates, but we also found people with zero tolerance policies, one of which suspended him for having a panic attack. And it wasn't because he was violent, or he threatened anybody. He just was in detention. And an administrator came in and started to yell at him. And he just crumbled and started to cry and said, I really want to talk to my mother. And she took that to mean that he wanted to get home and other words wanted to be suspended. I don't know quite how she made that jump, but I tried to go in and change that outcome. But they didn't budge. I mean, so that was really disappointing. And so I was seeing that administrators were not supporting us in our efforts to help our son who wasn't like this big discipline problem. So what finally happened is that as druggies escalated to a point that we had to kidnap our son out of his bed and take them to a wilderness program.

And yeah, you don't do that, because you caught your kid with a beard and joint, right? I mean, you do that, because you've got no other choice. I mean, I had to go to hotel room with my husband and plan this clandestine kidnapping. It felt ugly and slimy, and deceitful. And I remember he came in our room the night before he was supposed to be kidnapped and starts talking about the prom and what he's going to wear. And when he were trying to smile, I remember when he left the room, I just, I fell to the floor in tears. I was just crushed. And so he's kidnapped, he's taken to the wilderness program. And that is actually where we got a diagnosis. Finally, they did a full psychological evaluation, what would have cost us $50 If anybody's ever gone to the trouble of doing one. And after this, a recommended therapy, boarding school, so even though more expensive staff, and we didn't have a boarding school bank account, and basically our home equity loan paid for the wilderness and therapy boarding school. So he comes back in 2014, having spent about 22 months outside our home and some kind of placement.

He's not fixed, I didn't expect him to come home and be fixed, we did a considerable family work when he was at the therapeutic boarding school driving up there to upstate New York, from Virginia, flying up there when we could afford it, or my mother or mother in law, send us money for a ticket. So we did considerable amount of family work that by now Charles had kind of gotten jaded against the mental health system, because and it's still kind of this way, there's a lot of shame, right? Where you expect there to be support. And then that is starting to shift. But in back then in 2014, it was hard to find supportive people, most people were still kind of shaming me and him and even worse in the mental health and addiction space. And of course, what they always want to do is separate. So they want to say, well, you know, let's put your suicidal ideation on holes. And you got to get that drug problem fixed. I mean, you know, just making sets a really, the best thing is to start to treat and talk about it together, that nobody wants to do that, or they don't feel qualified to do that, or they don't really make the attempt to do that. So he ended up you know, we tried to set up therapeutic appointments and tried to set up family therapy. And he was just an expensive nerve show at this point. And he's 2019 years old, so we can't make him. And he ends up getting a job. And when he gets a job, we thought, Oh man, that is magic. One, you know, he has a job now. And now he has a sense of purpose. So what that did is it gave him money to buy more drugs, and he ended up becoming addicted to heroin. So you know, it was a once in a while thing, but once he had a job, it became a regular gig. And unfortunately, it was June 5 2015. We're sitting in a car in a parking lot. And the policeman tells us that they found our son dead that morning, and I was sure it was overdose. We had just recently found out that my son was addicted to heroin. So that was naturally the first thing that came to my head. were screaming and wailing. And my husband pauses in the conversation and he says, How did he die? And I remember thinking, that is such a crazy question. And it's not, but in that moment, there's just all this noise in your head and you can't think straight. And the policeman said suicide and the method left no question. I just didn't get it. I had no idea that my son struggle with thoughts of suicide. And looking back I now see that he displayed classic so have suicidal thoughts one of what she posted on Twitter. I thought Dad, no one would notice that 30 days, which could have been one of the bullet points enter the phrase, what do people say when they're thinking of suicide. So they feel like they're burdened, and they feel like they're worthless. And my son expressed that, but I didn't have that bucket to put it in. Because none of the mental health counselors after all the money we spent, no one ever talked to us and said that it was a risk. And then though, all those sessions, it had to have come up, especially since he shared his notebooks or rap lyrics, with clear intent, and planning for suicidal thoughts and, and ending his life that we never saw these, but he shared them with others that I know is shared with counselors. But nobody ever had that conversation with us, even when he was under age. So if it's not on your radar, you can't come up with that is a possibility. And unfortunately, it's on my radar now, after he died. And what I'd like to do is have people start to talk about it now before it becomes an after somebody that's especially with you, because we know what can prevent it. We know the triggers, we know how to treat it, we know what they say. But we're still not having that conversation. Because there is so much shame and stigma and fear. It's really fear driving. Well, if I talk about it, that means they'll kill themselves, or it'll put the idea in their head.

And think for a minute. If that put the idea in someone's head. How about all those great lectures that you've had with your children? How many? How many? How often has that lecturing? What? Never. And you know, you told your kid not to drink? And of course, what did he do with a keg party? And he probably he or she drank? Even despite what you said, yeah. So talking about it doesn't give them an idea. And it's been proven five times over and multiple studies. And we know that it actually encourages people who struggle to reach out for help. We also know from writing sorrow, my first book was Diary of a broken mine, which is in the background here. And that's a memoir. And you will not be able to put it down.

The second book, I wrote with CO Writer Kim O'Brien, who is a researcher and a licensed clinical social worker. And it's called emotionally naked, a Teacher's Guide to preventing suicide and recognizing students at rest. So while I'm interested in prevention from every angle, I really like going upstream, before children get to a place of crisis, and start to recognize one of those times that teens struggle, what are the triggers that are that can potentially be that last straw? What can we do in the school environment to create a foundation of suicide prevention. And really, the book is not about just having suicide education. That's really about 10% of that. It's mostly focusing on student wellness and coping strategies. And teaching in a way that we're not teaching that memorization and that kind of thing, but encouraging more connections, and encouraging more critical thinking skills. So they think through and do more problem solving, and allowing kids to tell their own story and to apply their own life experience as possible solutions to issues that they're facing. And wow, I'll be honest with you, when Wiley Publishing called me up and asked me did I want to write this book? I said yes immediately. But then When I hung up, I was like, Oh my gosh, this is a pretty, you know, pretty heavy burden. This isn't like you know how to ride a bike. This is telling it, you know, it's got to be I had to cite sources and we had to cite sources. And to figure out a co writer who Kim O'Brien had the invite the CO writer didn't figure out how we were going to work together. We have to get people to interview because when you say something in a book like this, you can't say it without citing a source or some of your own research. And both Kim and I have our own research that we could integrate. But we decided what we would do is interviews some suicide ologists, and teachers who've been through this is out of the students, students, school counselors and school social workers, principals, on nonprofit leaders like the Trevor Project, and the Jed foundation and American Association of Suicidology. And Riverside trauma about postvention. So we were covered prevention, intervention, and postvention. But I'm gonna shut up from that, let's let's you say some data because I was like talking about,

It's okay, it's okay. Um, you are a wealth of knowledge. And I, when I first met you last year, I was very impressed by the amount of, of data and knowledge you've had around the subject. So appreciate you sharing, I do want to, to emphasize what you said about, you know, there's, there is no proof that asking someone if they're going to, if they're planning to harm himself, gives them the idea or increases their risk. We have a board member who is a first responder, he's a he's part of the Eco fast team in the Northeast region. And he is he also says that every time we talked to people that, you know, asking people as a paramedic, they're supposed to ask every patient that they see. And I didn't know that. But he said, You know, there's no, there's no data saying that asking someone if they're having ideation or thinking of harming themselves that that gives them any more risk than they already have. And I think sometimes it makes them think twice, because now someone else is recognizing what may be is going on. And I can speak from my personal experience, if, if I would have thought that anyone knew that I was having ideation that probably would have made me get help faster. But in my case, no one knew that, but me. And so I just wanted to emphasize that. And also the, what you said about fear is that, you know, the minute you say the word suicide, people tend to shut down because they don't know what to say. And they don't want to say the wrong thing. So it's like, they don't realize that just being there, or saying hello, or giving somebody a hug, wouldn't matter, you know, just to be there and listen would matter. You don't always have to have the right words. You just you definitely don't want to tell somebody to think positive. You know, there's some things like that, that you don't we have some other videos that talk about those kinds of things. But I think that was very important. The only other thing I want to mention real quick, is there is a lady who I've become friends with who has an organization called bionic, and it's an acronym for Believe it or not, I care. And she's in Colorado, and she is she was a school counselor at the Columbine High School and at Green Mountain High School, which both had Whoa, combine had the shooting. That was about 20 years ago. And then green mountain had has had quite a few suicides in a short amount of time years ago. And so she started this program as a school counselor, where they have kids that are on committees that do outreach to other kids when maybe they're not at school, or they had a death in their family or it's obvious that something's going on. So I just wanted to mention that because I was hoping now her on, but that didn't work out. So since we're talking about schools and teachers, I wanted to also just mention that because she does help people set up those programs in schools.

That's awesome. I mentioned in the book, two official programs that are like evidence based or evidence informed and one of those is sources Strength. Okay, and the other is the Hope Squad. And then so those and that I've mentioned several programs in the book book, also there's signs of suicide, but the sources of strength and hope squad are more student based. And then I've also got a section in the book on how to start a mental wellness club, you know, what does that look like? What, and then a us three case studies of students who started one in their school. So the students that I interviewed kind of freelance, their mental health clubs, and what did they do? What did they focus on. And then Mike, riper off from the paint and Riker Foundation. And I think that's Nebraska. He goes through a couple of schools, they go through bring change to mind. And they have a mental wellness club, and you can kind of log in and get the ideas and so they kind of have a more templated version of a student program. I think it is absolutely vital to get students engaged in every aspect of the suicide prevention, a including helping develop a commemoration policy for the school.

Lots of times, we'll hear about, okay, I'll hear from our parent, my child, my cainy, died by suicide, and they did this big whole page of this one football player who died from heatstroke. But they did not come to my daughter because she died by suicide. So it's absolutely vital that schools have a commemoration policy that treats all student deaths equally. So if you've got to memorialize somebody in the yearbook, you Memorial, you know, you give them the same SAS space, and maybe it's just a quarter page each, but it's really more about putting your grief into action. With, you know, prevention, or if somebody died of heatstroke, then, you know, maybe you would have more education around that, if it's suicide, you that you'd have a school wide walk, I want to prevent suicide, and so such and such as name. So, because there are all sorts of ways, you know, if you commemorate everybody that dies in your school with a tree or some kind of stone marker, well, after a while, it can kind of look rangy, and can't and basically like cemetery and that you, you want to avoid that. So it gets you thinking about this, because at some point, you're going to lose someone at your school, whether it's a teacher or a student, it's going to happen. What if you have a policy, then you have some structure around which you can fashion what you're going to do going forward, and you've got something in writing that is written and getting students help up front. So you know, sometimes kids will have these spontaneous memorials or, you know, what do you do with that. And lots of principals want to come and just rip it all down. And in my own experience, I know when there was a child who died by suicide at Charles's school, two years before he did, then the neighbors actually went, and these kids did graffiti and a tunnel. And that one the right thing to do, but that was living the question of their grief. And they called the cops and I mean, they just made it a big, ugly thing when they just needed to be more compassionate. What they ended up doing is the students came in they apologized, and they said, you know, it's just an outpouring or expression of our grief. There were messages of love. And it wasn't the right thing to do. But they said, you know, we'll clean it up. And they made a date to clean it up. And that was going to be their ritual for coming together. For the love of their friend and doing something together for the good of the community cannot undo this thing they had done. Well, what the community didn't stead is that they hired a company before that day, and they cleaned it out before the kids could come do their thing. And then they had the cops, they pressured the police, to charge them with felonies, and see that they never came on school grounds again, because apparently, they did some graffiti on the side of the building. And it wasn't like, lots of graffiti, it was just a little bit.

So the kids were grieving. And they basically shun them and asked them, putting them at higher risk for suicide or early death, drug addiction or other substance misuse or self harm. Yeah, so how we treat those incidents afterwards also prevents future suicide. And, and administrators can always jump to the wrong conclusions there. So having a book that just kind of outlines the basic steps of what to do. So even though it's a teacher's guide, principles, we'll get something out of this. And then I've you know, we have a list of resources at the end. Here's a memorial guide here, you so here's a part school policy that you can start with, you know, and you can make it your own. And if you need help, you can hire the Trevor Project, and they'll help you with that school policy. So that you can get those policies in place. Before you have some terrible tragedy at your school, because in some point, something's going to happen at your school, and you need to be prepared with at least some basic policies that you might not think are important. But in that moment, when you're dealing with the postvention of a suicide, that's not the time to create them, because you can't think

That's true.

It's almost like, um, and I don't know, you might know more about this than me. But it just seems like if we could have some sort of class, I mean, I'm guessing it would be some kind of in science about what even is mental health? And what does depression look like? What does anxiety look like? What does ADHD look like? For the people who don't experience any of that and don't understand it? It's like, and maybe I'm getting off topic here, but just

No, no, this is this is definitely like, included in the book, all these, you know, what do you do in the classroom? That is, that's the main focus of the book is what had teachers done to integrate that education. I had a kid, there's a chemistry teacher, who integrates a mental health check in every Monday. And then I've got a health and PE teacher, that that's what she does. In her school, she teaches the mental health segment. And she hasn't do a PowerPoint presentation. And they pick from a list of ADHD, eating disorders, or various mental health issues, and they do a presentation and I do a three minute podcast on it. So that is the education piece, but also they the problem solving piece, how can you integrate that and one Spanish teacher and Kansas one thing that she did was, she had them do a Dear Abby assignment and have to do it all in Spanish. So it's for her more advanced classes. And because they want to express themselves and do a good job. They are really inspired to learn their Spanish to be able to answer these questions well, and to be able to present their narrative. So they have to use a real issue they faced and then she codes them so that they're anonymous, she passes them out to the students. And then the kids kind of answer on a Dear Abby way, you know, like, this is how I would approach this situation. And the kid will end up getting more than one answer. And then she pulls them back out and redistributes them. So it gives kids number one, the ability to see that other people are struggling with some pretty big issues. And so they get the feeling that they're not alone. It's not a same, by the way, you're not alone. It's very different from getting the feeling that you're not alone, then they also have the ability to learn Spanish, and to learn to problem solve. So she's integrated this into her teaching curriculum. And they're more motivated to learn the language, because they want to express themselves. She also does a social justice movie, they have to write it and film it, and then have a discussion. And she said, those have been the most meaningful part of her teaching career. And all of the different strategies that she's integrated, have made her teaching more meaningful to her. And it's just made all the difference. And it's because she went through a suicide at her school of one of her students. And she said, Never again, I'm doing everything I can. And she also talks about grief. And she has, instead of Cinco Demayo, she does de los Muertos day, the dead, where they celebrate their loved ones, and they talk about someone who's died. And that Spanish Day is a really cool way to celebrate daft. And we don't talk about it a lot to give students the opportunity to talk about people that they've loved and lost, because we don't do that very well,either.

That's true. I think I love

I love your audience. I mean,

I mean, I think that, you know, if people were more familiar, you know, I've been, I've been thinking about adults for for a long time in this round. But lately, the teenagers have really been on my heart. And I think that, you know, bullying, and social media, and all this stuff is, is I think, at the root of a lot of the problems that we are seeing in the teenage sector. And I think that if people understood it more, just like if adults understood it more, we would be more kind to each other. And we would be more empathetic, because you know, somebody has a broken leg, people can see that they have a broken leg, they're on crutches, they need help, they open the door for them, or whatever, carry their books for them or whatever it is. But when it's when it's a mental health issue, you can't see it. So we need to know about it more so people understand what people are dealing with. And I think it's so easy for us to hide it because we don't want people to know or we don't think we matter, or we don't think they'll understand. But it's like if it if it's part of our school and part of our education, maybe it will become more normalized, and it will, people will have the same empathy as they would for a physical ailment.

Yeah, so nobody ever suicides because of bullying a lot. Bullying is a contributing factor to a child that is already vulnerable to suicide. So you could call it a trigger. But when somebody suicides it is typically the result of multiple factors. Usually there's an underlying mental health or trauma and in that child's life, and the triggers the top triggers for teens and young adults, before they take their life are two things. One of them is relationship disruption, and the other is transition. So relationship disruption, could be bullying. It could be a fight with a parent, it could be a fight with the best friend, it could be a romantic falling out. It could be leaving one's connections at one school and going to a new school where they don't have any connections. So when teenagers reach out to me, that's really common is some type of relationship disruption and they feel worthless as a result of it. The second is transitions. So where we see a lot of different Coffee, and not just the big transitions of middle school to high school, college to real life or high school to college, those are the big ones. But we see a lot of kids suicide in those mini transitions from spring break back to school, or for right before summer break, or right before Christmas break, or, you know going to have from, it seems to be that leaving when they have a lot of support. And there, there's this fear that when men go back, they won't have that level of support and connectedness anymore. So that that was from my conversation with Dr. Victor Schwartz, who is the CMO of the Jed Foundation. And I've found that absolutely fascinating. And why aren't we sharing that with young adults? I mean, I don't think we have to come out and say, Well, this is one most people die by suicide, I just think we need to say, Well, we know that transitions are difficult for teens and young adults, at least set that expectation. Tell them this is going to be an issue. And this is a an issue with teenagers. How might how, what are some coping strategies that we might use to manage those transitions? And also set the expectation that yeah, it's it's uncomfortable. It's not gonna feel good sometimes. But if you feel that way, how many other people do. And when you're having those first week discussions in your classroom, maybe especially now, right after a pandemic, and going back to school?

How about an anonymous bulletin board, about how people feel about coming back to school, because they're excited, and they're scared at the same time. And then there's a percentage of them that are dreading it. You know, they've gained weight, they've lost weight, they've gotten taller, they've gotten hairier, the voices have changed, their hair's blown longer, it's a different color. And then there's been a lot of disordered eating. In this pandemic. That's been a really, that's a pretty serious uptick. Substance misuse and overdose. A lot. Those kids are coming back having brought there, they're going back, and they want to fulfill hopes and dreams, but they're also bringing their losses, their food and housing insecurity is back with them. And we need to understand that these are human beings that need that connection and support and how are we going to do that in our schools? And what changes can we make to support our students and make student wellness the core of our academics and not scores are nice shiny scores, because 2% of them are going to use algebra in their lifetime. But 100% of them will use their their coping strategies that they learned.

So we should be embedding those social emotional learning and Dialectical Behavioral Therapy type, exercise exercises that you can turn into fun games, into our classrooms. And make it make it fun and engaging and get those kids connecting with each other because the more connections kids have, the less likely they'll do feel isolated and that child that's being bullied, the more connections they have, the less likely there'll be bullied for one. And if they are bullied, the more likely they will. They are to tell someone what is happening. It's when children start to kind of self isolate, that those issues start to grow.

Yeah, I agree. I think my own high school experience. I was still involved in so many things. He knows sports and dance team materially all this, but I didn't I never felt like I fit in that crowd, even though I was part of it, and so sometimes it was, you know, people that knew me back then never saw anything that was out of order to them, about me because I was always involved in everything and seem to be popular and all that, but it was like, you're in the inner circle, but you still don't feel like you belong there. And that's, that's something that is hard to recognize, I think, as a kid, and then I had a pretty serious boyfriend in high school, and when we broke up was not my choice. So I was pretty devastated. And I even changed high schools and went to live with my grandmother, over all of that, because I was, I was so devastated. And so I don't really, I still don't really know how that connects to the rest of my journey. But I know that it started somewhere around there. And it's, it can be pretty devastating, you know, things that, as adults, we think are normal things we have to deal with when you're in high school. It's it's traumatic. So

It is and I get messages, working with a child in Saudi Arabia now, who is dealing with a lot of the things you just mentioned, and a whole different country. And, of course, I can't encourage her to tell someone there because it is so stigmatized, and it's likely to put her more at risk.

Yeah.

And, you know, I have to recognize that it's different country. There are more resources here now for that than there used to be. But I do an exercise with kids a workshop. And they come and they put up a post it note of how they're feeling of one issue that they're dealing with. And then everybody sits down. And they don't have any hesitation coming up and putting that posted net, and it's anonymous. And then I go up there and I kind of read all the ones and then I have, if it's a small class, I'll have them come up and read or I'll leave them up there and they come up and look at them later. But when I'm reading over them, they start to cry. Because I'll say all the three people in here that have been raped, this is a class of 100 people. Three had been raped in this class that I know of, and it could have been more. And I said, it looks like several people are struggling with gender identity. Somebody has a stuttering issue. And he struggled with that. And I mean, I'll just go over each one. And I'll just kind of hit the highlights. And they start to cry, because for the first time, they realize that their classmates are suffering, with some problems every bit as big and as devastating as their own. And some even more sad. And then we'll start to talk about unhealthy coping strategies and healthy coping strategies. So then, you know, it segues into that. And then before they have before they end, I don't tell them where the coping strategies go. And we tell them out and we ask questions. And, you know, before they leave, they have to, they have to think of to dress trusted adults that they will talk to. And I asked him to think about which of the coping strategies from the healthy column that they develop, that their friends, you know, contributed to? What were some of those ideas that they could actually use to, you know, manage a difficult situation, because I can't change the situation, but I can manage how I react to it. There's so many things out there that are not within our control. We can't make somebody else love us when we still love them. We just can't. So how are we going to manage that pain? You know, and we've already talked about the fact that numbing that pain leads to stuck there. So if you choose drugs and alcohol, you will remain stuck there and I've met dads or moms as well. The only way I could deal with the loss of my child is to drink every night and seven years later there and not a better place than they We're a month after it happened.

So, in order to heal, you have to heal. And when you hurt, those are the emotional building blocks to healing. That's how you find healing and it hurts like crazy. Trust me on that. Nothing, nothing took me to my knees like losing my child to suicide. And this went on for years. And I remember getting up in the morning and making the pledge to go running. But sometimes I would have to curl up on the floor two or three times before I even put my shoes on. Because there's grief waves and hit me so hard that it literally took me to the floor, curled up in a fetal position, crying on odd. And then when I you know, when it would lift, I got up, no, put on a sock, and then another sock and then the shoes.

Yeah,

I exercised a dialectical behavior therapy called opposite action. I wanted to get back in bed and crawl in bed and fall asleep. Because when I was asleep, I wasn't suffering. And I was dreaming about my child, and he wasn't dead when I was asleep. But when I was awake, I knew he was dead. And by exercising that opposite action, and saying, Okay, what I want to do is that, but I'm gonna do the opposite, because I know that's not good for me. Over time, that became a habit. And over time, that is what helps me heal and find peace.

I feel pretty quick or not. I mean, you know, wasn't a month, let's put it that way it was yours. But writing, I mean, I had this whole toolbox of strategies that I use support group writing, running, and exposing myself this extreme cold. That was another one. So in the wintertime when I was 12 degrees, I'm like, oh, yeah, I'm going out there running as long as there was no ice on the ground. Because then I got the Combine combination of exercising, and extreme cold, both of which reset to brain. It works, it really does work. I mean, it was hard to get out. I mean, my chest felt heavy, my arms felt heavy, my legs fell. I mean, it felt like I was dragging a lead behind me. But by going out there and doing opposite action, it helped. It helped a lot.

I mean, a lot of what you're talking about is is, um, you know, for your own recovery is what a lot of people go through that have ideation because we need to do the same thing to heal. It's what works for everyone. It does.

And that is why I tell my story about how I healed so high school students, because they take bits and pieces of what worked for me. And they take away what will work for them. Not all of them work for them. But I've got like seven or eight strategies that I talked about, were core for me.

Yeah.

And they recognize that, and then they're like, Oh, that one work for me. And then they've made a list. So when they leave that class, they have an idea of what goes in their toolbox. So I mean, then, you know, I can't do years of therapy and in an hour and a half, but I can raise their awareness that you know you have to you can't heal if you can't feel and you got to let the hurt end. You don't need to push it away. You're not supposed to do everything by yourself. And here are some strategies that have worked for a lot of people, including your peers.

I love that if you can't, you can't heal if you can't feel because I can relate to that.

I know you can and you're an empath and I can tell just by looking at you on this video. I mean that that is your natural inclination is that you are an empath and you feel everything very, very deeply. And there are Children. My son was like that to Charles. He felt everything. So there are just some people that feel things more deeply. And what is so, so important about people like that? Is you all are the ones that will bring us together? You know, I mean, that's a gift and you take it for granted. And you probably felt shame around it. I feel guilty and like, I'm too sensitive. But those are the people that others who are struggling talk to you, that's who they trust. That's who they go to. The end paths are the people that that bond with them that they trust, and they want to talk to.

It's true, I think I get it from my mom. Yeah. But it is true. And I think it's, for so many years, I did not letthat side of me show as much. I mean, I did in a business sense, but not in a personal sense. And I think that's another lesson to younger people is to embrace those things that are unique about yourself.

Oh, too, to see them. And I think reframing is another important skill. And we're coming close to the end, but I have to share this story with you. So I have a channel on YouTube that some kids will go to that channel and look up a way to kill themselves. Now the video that doesn't give instructions, but instead just tells a story and it's 55 second video. And it basically says that understand your pain. So this kid wanted to kill himself after his girlfriend friendzone them which means she says I want to only be friends and I mean he was just madly in love with her and had been for three years time away. And you know, she his whole world was all about her. So we do comments back and forth. And I guess it's about comment number 32. He comes back and he goes, I've decided not to kill myself. Because if I do, that would be 0% chance of her ever wanting to date me if I'm if I'm dead. I thought that was a great reframing. So like, okay, my chances are pretty low. But if I die by suicide, there's 0%.

That is, that is a very good explanation of Ricketts

cog cognitive reframing. Yes. I looked at it differently. I thought, oh my gosh, this kids 15. That is brilliant. I took a screenshot and guess what is in my presentations?

That's well, Anne Moss, I am so thankful for you. And I know that your speaking is not only helping children, but I assume that it's also helping parents. So I feel like you are a very strong person with so much information and wisdom around the subject. So thank you.

Thank you. I've gotten a lot of training and a lot of research behind that it's taken a long time.

Well, it's definitely needed. And it's definitely appreciated that you would share it with me today. And maybe we can have another conversation soon.

That'd be great.

But I just want to remind everybody that you know, if you have people close to you that you see signs of struggle or pain, to have a conversation with them and let them know you were there even if it's just to listen. And that said you can follow this page for more live conversations and discussions. And remember, it's all about having the conversation.