Aasra Suicide Prevention.This blog is about getting people to talk about their innermost feelings and emotions in times of distress and despair.All discussions are about the issue of suicide, mental health and it's effect on society.
Aasra Helpline for the depressed and suicidal. 91-22-27546669(24x7)
Johnson Thomas , director Aasra answers questions on Youth Suicides
According to a survey, 58 per cent of depressed youngsters (age group 14-24) have had thoughts of suicide. I would like inputs on the following.
> What are the reasons/factors behind such a large youth in the city being depressed?
The fast changing environment in urban life brought on by transitions linked to globalisation (loss of protective factors/fractured support systems like break up of joint family system, increasing incidence of nuclear and single parent families, increasing attachment towards materiakism, ambitions overiding the importance of relationships and social and ethical strictures leading to the lack of strong emotive bonding within relationships, poor conditioning in dealing with failure and rejection, lack of coping ability development to handle crisis situations.
> Do you think the fact that mental illness is not taken as a serious illness in our country?
Well it is not and you can see that in the low allocation of funds towards mental health in the budget itself. Also the stigma associated with mental illness has not been wiped out completely so seeking help for mental illness issues is difficult for most people. The lack of health professionals in this area is also an impediment. Also the manner in which some existing health care professionals treat the mentall ill is also questionable.
> According to the survey, 74 per cent of these people are unable to talk to parents about their depression. Why?
because most parents would prefer to overlook depression as a possible impediment to their child's future. It's something they do not know how to deal with themselves and the associated stigma is pretty much off putting for any attempts at seeking help. Also depression is largely trivialised as a behavioural issue and most parents would advocate hard work ,discipline, and will power as a cureall.
> How can youngsters better their mental health?
A regular stress free routine would be ideal but that's not exactly possible in today's world. So instead, a healthy lifestyle, a measured diet without carbonated drinks and fast foods, lots of exercise, meditation, yoga, deep breathing, adequate relaxation, cultivating hobbies, social interactions/communications. Above all stay practical and develop your self and skillsets as per your talent and potential. Do not get caught up in the rat race.
Facebook has tied-up with non-profit organisations AASRA and the Live Love Laugh Foundation. Photo: Ramesh Pathania/Mint#aasradotinfo #samaritandsUK #BefriendersWorldwide #IASP #AFSP #WHO #UN #INFOTES #Aasra24x7helpline91222754666#aasradotinfo #samaritandsUK #BefriendersWorldwide #IASP #AFSP #WHO #UN #INFOTES #Aasra24x7helpline912227546669ForDepressedAndSuicidalhttp://www.khaleejtimes.com/business/technology/facebook-rolls-out-updated-suicide-prevention-tools-in-india9ForDepressedAndSuicidal
http://www.khaleejtimes.com/business/technology/facebook-rolls-out-updated-suicide-prevention-tools-in-indiaA 42-year-old engineer in Gurgaon on Tuesday posted a photo of his slit wrist, a suicide note, and recorded video on Facebook to inform the world that he was taking his life. In 2015, a young doctor from Delhi posted a suicide note on Facebook before killing herself.
Many people tend to give out advance signals of their intention to commit suicide. With the emergence of social media and users’ willingness to express freely on them, there have been many cases of people baring their stress and depression online, often alerting their friends.
Facebook has tied-up with help groups such as Samaritans and National Suicide Prevention Lifeline in the US, where users can report a suicide threat or post by anyone. One has to attach a screenshot of the post, mention the URL and the user name of the concerned person at Facebook help page. These service groups then reach out to the user to understand how they feel and reassure them that things can be right again.
In India, Facebook has now made similar tie-ups with non-profit organisations AASRA and the Live Love Laugh Foundation to deliver similar services to Indian users.
Live Love Laugh Foundation is a Bengaluru-based organisation which work on awareness on mental health issues by engaging with organisations and professionals. It is founded and run by Actor Deepika Padukone. AASRA is a Mumbai-based NGO which provides 24-hour support to people with suicidal tendencies.
How it works
If you detect something alarming about a friend’s post, you can report it to these two NGOs directly, or put them on the Facebook help page. At Facebook, special staff will scan the reported incidents and respond by alerting the staff from the NGOs. Facebook claims the monitoring will be active throughout the day everyday in a week, which means you can report any incident any time.
On Facebook, you can access it by going to Settings> Help -> Visit the Help Center -> Safety tools and Resources -> Suicide Prevention -> How do I report Suicidal content to Facebook -> Suicide hotline.
You can also reach out to AASRA directly at 022-27546669 and The Live Love Laugh Foundation at 022-25521111 or email at icall@tiss.edu
One of the issues with social networks is to identify a serious threat from a prank. Often, the message is too subtly put that they are misread. Facebook has launched another campaign called Help a Friend in Need Guide in collaboration with AASRA. This is actually meant to help a Facebook user recognize signs of distress in a post and help them handle the situation on their own.
Guidance will be provided not just in English and Hindi, but in Urdu, Bengali, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam, Punjabi and Marathi.
The Gurgaon engineer survived because his Facebook friends spotted the message on time and alerted others who rushed him to a hospital. With its new initiative, Facebook hopes to help more people save lives in a systematic manner.
Facebook rolls out suicide prevention tools in India
IANS/New Delhi
Filed on June 15, 2016
The rate of suicide among the youth in India is one of the highest in the world.
In a bid to curb self-injury and suicide episodes in India, social networking giant Facebook on Wednesday rolled out updated suicide prevention tools in collaboration with local partners in English and Hindi.
The updated tools, also available to all 1.65 billion Facebook monthly active users now, were unveiled with help from non-profit organisations AASRA and The Live Love Laugh Foundation.
"We care deeply about the safety and well-being of the 148 million people in India who use Facebook to connect with the people who matter to them and recognise. There's an opportunity with these tools and resources to connect someone who is struggling with a person they already have a relationship with," said Ankhi Das, Public Policy Director at Facebook India (South and Central Asia) in a statement.
"Facebook is a place where people connect and share, and one of the things we have learnt from the mental health partners and academics we have worked with on this issue, is that being connected is a protective factor in suicide prevention," Das added.
Developed in collaboration with mental health organisations and with inputs from people who have personal experience with self-injury and suicide, these tools were first launched in the US with the help of organisations like Forefront, Lifeline and Save.org.
"The tools Facebook are rolling out aim both at people who are expressing suicidal thoughts and also guide concerned friends or family members to resources and alternatives and appropriate interventions," said Anna Chandy, Chairperson-Trustees, The Live Love Laugh Foundation.
With the help of these new tools, if someone posts something on Facebook that makes you concerned about their well being, you can reach out to them directly and you can also report the post to Facebook.
Varun Malik, who works in a multinational company, tried to commit suicide by cutting his wrist and uploaded the pictures of a bleeding hand on the social networking site Facebook.
His friends who saw the post came to his rescue and informed the police immediately. Malik was rushed to a private hospital where doctors said his condition was stable.
"AASRA has been working with Facebook for several years to help people who are having suicidal thoughts. Facebook's new tool is another step forward in helping to prevent suicide," noted Johnson Thomas, Director, AASRA.
According to Antigone Davis, Global Head of Safety and Jennifer Guadagno, Researcher, at Facebook, "We have teams working around the world, 24/7, who review reports that come in. They prioritize the most serious reports like self-injury."
"We're updating the resources we offer to people around the world who may be experiencing self-injury or suicidal thoughts, as well as the support we offer to their concerned friends and family members," they posted.
According to Deepika Padukone, Founder of The Live Love Laugh Foundation, the rate of suicide among the youth in India is one of the highest in the world.
"We are happy to partner with Facebook in this suicide prevention initiative. It is especially important to reach out to young people out there who are feeling depressed and encourage them to reach out for help," Padukone said.
What explains the spike in the number of top-level corporate honchos taking their lives
In May this year, the chief operating officer of Encyclopaedia Britannica took his life by plunging down the ventilation shaft of his residential building.
In April, after his text and messaging app failed to take off, 33-year-old Lucky Gupta Agarwal, founder and CEO of KQingdom Ites, killed himself by inhaling nitrogen.
In 2012, Lalit Sheth, owner of Raj Travels, drowned himself in the Arabian Sea when failures overshadowed the stupendous successes he had seen as a tourism tycoon.
All these people lived in metros, had access to the best medical facilities and yet did not seek help before taking the extreme step. While the factors behind any suicide are complex, often a mix of both personal and professional issues, mental health experts point to the rising tide among C-suite executives in an era where both success and failure are given undue importance. “People at the top find it more difficult to admit they have a problem ...to relate to someone not as intelligent as them,” says Anjali Chhabria, psychiatrist and founder of Mindtemple, a mental wellness clinic in Mumbai.
A 2015 study by Assocham found depression or general anxiety disorder prevalent among nearly 42.5 per cent of employees in the private sector, with demanding schedules, high stress levels and performance-linked perquisites cited as the main causes.
Medics warn that untreated depression can lead to suicide. “Just as the risk of heart disease is death, the risk of untreated depression is also death,” says Dr Chhabria.
According to the World Health Organisation, each year about eight lakh people commit suicide worldwide. Nearly 1.35 lakh, or 17 per cent, of them are Indians. Between 1987 and 2007, the suicide rate in the country increased from 7.9 to 10.3 per lakh. Government figures indicate that four-fifths of the suicide victims were literate.
Alpha and insecure
Johnson Thomas, director at Mumbai-based mental health NGO Aasra, says his suicide helpline receives nearly 100 to 150 calls every day, including many from businessmen, professionals and CXOs. “Today’s generation is ambitious and wants everything fast, but is not able to take rejection. If there is any loss of pay or position or some negative commentary on their professionalism, they tend to take it much harder compared to the previous generation,” he says.
Compared to a generation ago, many of today’s CXOs are much younger.
According to a 2014 global study by advisory firm Zinnov, the average age of CEOs who founded companies after 2000 is 36, compared with 39 for the founders who came before. The study, across the global 500 R&D spenders, also found that the average age of CEO appointments has fallen by four years after 2000.
Rajiv Vij, Singapore-based life and executive coach, says that while younger people are competent for bigger corporate roles for the most part, they are sometimes emotionally unprepared for the significant ups and downs of a corporate leadership role. “Additionally, owing to business pressures, seniors may not have sufficient time to groom the new leaders,” he says.
A telling point for today’s generation is that resilience levels are very low, adds Thomas.
There are several reasons why many at the top find it difficult to share or discuss workplace troubles with friends and family.
The CXO-level executives are largely characterised by alpha personalities and high achievers, but they also need someone to confide in and are usually unable to find anybody, says Thomas. “If they confide in a junior, they may be looked down upon. A colleague at the same level may be a threat to their position and confiding in a senior could mean their job is at risk.”
Making friends with failure
Culturally, too, Indians are largely wary of sharing their personal challenges with others. “For many, there’s a stigma attached to reaching out to a psychotherapist or even a coach,” says Vij, who used to be a managing director for Franklin Templeton Investments until he quit in 2006 to embark on a journey of personal growth and helping others in theirs. Even parents today are focused only on education, says Thomas. They don’t tell their children that life has ups and downs, leaving them incapable of handling setbacks with fortitude.
In November last year, Angad Paul, son of India-born Britain-based businessman Swraj Paul, plunged to death from his penthouse in central London. The CEO of Caparo Industries took the step after the company went into administration and many jobs were lost.
In Switzerland, Zurich Insurance CFO Pierre Wauthier took his life in 2013, while the company’s former chief executive Martin Senn killed himself in May this year. The high-pressure world of Wall Street investment bankers is notorious for suicides.
Trouble brewing online
The Internet comes in for flak, too, for overemphasising failures and successes with every click. “The Internet has also made people insecure. People who don’t have the right values are actually using it for dishonouring others,” says motivational speaker Shiv Khera.
The constant updates on social media piles on unnecessary pressure, says Chhabria. “You may get a lot of likes, or you may feel sorry for yourself when you don’t,” she says.
But in the world of business, it is not only corporate honchos who are ill-prepared for life’s vicissitudes — online or offline.
Small and medium business owners, stockbrokers as well as real estate executives are also high on the ‘suicidal’ list.
Following the stock market crash in 2008, there was a spate of suicides by stockbrokers in India.
A broker who had lost all his wealth reached out to the Aasra helpline. He explained that he was unable to even call his family as that would put the loan sharks on his trail. “We talked him out of suicide and helped him tide over the crisis,” Thomas recounts.
Family in the loop
Chhabria stresses the importance of a robust family support system in the battle against depression and suicide.
Khera points out that, all too often, successful CXOs have little trouble facing the external world but struggle to deal with the internal world of family relationships. “When people have poor relationships in the family, they become internally weak. The probability of committing suicide then becomes high.”
Mohamed El-Erian, chief executive officer of trillion-dollar investment fund PIMCO, decided to invest more in his family by quitting his job in January 2014 after his 10-year-old daughter listed 22 milestones he had missed in her life.
While this may appear extreme, most CXOs would be better off targeting work-home balance. “We tend to identify ourselves too much with our professional work,” says Vij, advising a healthy and balanced perspective instead.
Moreover, being open to sharing problems with others or seeking professional support is helpful too, he adds.
“India is in a transitional phase and, unlike before, there is no support from a joint family. Being bonded with the immediate family is essential,” Thomas says. Keeping family in tow while climbing the corporate ladder may slow down the journey, but it will perhaps be more sure-footed.