I was mid-sentence when someone slid a sheet of paper across the table to my friend Sam.
“This is for you,” a female-sounding voice said to Sam, and the messenger slipped away without my ever seeing her.
We were lunching at a popular diner in Denver. I was intrigued: What was on that piece of paper?
Sam happened to be wearing a T shirt that could be construed as anti-Trump. Perhaps the person had dropped a note expressing solidarity. But the longer Sam read, the more their face tightened.
“Are you OK?” I asked.
With a grim expression, Sam passed the paper to me.
Speaking of Suicide Between Friends
I should mention that Sam had been telling me about their son’s suicidal crisis last year.
Like me, Sam’s a social worker who’s done a lot of suicide risk assessments, safety planning, and counseling with people in crisis. Sam said those experiences made it easier to have a calm, empathetic conversation with their son about his wanting to die. In contrast, many parents panic or resort to toxic positivity.
Our restaurant booth was tiny. There was barely enough room for one person on each side of the postage-stamp table. A thin, wooden partition separated us from the booth next to ours.
Evidently, the person had overheard us.
Hey there,
From one clinician to another I truly empathize with your situation and I’m asking you to stop talking about these things in public. Not only are you divulging your own trauma to everyone in here that cannot consent to hearing it, the details of your own involvement in your child’s mental health crisis are unethical. Please speak about these things in private like our code of conduct dictates.
Sincerely,
Another clinician who now knows way too much
Is It Wrong to Talk about Suicide in Public?
For the record, there is no code of conduct that prohibits social workers or other mental health professionals from discussing their own child’s suicidal crisis with others.
If the social worker discusses a client in a crowded restaurant, that’s a different story – of course. Professionally, we are ethically and legally bound to keep what our clients tell us confidential, with very specific exceptions. Personally, mental health professionals are entitled to talk about their own lives, just like everyone else.
There’s also nothing in social workers’ Code of Ethics that forbids speaking about suicide or other mental health challenges in a public place. Or, for that matter, that forbids using well-practiced active listening skills with your child.
“It’s stigma,” I told worry-stricken Sam. “If you’d been talking about your diabetic child becoming dangerously hypoglycemic, would they have left you this note?”
I seriously doubt it.
Maybe the letter-writer assumed Sam’s son would be embarrassed or ashamed if someone he knew recognized Sam. That kind of automatic assumption is rooted in stigma, too.
Not everyone finds a suicidal past embarrassing or shameful. Our son, for example, also went through suicidal crises as an adolescent. He also attempted suicide. And he doesn’t buy into the stigma.
In anticipation of writing this post, I asked his permission to mention his history here. He said yes.
“Thanks for giving the okay,” I texted. “May I ask you something? I’m wondering why it’s OK with you?”
Our son is 25 now. He texted back, “My adolescence was spent on the internet in some shape or form. That’s how we communicated with each other. The internet is a very open place, and in turn it’s made my generation very open.”
We Want People to Speak of Mental Health Challenges More Openly
I know, I’m fretting about just one person’s scolding note in a diner. But I also know that many others probably agree with the anonymous scolder’s sentiment, “Please speak about these things in private.”
Suicide is so stigmatized, so taboo, that it’s often spoken of only in hushed tones, if it’s spoken of at all. Many people with suicidal thoughts hide their predicament as a result.
That’s why so many suicide prevention messages try to convey that, really, it is OK to talk about suicide. Not only OK, but also potentially life-saving:
“It’s time to stop whispering about suicide. We are losing too many to silence,” the Samaritans explain.
“Talk saves lives,” the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention says.
“Break the silence,” AllOne Health advises.
“Start a conversation” the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill urges.
I agree with all those statements. We need to make it okay to talk with friends about suicide and suicidal thoughts wherever they want, not restrict those conversations to private rooms with locked doors and soundproofed walls.
But …
At the same time, all of this has left me wondering if I’m the best person to assess when a conversation about suicide is too sensitive for public spaces.
I mean, I run a website called Speaking of Suicide. I’ve written books, conducted professional trainings, taught courses at the University of Denver Graduate School of Social Work on helping people at risk for suicide, and shared publicly about my own suicidality in my 20s.
It’s possible I’ve become unusually desensitized to talking about suicide. Maybe I’m even naïve about the enormity of such conversations – or idealistic about their acceptability.
To me, it’s no big deal. The talking about it, I mean, not the suicidal episode itself. At least, talking about it shouldn’t be a big deal. It should be like discussing a child’s blood sugar levels or broken arm.
But I do wonder: Have I lost perspective in some way? Perhaps so, because of my immersion in suicidology, my conviction that we need to drop the stigma, and my openness about my own suicidal crises.
Either way, even if I am inured to discussions about suicide, that doesn’t make it OK to treat suicide as unspeakable. As I said in an earlier post, it’s awfully hard to help suicidal people – and for them to ask for help – if we treat suicide as a dirty word.
© 2025 Stacey Freedenthal. All Rights Reserved. Written for Speaking of Suicide.
I think it’s important to normalize the conversation. I’ve had people say similar things.
One person said to someone who told me,
“She’d probably be over her own son’s suicide if she didn’t talk about it so much.”
Or, “When you talk about suicide, do you have to say the word so many times?” (the answer is yes by the way.)
“You know when you talk about suicide, you are planting the idea in people’s heads.” (I’m not, and 4 studies validate that.)
I let those comments roll off me like rainwater, take a deep breath, and use it as an opportunity to educate, gently, thoughtfully, and often by asking questions.
It’s pretty cowardly to leave a note and pretty judgmental, too. I wouldn’t want to go to a therapist like that. (the person who left the note)
I often offer explanations. For example, I tell a person how being a suicide prevention speaker has helped me heal. And since they have never lived through the suicide of their child, they can’t know what that experience is like, thank God. Then I say that I do what I do so they never find out.
Your friend was not talking about some graphic murder scene. They were talking about something we should all be talking about every single day. I applaud him for it. And for you for writing this article about it.
Appreciate hearing your thoughts and story here. Thank you for sharing about your own healing through speaking up.
AnneMoss,
Thanks for leaving such a thoughtful, detailed comment. You make so many excellent points, I’m not sure where to begin. 🙂
For one thing, you said, “‘When you talk about suicide, do you have to say the word so many times?’ (the answer is yes by the way.)” That reminded me, years ago I heard a well-known suicidologist (I can’t remember which one, sadly) say she’d been invited to give a talk about suicide prevention. The audience was a crowded auditorium of high school students’ parents. Five minutes before the speaker went on stage, the principal frantically ran to her and said, “Can you please avoid saying the word ‘suicide’ in your talk?” (I think it was Maria Oquendo who recounted this experience, but I’m not certain.)
I admire you for letting those remarks roll off of you. As you see in my post, the letter writer’s words stuck with me (partly because I brought the note home, in anticipation of writing about it). I began to question myself and my role in the conversation. But I do believe people should not censor themselves about suicide, because that sends the message to people with suicidal thoughts that they must censor themselves, too. And then if someone dies by suicide, the same people who encouraged silence will wonder, “Why didn’t they tell me?” Sigh. (NOT that the suicide then is the stigma-driven or fear-driven person’s fault! Only that people closed to talking about suicide are missing out on potential opportunities to help.)
I’m grateful to you, too, for sharing about your son’s suicide, in the service of helping others to stay alive. Thank you. 🙂
Years ago, when I was a mental health therapist, I had similar, in-public conversations with friends and colleagues during my own son’s suicidal crises. (He, too, has given me permission to write about his experience.) I can’t imagine how hurtful a scolding note would have felt. My heart goes out to Sam.
Thank you for speaking of suicide, and thanks for your writing.
Jenny-Lynn,
Thanks, I really appreciate your comment. You’re absolutely right – it would have added more pain to an already painful situation if you’d been handed such a note. I don’t speak much in the post about Sam’s reaction (maybe I should) but they definitely were not grateful or happy about the unsolicited advice. I do know, based on what they shared with me, that my being there to provide a very different perspective helped them.
Thanks for sharing here!
Thanks for sharing your experience here 🙂
Kind of terrifying that a mental health clinician would chastise someone for talking about their own experiences of suicide in a public place. But unfortunately reminescent of how a professional Suicide org originally tried to rally against (and silence) those who wanted to share their lived experience! (Luckily did not succeed!)
Nina,
I agree. Maybe hearing our conversation was activating because she’d had a suicide loss or suicidal experience herself recently? No idea, but I want to think she had good intentions in leaving the note, because it’s upsetting to think of the harm such an intrusive, judgmental note could cause.
It seems like it’s only been in the last 10-15 years that voices of people with lived experience have been valued. I’m grateful for the change.
Thanks for sharing here!
Dr. Freedenthal, Thank you for your intelligent and well-considered discussion of this scolding note. I agree with you; the stigma against discussing suicide is potentially lethal. In fact, sometimes it is lethal, no doubt about it. Furthermore, I don’t think you’ve lost your objectivity through your long association with the subject of suicide. You are an expert and that note-passer was over-reacting out of their own fear of the subject. Thank you for your care and your candor, as always. I am glad you still walk the planet and help others with the struggle you yourself have faced. That takes a great deal of courage and honesty.
Linda,
Thank you so much. I always appreciate your supportive, beautifully articulated words. And you’re right, the note reflected more on the person who wrote it than the person she delivered it to. It’s hard to imagine because it had such a shaming tone, but she probably had good intentions when she wrote it and was trying to help in some way, whether that help was to manage her own anxiety about death and suicide or to protect others from what she perceived as a threat. And I hope that, one day, it won’t be perceived as a threat to talk about facts of life — and death. Many years ago, it was also unacceptable to talk about cancer openly. That must have been so alienating for those afflicted with it!
Anyway, thanks again for your support. 🙂
No, thank you, Dr. Freedenthal, for your time, your energy and your expertise in this most difficult subject. I have a friend who found her sister hanging in her basement. It was years ago, and my heart still aches for what my friend suffered and still suffers finding that horror. She’s writing a family memoir, including that incident, and has asked me to edit it for her, which I gladly would do. However, I’m at a loss as to what other support I can offer. I have written notes to her expressing my sympathy for her and my anger with her sister for choosing that way out. She knew all too well that it would be my friend who would find her. Was my expressing that anger inappropriate? What more can I do?
Linda,
It’s natural to question if expressing your anger was appropriate, but the answer will vary depending on the person. I think the person to ask is your friend. If she also feels angry with her sister for her suicide method, then your expression might be perceived as empathetic and validating. But it’s also possible that she understands that suicidality (and the problems that create it, such as depression) can compromise a person’s ability to think rationally and doesn’t feel angry at her sister, in which case your expression might be perceived differently. That’s why it’s important to ask her.
As for what more you can do, that’s a good question to ask your friend, too. It’s possible that she doesn’t need for you to do anything at all, especially since the suicide occurred years ago. It’s also possible that she does need something from you, whether it’s to listen or to bring up the suicide. I just can’t know.
Thanks for sharing here! Sorry I can’t more precisely answer your questions.
Love this post and I regularly read your posts. I do not think you have a level of desensitization. As a social worker myself who has experienced SI and talked about this personal issue, there still exists tremendous avoidance of taking about this topic. Keeping talking because we need to normalize this experience, reduce the shame and save lives.
Laurie,
Thanks so much for your supportive words. I wish I’d thought of that last line for the post: “We need to normalize this experience, reduce the shame, and save lives.”
(Note to anyone who takes issue with that: I mean normalize suicidal thoughts, not suicide itself. Because, yes, many millions of people every year have suicidal thoughts. Might be the basis for another post.)
I’m sorry you’ve been there, too, and grateful you’re still here. 🙂