"I knew nothing but shadows and I thought them to be real" Oscar Wilde
This morning I learned that a student of mine attempted suicide this past weekend.
By "mine" I mean MY student.
Not just A student who attends the school I work at, but one of MY students.
This is a student I work with individually every week, a student I connect with daily.
My student.
There were no warning signs.
No cry for help that I could see.
The student went from being one who would willingly work with me and accept my help to a student who found as many reasons possible to avoid me. Maybe that was the cry for help?
This a kid who has a solid group of friends, a caring family, an education that is project and interest drive and still - absent of the typical triggers of being bullied, lonely, abused, or stressed because of school challenges - life was darker than death.
I look around at the students at my school and see a lot of messed up kids. They are all a bit quirky, that's what draws them to the school, but their quirkiness is not what I'm talking about. They are messed up because so many of them are shrouded in a darkness of depression and anxiety.
I remember being a high school student and caring too much about what other people thought about me or what I was wearing. But today's youth are a whole different breed of caring too much about some things and not enough about others. The kids are living with blinders on, with no vision of themselves or the world around them beyond the now. They only see a blurred view of themselves and society and don't seem to know how to find the truth, the crisp image of who they are and what their purpose is.
I will not discount the real feelings of discouragement or depression that my suicidal student felt. I believe the reasons why were incredibly powerful in the student's mind but I do think that as the movie of their life plays in their head it is seen behind a layer of smoke and mirrors.
There is an overwhelming cloud of darkness over the youth of this age. These are kids who see news that looks more like a soap opera, violence that rivals wars, disrespect that would bring shame to generations of the past, they have parents who don't think they have the power to "parent" and systems that have given up on raising the bar and are content to drop it low enough to let everyone feel like a winner.
These kids are living in shadows and they believe them to be real.
No other time in my life have I felt so compelled to bring light and truth to the worth of the people I encounter every day.
This morning I learned that a student of mine attempted suicide this past weekend.
By "mine" I mean MY student.
Not just A student who attends the school I work at, but one of MY students.
This is a student I work with individually every week, a student I connect with daily.
My student.
There were no warning signs.
No cry for help that I could see.
The student went from being one who would willingly work with me and accept my help to a student who found as many reasons possible to avoid me. Maybe that was the cry for help?
This a kid who has a solid group of friends, a caring family, an education that is project and interest drive and still - absent of the typical triggers of being bullied, lonely, abused, or stressed because of school challenges - life was darker than death.
I look around at the students at my school and see a lot of messed up kids. They are all a bit quirky, that's what draws them to the school, but their quirkiness is not what I'm talking about. They are messed up because so many of them are shrouded in a darkness of depression and anxiety.
I remember being a high school student and caring too much about what other people thought about me or what I was wearing. But today's youth are a whole different breed of caring too much about some things and not enough about others. The kids are living with blinders on, with no vision of themselves or the world around them beyond the now. They only see a blurred view of themselves and society and don't seem to know how to find the truth, the crisp image of who they are and what their purpose is.
I will not discount the real feelings of discouragement or depression that my suicidal student felt. I believe the reasons why were incredibly powerful in the student's mind but I do think that as the movie of their life plays in their head it is seen behind a layer of smoke and mirrors.
There is an overwhelming cloud of darkness over the youth of this age. These are kids who see news that looks more like a soap opera, violence that rivals wars, disrespect that would bring shame to generations of the past, they have parents who don't think they have the power to "parent" and systems that have given up on raising the bar and are content to drop it low enough to let everyone feel like a winner.
These kids are living in shadows and they believe them to be real.
No other time in my life have I felt so compelled to bring light and truth to the worth of the people I encounter every day.
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