National Suicide Prevention Week

September is Suicide Prevention Month; in addition, National Suicide Prevention Week started yesterday and runs through September 13th. While we always need to be talking about suicide, suicidal ideation, and mental health, this year, it feels even more vital to do so.

While this year there is no one universal theme for Suicide Prevention Week, the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention picked “Looking out for each other,” To Write Love On Her Arms picked "I hope you stay," and The National Alliance on Mental Illness picked "Start a Conversation. Be the Difference," as well as highlighting the importance of 988 for those in crisis.

Together these themes recognize that many of us are feeling overwhelmed right now and that the best suicide prevention includes a holistic and community-wide approach. Often the best suicide prevention is providing safe and brave spaces to talk openly about our mental health so that we can recognize we are not alone and that there are many people and groups who want to support us when we are struggling.

Below is Wentworth Miller's Active Minds speech he gave almost a decade ago that is an important example of how meaningful talking about our mental health experiences can be. Wentworth is vulnerable about his own experiences with suicidal ideation (from childhood), the trauma caused by people's response to that ideation, and how he used the power of telling his story to learn to thrive and help others. 

Mental Health in Sabrina (1954)

Today my local library branch showed the romantic comedy Sabrina (1954.)

Two clips stood out to me within the context of September being Suicide Prevention Month,

But I recognize I have no idea what the original intent was by the filmmakers.

Note:

I will be describing two clips from the film

The clips reference or show suicidal ideation, but are not graphic

In addition there are no major spoilers since neither clip is key to the film's plot.

Sabrina's Suicidal Ideation

Pretty early in the film, Sabrina's suicidal ideation is portrayed in a "Romeo and Juliet," aka young people don't know how to handle "big feelings," way. While it is not played for laughs exactly, it is portrayed in a relatively lighthearted way, gets resolved quickly, and seems to be forgotten by everyone. (And yes, I really want to know what happened to the suicide note she slid under her father's door right before the above clip, which is never referenced by anyone.)

  

Linus's Suicidal Ideation

(You can start at 1:55)

Much later in the film, Linus mentions his own previous brief suicidal ideation. Most likely in the film this conversation is intended to simply show Sabrina that Linus really has a heart and has felt "big feelings" in the past. But this brief scene added to the film and felt like the start of a slightly more meaningful conversation around suicidal ideation.

  

Suicidal Ideation in Conversation

Sabrina's and Linus's suicidal ideation put together felt like a deeper conversation around how anyone can experience intrusive thoughts/suicidal ideation. It does not matter if you are young or old, female or male (or nonbinary, but the film was made in the 50s, so it's pretty binary in its portrayal), emotional or serious, a chauffeur's daughter or an elder son running a major business conglomerate.

In addition, from what I know of the 1950s (when the film was made), male-identified individuals often did not discuss their mental health with others, let alone discuss suicidal ideation seriously in films (yes, sometimes mental health was represented, but more often as a punch line or joke at the expense of male-identified characters who did not meet the societal expectations for masculine individuals).

While I know that mental health and suicidal ideation are neither the main focus of this film nor does the film really go too in-depth around these subjects (and I know moving to France is not the universal cure for suicidal ideation), I was pleasantly surprised to have the topic shown at all, let alone relatively well, in a 1950s romantic comedy.

"What It Sounds Like ..."

 

Currently I am really into K-Pop Demon Hunters, and I would recommend it to pretty much everyone. I am likely to write more about it at some point, but for right now I decided to share a poem I wrote in response to the song "What It Sounds Like." You can also listen to this recording of me reading the poem at August's Three Avenues Open Mic.

8/22/25-8/30/25 (I worked on this poem over the course of several days) 

This poem is based on the song “What it sounds like.” from “K-Pop Demon Hunters” 

K-Pop Demon Hunters’ Song 

“What it sounds like” playing on repeat 

Calling me out, calling me in

What words have gone unspoken?

When did I forget that I’m not alone?

What patterns am I ashamed of?

Recently all too often I forget

How to struggle, How to survive, 

Let alone how to live, to thrive

Forgetting how to be “gentle, gentle” with myself

Forgetting how to be able to hold my reality together

With little more than fanfiction and daydreams

Or honestly, even remember why I should Want To “Want To” 

Hold this splintering multiverse called life, called living, together

When the shards of history, of time itself can cut me deep to my bone

Sometimes I want to return to starlight, to stardust

Longing for that which we all come from, all return to 

Seeking the sunless lands, hoping "To sleep, perchance to dream" 

Yet knowing life should not mirror a never ending time loop

Wanting a reason to seek new sunrises, new days, new tomorrows

Beyond my impossible wild hopes, impossible wild dreams

On the not good days, in the “here, here” moments 

It can feel like all I have left to cling to is imagining “What if?” 

What if I manifested a shattering of the fourth wall?

Surviving for the day The Tardis appears on my path

Surviving for the day Captain Cold is guided into my life

Surviving for the day Wentworth or Ncuti appears here at open mic

On the not good days, in the “here, here” moments 

It can feel like all I have left to cling to, is my intersections 

With my characters, with my parasocial support network 

There are worst things to keep surviving for, to use to cope 

Than clinging to wild dreams, wild imaginings, wild “What ifs”

But yet I wonder, is it always enough to survive for impossibles? 

So what words have gone unspoken?

The words that I am not always ok, that simply living life 

Adulting, being human, can feel like too much

So when did I forget that I’m not alone?

Forget that others know the color of the ink in my veins?

Forget that others know the vibrations of my atoms?

Why do I often forget that I have been claimed?

Claimed by the god and goddesses of storytelling? 

Marked as a believer in the magic of Three Avenues?

So what patterns am I ashamed of?

Patterns where I don’t give voice, don’t trust others 

With everything that is bubbling up inside myself

Inside of me are swirls, vortexes, and multiverses

Inside of me is the shadow, the night sky, the candle, the stars

Inside of me is every character, every fandom that keeps me alive

I seek to see this splintering multiverse called life

As it really is, as it might be, as it could be in daydreams

To be called out, to be called in, to sing a song of transformation

*Shouting in the quiet, "You're not alone"

We listened to the demons, we let them get between us

But none of us are out here on our own*

I’m not alone

You’re not alone

We’re not alone

*So we're not heroes, we're still survivors

The dreamers, the fighters, no lying, I'm tired*

*Fearless and undefined, this is what it sounds like*

Here I stand before you in all my imperfections

“We broke into a million pieces, and we can't go back

But now we're seeing all the beauty in the broken glass*

We need to be honest with ourselves, with the multiverse

*Why did we cover up the colors stuck inside our head?

Get up and let the jagged edges meet the light instead*

So now we stand hand in hand, dreaming, singing

*We're shattering the silence, we're rising, defiant

Shouting in the quiet, "You're not alone"*

The power of song, the power of words

The power of sharing what is deep inside ourselves

The power of shouting our truth, the truth

I’m not alone, You’re not alone, We’re not alone

*Get up and let the jagged edges meet the light*

Remembering *none of us are out here on our own*

*Up, Up, Up It’s our moment

Gonna be, Gonna be golden

Gonna be, Gonna be golden*

Bold text is taken directly from the songs “What it sounds like” and “Golden”