What Are We Missing When Young People Are Hurting?

After several recent suicides of teens and young adults in my local area, I wanted to talk about the bigger question so many of us are asking: What are we missing?

In this episode, I share thoughts from more than 35 years of working with young people, including the need for real connection, emotional regulation, coping skills, school belonging, sleep, trusted adults, and support before a crisis.

This is not a conversation about blame. It is a conversation about prevention, connection, and helping young people know they are not alone.

If you or someone you love is in suicidal crisis or emotional distress in the U.S., call or text 988, or use chat at 988lifeline.org/chat. 

 Struggling with anxiety in your family? If anxiety is causing tension, fights, or disconnect in your home, you don’t have to face it alone. I help parents bring more peace, confidence, and connection to their families. Let’s talk—schedule a free consultation today or email me: ccoufal@cynthiacoufalcoaching.com

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Transcript

 Before we begin, I want to let you know that I am going to be talking about some suicides that have been local, and I want you to know that I don't know any of these families. I'm not connected to any of it, but there were five in my area in the last few weeks, like within a hundred mile radius, and I know people in the towns and, and I, I have a love for young people. That's why I do the work that I have done my entire adult life. And I've thought a lot about what I should do or what I should talk about, and I had other ideas about what this week was gonna be about, but I just kept coming back to why? And I'm sure a lot of people are asking that question, and we can't even guess to know the private pain of any of these individuals, the families, the people, the... or what circumstances were going on. I don't know. But the ages ranged from 13 to about 23, and I just keep thinking about I work with young people, and I don't want anyone to go through this kind of pain that is associated with it, for the people who are now not here and the people that are still here. And I just... the question that keeps coming back to me is, "What are we missing? What should we be doing?" And- Uh, I, I don't have any great answers, but I just wanted to talk about my thoughts, and I would love to hear what your thoughts are because I, I want to be part of the solution. I want to help people, especially young people, feel like they have somewhere to go to talk about the things that are so painful to them and are so confusing and sad and And I realize that just talking is not the answer. Um, there's ... Well, there are so many reasons why. And when people die by their own hand, many times it isn't, it isn't one thing that happened. It's a combination of a lot of things that have happened or even, uh, chemical imbalances. I mean, there's just like so many things. So we can't even just talk about any certain thing. But I just wanted to bring up what I am seeing with young people, and I've worked with them for the last 35 years, so I feel like I have a, a scope of things that I've been seeing that I feel like could be helpful as people are looking at what do we do and how do we help these situations Some of the things that I think are missing are real connection, face-to-face, in-person connections with people. We are relational creatures. We were created w- you know, since the beginning of time as humans that need to have other human real-life in-person contact. And for a lot of the years that humans have been in existence, that has been the main way that we connect with people, and it's just been in the last You know, I mean, I suppose the telephone was a way to connect with people where you weren't physically with someone. But having a telephone conversation with someone, there w- there just was, there, you still had the need to see the person. And now we have a lot of ways to have connections with people just on a screen, and I have some beautiful friendships with people I've never actually met in real p- in real life, and I don't think that that's, like, that in itself is not the problem. But the problem I think is when, especially with the generation of kids that have always had a screen, that they've missed something in having face-to-face real life connection. And because we were created as relational creatures, humans, having a real life person-to-person connection with people actually helps us to regulate ourselves. It helps us to have better mental health. And I think that we didn't realize, and I'm not blaming any people because, um, I didn't think that the, that social media and screens was a problem until I started seeing evidence that it is part of the problem. And I love my screens as much as the next person, but what I think is different about someone my age, and even my own children who are Millennials, I didn't see the same problem with them because they had a length of time in their life pretty much, for both of my kids, they had to have face-to-face real life connections with people probably until high school at least before, uh, online relationships and connections started to become a bigger deal. And I think that they, they still had to learn how to have connections with real life people before they were introduced to screens. And of course, my whole life even t- until adulthood, I only knew real life connections. I didn't, you know, I wasn't exposed to screens until I was already a fully formed adult. So I think that's why it doesn't affect us as much, this particular part I'm talking about, where some, some people don't really have a lot of in real life human face-to-face connections with people. And now that we have AI bots and, um, AI avatars and AI people, I guess. I don't... What are we calling people? I don't know. AI robots People are connecting to an AI robot because it's easier to connect because AI accepts us no matter what. Now, I'm not saying that we shouldn't be accepting people no matter what, because I think that's part of the problem, is that trying to belong sometimes for some people is really hard, whether they're lacking skills to connect or, um, you know, e- especially if you're in a, a small community, sometimes people get labeled as certain things and then, you know, everyone's like, "Oh, we don't wanna talk to that person," or, "We don't wanna be around that person." And an AI creates a false sense of connection because AI thinks everything we do is great, and we're perfect, and we're beautiful, and we're all these things. And if you have a relationship, a romantic relationship with an AI bot, you can create the relationship in any kind of way you want with no friction. Like, there's nothing, you know, the AI bot isn't getting mad at us or isn't, um, saying, "Hey, you need to do this differently in a relationship so that, you know, we're compromising or getting along." There's none of that. And all of those things are hard in relationships, and I don't blame people for thinking, "Well, I'd rather have the easy relationship because I don't have to change, I don't have to be different, I don't have to, um, I don't have to try to get along. I can just get along because it's easy." Sometimes when things where we have to dig deep and grow and, and learn about ourselves, that's where the true connection and relationship come from. So I think I've already gone off on a tangent, and I didn't wanna do that. Um, but I think the real connection is part of it. I think we don't do a good job of teaching our kids, especially in school. I mean, I think some parents are really getting this, and, um, but I don't think we can just look at parents doing this. But we need to be teaching emotional regulation. We need to be teaching coping skills. How do we deal with things when they don't go our way? How do we deal with sadness? How do we deal with depression? How do we- How do we recover and have resilience when we have challenges in our lives? And because the world is pretty easy now with so many conveniences, w- we don't have to deal with challenges very often, or we can just ignore challenges and do it a different way that's easier so we don't have to do the hard thing. And we're not teaching kids how to deal with things that are hard and stressful and Um, so that's like one of these other little pieces. I'm not saying that that's the whole reason. Um, one thing that I, I had forgotten about, but I did do a podcast about a couple years ago, is about sleep. Sleep is so important. Sleep helps us recover not only physically, but mentally. And a lot of times teenagers sleep, and young adults, sleep gets disrupted for many different reasons. Um, and some of them are actually developmental and, you know, not something they could necessarily do something about. But getting a good amount of sleep helps us to recover and feel better, and so sleep is just another one of those little puzzle pieces. I think another thing that schools can do better is making sure that every kid feels like they belong to something, whether they belong to a club or a group or they, there's adults in the school that care, show care to them, and care about whether they're there or not, care about what's happening with them, noticing when they feel sad, noticing when they're not acting as they usually act. As a school counselor, I can tell you there were, um, several times where a teacher would contact me and say, "I'm noticing something different about this student." And in one particular case, um, the student that they noticed was a little bit off was a student that was never on anyone's radar, was he, he never had problems. I mean, he was, he was a great student. He was ... seemed happy all the time. Um, got along, didn't have any behavior problems. I don't think had really, I'm not sure, but I don't think had ever been in my office for anything other than maybe where I was purposely intentionally calling kids in, talking about certain things. And so I just pulled him in and was like, "Hey, your teacher's kind of noticing that you're, you're acting a little bit different," and they were concerned. And at first, you know, because this is pretty traumatizing for kids sometimes, especially when they're the good kid or the kid that's doing all the right things or the straight A student or whatever they are, they don't want anyone to worry about them. They don't want their parents to be upset or worry or think something's wrong. They don't want other peers to think that there's something wrong. And so he was like, "Oh, you know, I'm fine." And I don't remember what I ended up talking to him about that got us going in a different direction, but during our talk then he said, "Yeah, I actually was thinking about dying And we dug into, you know, what was going on and, um, you know, why he was feeling like that. And as a, I mean, a- as anyone who needs to help people who have suicide ideation, I told him I was gonna need to call his parents and talk to them about it. And in my role, I always gave students the option to be part of the conversation. Like, "When I call, you can be sitting right here. You don't have to say anything, but you can hear what I'm saying." If they wanted to hear what their parent was saying, I would tell them, you know, "I'll put it on speakerphone," but then I would tell the parents when I called, "You are on speakerphone and they're here. They'd like to not say anything. They just wanna hear our conversation." And sometimes kids would say, "I don't wanna be part of this conversation. You know, you can, you know, I guess if you have to call them, but I'm, you know, I'm gonna go to the other, you know, sit in the other room, or I'm gonna... I don't wanna hear about it." And what- all was fine. Like, what- whatever they chose, I allowed. But, um, this particular student, I think, wanted to be there, if I remember right. And when I talked to the parents, they said, "We're so confused. Like, last night we had one of the best nights we've ever had. You know, we had supper together. We were laughing. He had younger siblings, and he played with them, and we were just all having such a good time, and we can't even understand what you're saying to us." And he said, and again, I don't know if he said it during the call or maybe he told them later or told me later, but he said, "I was trying to give my, my siblings a good memory of me before I died." And it was just like one of those things that I was like, "Oh my gosh. You know, this, if this teacher hadn't have thought something's off about this student..." And I know that's hard to do. Like, in that particular school, that teacher probably had 140 students a day going through their class, so I get how this stuff can be missed. But thank goodness he happened to notice this, tell me, we got it. And those parents were so grateful. I mean, of course, they came to the school. They got their child. They got him help. And They ev- I think it was a year later maybe, they were sending, you know, a note saying, "We're still just so grateful that we have our son, that he's here," that people noticed, that people cared about what was happening with him. And I just think that schools, we just need to continue to be or start being really vigilant about and intentional about what is going on emotionally and socially with our kids, not just about academics, not just about their test scores. Um, but parents too, like, when kids become teenagers, they like to be doing things on their own. They like to be in their rooms. They like to, um, you know, not hang out with us as much or talk to us as much, and there's nothing wrong with that, but we still need to stay connected as best that we can. Like, what can we be connecting with them about? You know, is it the meal that we set- everyone sits down to and we just talk about the day? If, um, we're not seeing them that evening because they have work or practice or a game that they don't get home till midnight or, you know, whatever it is, find some other ways to connect with them. You know, can you send them a positive text message? Can you, you know, ask them a g- a question? Can you leave a note on their pillow? Can you do different things? 'Cause I know that everyone gets busy, but w- we need to be really intentional about keeping those face-to-face human connections with our kids and making sure that they have human connections outside of the home with other real people, and not just peers, but other adults that can connect with them as well and just give them that community and that group. Um- I think that access to support is hard. Um, I had an adult friend who in the last month said that she was in crisis, and she went to an emergency room to get help, and they... I mean, they didn't turn her away at that time. Like, they gave her some time to listen, maybe gave her a medication, I don't know. But then they were just like, "See you later." And she was like, "Well, I need some more ongoing help." And they were like, "Well, it's six months or so before you'll find anyone." And then there was also, you know, if she sought private care, it was very expensive, that she couldn't afford. And then it's just like, "Oh, well." And it shouldn't be like that. Um, and so I do think access to support sometimes is difficult, and I don't have the solution for that. But I do think that we need to be looking at, you know, therapy is amazing and therapy is needed many times, especially if someone is suicidal. I think therapy is definitely... I mean, therapy has to happen in some way. But I, I think sometimes if we are catching these things, if we're just, like, helping every kid from the minute they, like, toddler, preschool on, teaching coping skills and talking about emotional regulation and, and connecting them with a bunch of adults at the very beginning and just being just so with these kids and teaching them all the things, not just academic things, then I think that we're gonna circumvent a lot of these things before there's ever a crisis. They're gonna be able to be proactive about how they're feeling, and their parents will be able to be proactive, and the school can be proactive because there's all these things in place and all these skills that they already have before the crisis happens. I think right now our system is, "Oh, this person's in crisis. Now what do we do?" We don't... You know, the people are busy and there's, you know, it's really expensive and all these different things. What about all the stuff we could do ahead of time from Uh, daycare, preschool on in the home and in the daycares and in the preschools and in the schools And some of those skills that are taught are everyone has negative thought loops go in their head, and they are just stories our brains are making up. I think we just need to constantly tell kids about that because I think a lot of times it's that, that thought of, well, no one would care if I wasn't here, or I don't matter, or everyone hates me, or, you know, or my life sucks so bad I don't wanna be here, and it's that story that they've... And sometimes it's just, like, such a quick decision that I don't wanna do this anymore. And my daughter has been suicidal twice, and thank goodness she has beautiful people in her life that, her husband being one of them, that both times knew something is wrong, and she also felt safe to tell him something is wrong, and he immediately got help for her both times. And I just recently talked to her about this when these suicides happened, and I was like, and she's a mental health provider also, and I was like, "What are we missing? What should we be doing?" And she said, "Both times I felt suicidal, I... It was such an instant I want to die right now that there really wasn't a lot of thinking involved." And she said, "If I would have had access to a weapon, I could have done that so quickly without- Even thinking about what I was doing. And luckily she didn't have access to that, and I think that's another thing that we need to think about is, you know, if we have any concerns at all, we need to be careful about what is available. W- with all the kids that I've worked with over the years, the ones that have attempted They all had access to something. Um, and that's some part of the process when you're asking and talking to kids about it. Um, and the ones that didn't have access, that had to... Like, it would be really hard for them to figure out the plan. That buys you time. Like, they, there's a way, there's a time where they have to think, and then it's like, "Oh, but maybe I don't really wanna die." And my daughter said to me, "I didn't really wanna die, I just wanted how I was feeling to go away. I just wanted the situation to be done." And luckily she, you know, knew in the back of her mind, and she's also a full, her whole frontal cortex is, is complete because she is older than 25. So she had the ability to think it through, where I think young people, their brains don't work in that way, or they don't have the full capacity of their brain to think this stuff through, and that's why it's so much more dangerous, I think, with young people who are under 25, because they don't have the full capacity of their brain to figure it out Lawrence, what I think you need to know is that teens and young adults, well, really a lot of people who are suicidal, 'cause obviously adults, um, do this too. But a lot of times, many times, people don't look suicidal. They don't look sad. Um, just like my story with the, my student who it was the best night they ever had in their house. Like We don't always, we can't always sometimes see signs, but be paying attention to, you know, do they have other connections outside of a screen? Do they, do they feel like they belong to things? Are you noticing agitation or behavior changes or appetite changes or sleep changes? Just anything, or them saying things that are sort of off-putting. I do re- when my daughter was, I would say four months before she actually had her first suicide planned, when we were talking on the phone, she was crying and she said, "I think it would be better if I was dead." And I said, "Oh, no, this, that is never anything that would, would actually help." And that day I went to her to be with her because I knew that that was not something that you could just let go and just, "Oh, well, she just said that because she was upset." And even though I knew that, and I checked in with her a lot for a few months after that, I still... I mean, I didn't want her to be suicidal. I wanted her to get better. I wanted her to feel better. So when she started seeming better, I just thought, "Oh, good, I don't have to worry about this anymore," because that's what I want to believe, that I don't have to worry about it anymore. And so then I stopped asking and stopped worrying about it so much, and then it was after that that she actually had her suicide planned. So then after that time, then I was constantly asking. And when the second time came around, it again totally blindsided me because I thought, "Oh, she's better. I don't have to worry about it anymore." And that one did kind of come out of, well, a lot of things were going on in her life, like this like challenge and problem and challenge and problem after another, but she seemed to be handling it, so I thought, "Oh, good, I don't... Again, I don't have to worry about this," when really I should've been thinking about that. Um, I don't let those things go by anymore, and I ask her a lot, you know, "How are you doing? What's going on?" And I know she will be truthful with me because the truth is, as she said, she doesn't really want to die. She just doesn't want to feel like that. And so, um, she knows that there are ways to not feel that way, by going to therapy, having, taking medication, taking care of herself, and she pays a lot more attention to those things, and I pay a lot more attention to those things. So saying to your child, like especially, um, you know, I, I can't say that these, these suicides, like any of the kids knew the other. I don't think they did know each other, but they might have heard about that happening, and then thinking, "Oh, that seems like a good solution to what's going on with me." Who knows? We don't know any of that. But I think saying to your child, especially if you're hearing about this in a community or your child comes home and says, "So and so did this," or, "I heard that this happened," um, bringing it up with them and saying, "Sometimes people feel so overwhelmed or so sad, or they don't think there's any answer to their problems, and their brain starts telling them that they should die or that they shouldn't be here anymore. Has your brain ever said that to you before? Have you ever felt like that before?" And this isn't putting the idea in their head. Kids by a certain age know that that is a way that some people, um, I mean, because they've heard about it, and they know that that can happen. And so you asking them pretty specifically about it is gonna give you information, because most kids are gonna tell the truth. Now, they might not at first just because they're like worried about what you're gonna do or say. Um, and if they do say, "Yes, I have felt like that before," you, even though this is... I know it's really hard to be calm, but as much as you can, be calm while they're talking to you about it, and just keep being curious and asking questions. And talking to them about what are other ways that you can feel better And that they need to feel connected to you and safe with you that they can talk about these things. And you can talk about, "Here are all the adults that I know that you can go to if, you know, if you don't feel comfortable telling me some of these things because you don't want me to be sad or upset or scared. Tell Grandma, tell the neighbor, tell my best friend," you know, who all, whoever all these people are. Your coach, a teacher you like, you know, whatever it is. Because a lot of adults will know, "Oh, this person needs help, and here's what I can do to help them." So you have, like, these extra people that can help you. You know, you don't have to be the only person being hypervigilant about everything. You have these other people helping you with that. And saying to them, "I'm so glad you told me. I- that I'm so honored that you could share that with me, and I just want you to know that no matter what, I am here. I am here for you. We are gonna find the answers to all of this. You're ... I know that we can help you feel better. L- and here's some things, here's some ideas I have," or, "Would you like to hear my ideas about what I think we could do?" And giving them the suicide hotline numbers and the suicide text numbers. 988 is the national one that anyone can call or, um, text. That sometimes is the initial beginning to them because it- they're talking to an anonymous person who, or a neutral person that they don't have to feel ashamed or worried about like they would if they were telling their parent about it. And those groups can get them help also I think we also need to make asking for help and going to other people for help as normal and visible. When we're struggling, not that we need to scare our kids or let our kids know that we're struggling in that way, but explaining to them maybe, um, a less high-stakes situation where you needed other adults to help you, or you needed your partner to help you, or you needed your parents to help you, or your sibling or somebody, and showing them that as a human, we have to have other humans in connection with us, helping us until we're, you know, until we're 100. That never goes away, and it's okay to ask for help, and it's okay to bring other people into your life to help you, um, feel better, whether that's a coach or a therapist or some other mentor in the community, a pastor, um, other st- other family members and people that you kind of go through life with. All of those people can be great people to help you when you need help and make you feel better mentally when you get low And what I want young people to hear is your thoughts are not telling you the truth. Every single person in the world's brain wants to figure out what's wrong, and it looks at all sorts of things that are going on in our world, and it makes assumptions and stories about what's going on. And sometimes our brain gets caught up in everything's terrible, nothing's gonna get better, you're a loser, all these things. And again, every person's brain does that, but some people can just be like, "No, I'm not listening to that. I'm gonna move forward and keep going in my life." And other people get so lost in it that they don't know the way out. And no matter which person you are, you need to have people helping you pick through those thoughts and figuring out, you know, what's going on here? Why am I thinking this? How do I, how do I move forward? What should I do? Um, and you can find a trusted adult to help you with that, and they're all over the place. You, you just have to look for them, and you have to be open to finding them and not just keeping everything to yourself Remember that social media and using screens and ChatGPT and all of those things, there's nothing wrong with any of that stuff in balance, in moderation. But if you are spending all your time, especially when you're sad and depressed, looking at sad and depressed people on social media or on the internet, your phone, the algorithm of social media, your phone AI starts to think, "Oh, you really like watching sad, depressing things. I'm gonna send you more sad and depressing things." And then it starts to feel like the world is sad and depressing because you're only being fed the things that you're thinking and experiencing, and it just becomes like this mess that probably feels like you can't get out of it and you can't change it. And so if you feel like you've kind of gotten in a doom scrolling, um, depression algorithm on your phone, put the phone away, walk outside, find real people to talk to, and not just people who are also depressed, people who have a different outlook in life. Um, move. Get some exercise. Drink water. Sleep as much as... You know, get that 7 to 10 hours of sleep, whatever it is that your body needs. Find ways to get out of just ruminating in the same thing over and over again. And, um, make sure that you know, you know, any support lines or text lines that you can get some help from. Talk to s- to real people, not just AI And if you are a friend of someone who tells you, "I don't wanna live anymore," or, "I am worried that I might un-alive myself," then you need to help. You are not the therapist. You... And even if you were a therapist, you're not gonna help your friend. That would be, um, ethically, even for a therapist, they don't treat their friends, and they don't treat their family members. They refer their, their family members and friends to other people. So, and especially as a young person who does not have a degree in any of these things, you are not their therapist. You need to get an adult involved that can help them. And your friend might be mad about that, but I used to say to the students, and I, I said it to my clients, "Do you wanna have a mad friend, or do you wanna have a dead friend?" And I'm guessing you would be okay with them just being mad at you. And the mad does not last. I have made so many students mad over the years because I said, "Hey, I have to tell your parents," and they did not like it, and they did not want their parents to know. And sometimes it wasn't going to be a good situation because their parent was going to mishandle the situation, and I knew that, but it was still my obligation to tell their parent I'm not guaranteeing that when you tell an adult it's going to make it better, but you still have to do it because this is not your burden. This is not something that only you should be handling. You need help too. You need other adults to help you. And so please role model for your friends what you should be doing by asking for help and getting them help. But I can promise you that many more times friends were glad in the end that they got help than them thinking it was worse. Because most of the time the help helps, and they are able to get, get support for what they need and be able to move on to a happier place in their life. This was really... I don't even know how long this thing is, and I, I might have to edit it a little bit. But this is just stuff that's been on my mind, and I just want you to know about it, and I want you to, to know that there are people that love you and care for you and want to help you. You just need to look for them. And I know sometimes it can seem like they're not there or you don't know who, but give yourself a chance to find the people that can help you because you... it's so worth it. There's so many things that you're supposed to do in this world, and you need to be here to do them. And I just want you to know that you, you are so worth it. You are so lovable. You are so worthy, and we want you to be here. Please reach out, even if it's to me, because I can help you. I can help you find whatever you need, and things are going to get better