Utah Valley University (UVU) hosted the sixth annual Suicide Prevention Conference on Oct. 7 to bring attention to mental health, educate the public on suicide prevention resources, and remember those lost to suicide.

“Suicide is very complex, and there's not an easy answer for why people die by suicide,” UVU Director of Crisis Services J.C. Graham said during the event’s morning dove ceremony in remembrance of those lost by suicide. “Each suicide death is individual, and there are people in this space right now who have personally lost someone [by suicide], so I encourage you to be kind to yourselves and also be kind to other people.”

Sergeant Kevin Briggs, a retired California highway patrol officer who personally dissuaded over 200 people from jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge, was the event’s keynote speaker. In his 23 years of service, Briggs has been affectionately dubbed “The Guardian of the Golden Gate Bridge.”

“We are losing 47,000 people a year to suicide,” Briggs said. “That's a lot of people. That's more than homicides, more than traffic accident fatalities. But we don't hear about it. We need to start talking about this more.”

Breakout sessions were held following the keynote address, discussing topics like safe and effective messaging, suicide among sexual orientation and gender minorities, mental health in the workplace, isolation, and other suicide prevention resources.

Family lawyer and mediator Dr. Tamara Fackrell spoke in one of the breakout sessions on the benefits of social-emotional learning.

“We are all responsible for how we act, feel, and think,” Fackrell said. “It’s all sequential. You don’t act without feeling, and you don’t feel without thinking. What I’ve found is that people that struggle with emotional health, a lot of the time, don’t understand how thinking, feeling, and acting work.”

The Suicide Prevention Conference was put on by UVU’s College of Humanities and Social Sciences (CHSS) as part of its Mental Health Lecture Series.

“At Utah Valley University, especially within the College of Humanities and Social Sciences, our focus is on exceptional care,” CHSS Marketing and Communications Director Candida Johnson said. “This [conference] is an opportunity for us to present that exceptional care to the community by providing educational opportunities for suicide prevention. By providing that opportunity, we are building everyone's toolboxes with the skills that they need to be that first responder, to be the one that helps intervene, and to be the one that makes a difference.”

 

Suicide Prevention Resources

The rate of suicide in Utah is consistently higher than the national rate in the U.S., according to the Utah Public Health Based Information System. If you or someone you know is struggling with thoughts of suicide, call 988 to connect with the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline.

UVU Resources

Mental Health Services: (801) 863-8876

Crisis Hotlines

Huntsman Mental Health Institute Crisis Line: 801-587-3000

SafeUT Crisis Line: 833-372-3388

988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline: 988

Trevor Project Hotline for LGBTQ teens: 1-866-488-7386

Online Resources

NAMI Utah: www.namiut.org

SafeUT: www.safeut.org

Suicide Prevention Lifeline: www.suicidepreventionlifeline.org

American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, Utah chapter: www.afsp.org/chapter/Utah