Every year,
30,000 Americans take their own lives by committing suicide.
At least 15%
of people with depression complete the act of suicide, but an
even higher proportion will attempt it. While depression is one
of the most treatable mental disorders, it is also one of the
most underdiagnosed and underrecognized.
According to ABC News, since
it opened in 1937, more than 1,200 people have jumped from the
Golden Gate Bridge to their deaths. There's a suicide every two
weeks, according to the Marin County coroner, probably more owing
to strong tides that wash bodies out to sea where they are never
found. Thirteen emergency phones on the walkway are connected
to a suicide counselor. The family of Marissa Millgan, who jumped
two years ago, is suing bridge authorities to force them to build
a suicide barrier. Psychologist Richard Seiden who tracked 500
people who had been prevented from jumping found 94 percent were
still alive 25 years after their attempt or had died of natural
causes while only six percent had killed themselves.
Said Seiden to ABC News: "The
whole linchpin of suicide prevention is that a person's not suicidal
their entire life. It's related to crisis. And if we can get them
through that crisis, there's a good chance they can have a decent
life."
"There is
research
supporting that when people are stopped from committing suicide
off the bridge, they don't commit suicide by other means,"
says Lawrence Wallack, professor of health education in the School
of Public Health at UC Berkeley and a founding member of the
Suicide Barrier Coalition. "Anything that makes it more
difficult for people to commit suicide, that gives them some time
to reconsider, is definitely a good idea."
CASE HISTORY:
My name is Leigh
Roth.
I am a Certifed
Nurse -Midwife and chemical dependency counselor, with training
as a Master's in Family Child Counseling
In November 1999
I developed bipolar disease which was undiagnosed until the day
I tried to jump off the Golden Gate Bridge.
Although I have
many degrees and years in the obstetrical and psychiatric fields,
my illness caused me to become impaired so quickly I was unable
to properly get help. Instead of seeking help at my Kaiser Oakland
HMO, I was seeing a community private practice psychiatrist named
Stuart
Gold.
In late July 2000
I went to see Dr.
Stuart Gold, complaining
26 agonized hours
later, after setting off the smoke alarm in my bedroom with my
endless cigarettes,
"I CAN END
ALL THIS EASILY--
I'LL JUMP OFF
THE GOLDEN GATE BRIDGE!"
My brain was too
impaired to write a note nor could I wait.
Due to agoraphobia,
I hadn't driven in months.
At the Presidio
I abandoned my car, leaving doors unlocked and keys in the ignition.
I walked up to
the bridge
It seemed like
such a long way....
And I was in
a hurry...
Around me the
smiling throng of people, blue sky and puffy clouds
I couldn't bear
to look at anything.
Finally, I reached the balustrade.
To my consternation,
I was looking
down at cement foundations instead of the ocean.
I've always lived
by the OCEAN
But it was very
scary up on the bridge right before you jump. Was it my acraphobia
that saved me? Or just Mother Nature screaming: "THAT's GOING
TO HURT,
DON'T DO IT"
A computer system
over-ride
protracted my
struggle to throw the second leg over. In that interval I was
accosted.
