CHESTERFIELD COUNTY, Va. -- September is National Suicide Prevention month and Chesterfield is offering a program to help people out in the community learn to read the signs when someone, especially a young person, is struggling.
Their hope is to build a larger network of supporters to get people the help they need.
A local business shows how it might work.
"Did you want any products today?" asked a stylist at Alicia’s Salon and Day Spa in Chesterfield.
"During COVID, we started seeing that the need, so we started mentoring people, helping people where they were,” said salon owner Alicia Amsler. “They could have been dealing with crisis, dealing with anxiety, they could be dealing with anything really, layers of stuff. So there's definitely a need right now."
Spend any time in a hair salon and you quickly realize there's a lot more going on than just frosted tips or a blow-out.
"People need someone to talk to,” Amsler said. “Bottom line, people feel like they don't get heard. A lot of times we keep things hidden. And we're not meant to, we're meant to put things out."
That's why Chesterfield is asking people just like Amsler to look out for signs of anyone struggling with their mental health, who might even be thinking about suicide.
"Traditionally, when we think of who's going to help in a mental health crisis, we think a doctor or a mental health professional,” said Melissa Ackley, with Chesterfield’s Mental Health Support Services. “But if you think about yourself, and ‘who would I talk to if I had a mental health concern?’ It's probably neither of those people, right? It's someone in your natural system. It's your clergy members, the guy you run with, potentially the person who cuts your hair, people like that. And we know that's particularly true for youth."
Because young people often share mental health concerns with people in their natural networks such as parents, neighbors, coaches and clergy, Ackley says the effort this month is to raise awareness in the larger community.
You could be a drama teacher, a soccer coach, a hairdresser, or someone at a house of worship. She says adults who have sustained contact with young people are in a position to recognize when something's wrong. They just need to know to look and to act.
"The fact of the matter is those kids talking about it, that they are saying, ‘Hey, I'm hurting. Hey, I'm feeling depressed and I'm feeling anxious,’” Ackley said. “Where we've done a less good job is educating the adults around them to be able to handle that calmly and with confidence and knowledgeably."
Because she saw the need, Amsler started a non-profit called Runway 2 Life which helps people struggling with their mental health by sharing faith, education and hope. She points out that all you need to help someone in crisis is a willingness to do so.
"If we don't even know to see it, then we can't help,” Amsler said. “But it's really important that even if people you know are feeling that they themselves can't help somebody else because they're already dealing with someone, we can learn to pass the baton."
You can get immediate help by calling Chesterfield Crisis Invention at (804) 748-6356 or calling or texting the National Suicide Hotline at 988.
To learn how you can help, the Chesterfield Suicide Prevention and Awareness Coalition workshop, Raise Your Voice about Suicide Prevention, will be via Zoom Tuesday, September 27 from 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m.
It's free but you must register, by clicking here.
