- So when we're talking about
suicidal ideation, suicide intent,
it's super, super important to pay attention
to what's going on with your kids.
And there are old, tried and true sort of just things
to look for.
Now when it comes to boys and girls,
they'll usually present very similar,
and these are the most important things to look out for
that I'm about to sort of list for you.
Boys may tend to be a little bit more
withdrawn and isolated, that's certainly a possibility,
and sometimes boys can be a little bit more irritable
when they're depressed.
As girls tend to be a little bit more emotional
and more apt to cry
and potentially socially isolate as well.
But there are some very, very important bullets.
Number one, and I think this goes without saying,
but you'd be incredibly surprised
at how many people blow this off.
When someone makes a suicidal statement,
and nowadays, that could be anything from a text,
a post on social media,
actually telling you or your friends
or someone that you know, or that they know,
that they're feeling suicidal, they're verbalizing it,
they're texting it, you have to take that seriously.
And that's the biggest one, right?
The other one, a very, very important thing to think about
is sometimes what you'll notice is
there'll be these themes of death or themes of suicide,
and it'll come up in conversation,
it'll come up in their writing,
it might come up in their art or their journaling.
But you might notice this sort of preoccupation
with thoughts of death and suicide.
That might not be as direct as saying
that I want to harm myself,
but you might see these themes,
that are really, really important to look out for.
And then the other ones that we tend to notice
through research and looking at data
over the course of years,
is sometimes kids will actually start giving things away.
They'll give away things that they loved,
things that you would never think
they would start giving away, things that had value to them,
they would start giving away
to friends, family, loved ones, peers.
So definitely look out for that.
Another one is a social withdrawal.
So what you'll see is basically paying attention
to your kids and their lifestyle,
suddenly they're just not present,
they're just not as active
and they seem more sullen and withdrawn.
They're not engaging like they used to.
So very, very important to pay attention with that.
And as I said, too, sometimes you see this with boys,
it could certainly be with girls as well,
but sometimes you'll actually notice
hostile or aggressive behavior.
So you might've had a timid, quiet child
and all of a sudden, they're just changing in the way
that they respond to things,
low frustration tolerance
and sort of becoming a little bit more hostile
and a little bit more aggressive.
Those are definitely the big bullets, but listen, guys,
you always have to pay attention to things
such as neglecting personal appearance,
or if there's sort of daily living,
sort of activities of daily living change
like neglecting personal appearance
or taking care of care of themselves,
running away from home.
Behaviors that are really important too,
is if you notice risk taking behavior.
So suddenly they're just engaging in things
that they normally wouldn't engage in.
And sometimes we see that in anything
from just being very impulsive and dangerous
by the way they drive,
or even just the way they're going about
their day-to-day life or even sexual promiscuity
is something that you might see as well.
And then, you know, honestly, the foundation of this,
and we're going to hopefully talk about this,
is know your kids,
and a change in personality in general.
So a child that's been upbeat
and suddenly becomes kind of quiet and sullen,
that's a red flag as well.
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