To those who have lost a loved one to suicide

I am writing to you, the living. You who have experienced the suicide of a loved one, family member, partner or friend.

Last year, I attended a suicide walk in Nashville’s Music Row area, a time for those affected by suicide to gather and grieve together, and to raise money to help prevent suicide. We were given necklaces in a variety of colors connected to how we were related to those who had died, whether a friend, family member, partner, or child. It was upsetting to see so many people with not one necklace but several of different colors.

Recently, family and friends were shocked and stunned to find out that Kevin Watts had killed himself. What many people go through following a suicide includes much grief, sadness and also sometimes anger about the suicide. I want you to know that any feelings or thoughts that you are having about Kevin and his death are normal reactions to a tragic and horrifying situation. No one knows how they will react to a loved one’s death, especially not to a suicide.

One way some people handle such a tragedy is by questioning themselves, wondering what they missed, blaming themselves for not having seen the signs and not being able to prevent the suicide. I do not know Kevin or his family and friends although I have read a friend’s tribute to him as well as a piece written by the Tennessee Suicide Prevention Network highlighting his death and how we need not stigmatize suicide nor keep it secret or silent. People need to know more and talk more about suicide in order to prevent it.

I am focusing on how the living can go on living, mourn and grieve death, and cope with such a tragedy. Family members and friends often beat themselves up about a suicide. They think they should have known it was going to happen and that they somehow could have prevented it.

But, none of us are mind readers, we can’t always know what goes on inside even our closest loved ones. Depression, anxiety and other forms of mental illness come in all sorts of flavors. We sometimes tend to notice those who are depressed when their symptoms include withdrawing, isolating, missing work, using too much alcohol or drugs, and/or having visible physical pain. We can see those symptoms.

We can also try to understand the reasons why someone has killed themselves and usually there are many important factors. Still, however, we may never really know why, because we can’t fully know any human being like they know themselves.

It is far harder to understand suicide when a person has seemed to be doing well, has seemed to handle life with a smile, and has continued to be engaged with family and friends. This type of person isn’t usually trying to lie about how they are feeling (although some are excellent actors and don’t want anyone to know the severity of their pain, or their plans). Some act out externally but others implode, directing harsh and negative feelings toward themselves, not others. The nature of depression itself can prevent people from reaching out, crying loudly in distress for others to see.

In fact, sometimes we witness a person seeming to feel better and we feel better in return. Even though we have given them close and careful attention when life seemed worse, we may back off a little.

The unfortunate truth is that sometimes people, who have fully decided to kill themselves, may go through a period of time feeling more peaceful and calm, knowing they will be ending their lives soon. The pain may even slip away as they plan the suicide. They are not trying to fool us, but they may honestly feel better temporarily.

Do not blame yourselves. Yes, we can help people enter treatment programs or find trained professionals hoping that they will benefit from such help. But, sometimes even then, suicide can occur.

What we can do is to offer ourselves to them, giving them all the support or assistance that they may need, but knowing that we are not in control of their decisions. If they push us away and refuse or resist such help, there is little we can do except to love them anyway, feeling compassion for them and concern about their suffering. Hoping that they can find new ways to decrease their pain and suffering while still living among us. 

Voting for a new Mayor in Nashville

Last week, a news report claimed that women in this country only make on average 77 cents for every dollar that men make.  And, women may not reach equal pay until 2058.  How tragic and strange.

Americans can create all kinds of technological feats but we also spend much of the U.S. budget on defense, building tanks and military equipment that are never used.  Why can’t we make better decisions about women’s equality, as well as about civil and human rights?

The U.S. views itself as the world’s number 1 country, and Nashville is the new “It” city.  But there continues to be much discrimination and inequality throughout.  Surely we can do better than this.

I attended an event for Megan Barry on March 29th, and the room was packed with supporters who want Ms. Barry to be Nashville’s next mayor.  Nashvillians Emmylou Harris, country music artist, and Connie Britton from Nashville on TV, both spoke on behalf of Megan, cheers rippling through the crowd. Nashville can design for itself a bright future, and we believe that Megan Barry can lead us there.

Ms. Barry has been a Metro Nashville and Davidson County Council Member since 2007, and she is the only mayoral candidate who has both business and government experience.

I will vote for Megan because she believes in improving the public education of our children, and wants to fully fund pre-K education in Nashville. She is also the only candidate who spoke out about voting “No” on Amendment 1 last year because she believes that women’s medical decisions should be left to women and their doctors instead of those decisions being made by politicians. And, she says it doesn’t matter who you love.

Megan also believes that “a city that thrives is a city that moves,” dedicating herself to a Transit vision that includes all modalities from bicycles to buses and more.  If Nashville is truly the “It” city then we need to pay attention to all of our citizens and not just to the wealthy and powerful.  Megan sponsored and passed a bill keeping guns out of parks, illustrating her strength and dedication to protecting our citizens from harm.  She has also participated in setting up the Affordable Housing fund and the budget for it.

Megan is a smart, enthusiastic leader for us all.  She closed this campaign event with something that she heard at church.  “Be grateful for the people who do things for you, not because they have to, but because they want to.”  I couldn’t agree more.  

Don’t let just 20% of our citizens select our leaders.  We all have the power in our hands to elect those who will serve us well, who will listen to us, and work for us. I urge you to vote in every election in Tennessee and in the nation after educating yourself as best you can about the candidates and their values.

Out of Darkness Comes Light

When I was recently diagnosed with the flu,  I was both upset but also glad to be validated that my pain was biologically based. Being who I am, I took this opportunity to make meaning of this illness.

When I got sick, I entered into Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’ stages of grief, spiraling through denial, anger, despair/depression, bargaining and acceptance; along with my wondering: “How dare my body let me down?  I feel betrayed!”  By myself.

Then came poor, pitiful me.  Finally, giving up and giving in to the fact that I could not control my having the flu or not, I accepted it and let myself rest and relax instead of beating myself up for being so damn human that even I can get sick - like everyone else.

Out of darkness comes light. We have often heard: out of sadness comes joy, out of pain and sorrow comes rebirth, and out of tragedy comes hope.

Perhaps we can begin to heal ourselves while focusing on bodily symptoms, wondering about them, not only exploring how we got sick but by asking these ailments what they are doing for us, even embracing them as part of us. Only then can we be with whatever is going on inside us and explore ourselves without judgment in order to release old negative energy or blocks, renew our vitality, and move through trauma toward transformation.

When I finally surrendered to the fact that I had little control over having the flu, I could get on with the business of what I could do to help myself heal.

Out of darkness comes light.  Is that true then for such tragedies as war, poverty, the mass incarceration and killing of black and brown men and boys, rampant sexual abuse all over the world, and the fact that people destroy and kill each other physically or emotionally every day?  What grace or good can come out of these dark facts?

If we can look at all of the world’s tragedies as parts of us, all of the images and issues that represent the pain and agony that we feel inside ourselves and dish out to others, then maybe there is a way to decrease our violence toward ourselves and others.  I am the first to admit to my judgmental-ness, my privilege and my anger toward others with whom I strongly disagree. Some of us also struggle with harsh evaluations of ourselves. What matters is what we do with these understandings about life and health.

When we as a community get better at diagnosing our “illnesses” and providing the support we all need while “sick,” only then can we work toward healing within our communities and the world.  Only when we admit to and work through our conflicts internally and externally, can we become our best selves, more loving and nurturing for the whole planet and all the beings within it.

Becoming Healthy in an Unhealthy Culture

I wonder how we can become healthier people while living in what I believe is an unhealthy culture.  There are so many wonderful things about America, its gifts and promises, but there is also deep destruction of the body and soul at work within some of our systems.

To develop good health, we need to become aware of what we want and need. Then, we learn how to get some of what we need and also cater to the needs of others in a fine balance, a dance of giving and receiving.

We are constantly negotiating in life between what we want and what others want. We are in continual flux, and we move with or against that flow. Conflict occurs when we bump up against what someone else wants, and how we handle that conflict is a key to fulfillment or misery in life.

If we are constantly absorbed in ourselves, in our traumas, emotions and needs, it is difficult to look outside of ourselves to see what others may want or need.  If we listen mostly to those outside of ourselves, we can get unfocused and twirl around like snowflakes in the wind, in reaction to whatever is happening in our world.

Our spiritual traditions teach us how to live, how to love and serve, and how to be our best selves.  The media also tell us about who we are and how people act together.  We learn how to be in relationship with others from our families, our schools, our peers, our leaders, and community groups.  Our culture, locally, nationally and globally, influences our beliefs about who we are and who we should be.

But, what if our culture hurts us? What if our culture is actually toxic, reflecting and adding to our distresses and those of others instead of assisting us in our quest for good health and well-being?  How do we get healthy in a society that acts greedy, starts wars, discriminates harshly between the poor and the wealthy, and divvies out justice in prejudicial ways?  How do we live during these times of extreme individualism while caring about others, helping others instead of just looking out for ourselves?

One example portraying our culture’s illness is that many people have been and are still being incarcerated on drug charges, filling our prisons with the poor while white collar and corporate crimes are rarely punished, and are sometimes exalted. Private corporations run our prisons making huge profits with great incentive for the justice system to keep locking away non-violent offenders.  Money talks loudly and we listen. And, we also collaborate with that corporate initiative if we don’t speak out and try to change this disastrous business of ruining whole lives because of some mistakes.

We live in a culture that violates bodies and human spirits. We need to improve the health of  our American systems in order to promote better lives for all.

Trafficking Children in Tennessee

Imagine being a 13 year old girl or boy whose family has betrayed you in some way, maybe by sexual, emotional, or physical abuse, or through neglect.  Now imagine an older teen girl or guy, befriends you, acting like they really care about you, and you are starved for attention.

Then, all of the sudden, your life changes dramatically.  You are driven or flown to another city, conscious or unconscious, then used and sold as a sex slave.  You have become a prisoner of a sick, big business, called human sex trafficking.

Trafficking happens all across our nation, here in Nashville and throughout Tennessee. Selling bodies crosses all lines, including socioeconomic, racial, religious, age and geographic boundaries.  No longer is this something that happens to someone else. This happens here. 

A  state-wide victim advocacy non-profit organization, You have the Power, has partnered with several other community groups and private parties to spotlight this ever-growing, inhumane system by creating a documentary film called, No Girl’s Dream. No child asks to be sold into a life full of violence, fear and entrapment. This nightmare can damage their lives forever.  

Recently, spokespeople from End Slavery Tennessee, The Hannah Project, and the TBI reported horrifying statistics like 1 in 3 runaways are enslaved with 48 hours of leaving home.

The good news is that several groups have gathered to create more powerful laws that seek to punish those who buy and sell people in the sex industry. The courts also order “johns” to pay for and participate in a program that teaches them that what they are doing is re-victimizing kids who are already victims.  Coordinating this training is Magdalene, founded by Becca Stevens, a residential program for women who have survived lives of prostitution, trafficking, addiction and life on the streets. All men who trade money for sex need to understand that they are not paying a kid to help them have nice things.  Rather, they are supporting sex slavery.

These children have no choices, they are tortured with weapons, threatened and raped if they try to leave the system that traumatizes them.  Some who have been victimized by this system move up the ladder and become pimps, perpetuating violence just like they have received.

Only when we work together as a community, and when men and boys can challenge each other about their behaviors, can we decrease the sale of human bodies.  Men and women in power and consumers of such services need to intervene in the functioning of this monstrous business.

Let us help Tennessee and our nation become healthier places for all people, finding ways to enforce punishment and treatment for abusers and continuing to develop and fund treatment programs for victims. If you want to become involved, contact End Slavery Tennessee (http://www.endslaverytn.org), The Hannah Project Nashville, or the Magdalene program (http://www.thistlefarms.org/index.php/about-magdalene).

An exploration into a hate crime, or why do people act out?

During the past several months, it came to the attention of Vanderbilt police that someone had been stealing O&AN newspapers out of its boxes on Vanderbilt’s campus, particularly around the medical center. The boxes would sometimes be totally emptied overnight. Although this is a free newspaper, a sign on the box asks for payment after taking one copy.

This cloak and dagger story has already been written about and even talked about on TV (link to the TV piece?). Why would someone do such a thing?

When interviewed on TV, James Grady, the current editor of O&AN, (link?) described these actions as a hate crime. When asked to further explain how that term fits this set of events, Mr. Grady said that any action with the intent to target a minority is considered a hate crime. Was some homophobic person stealing the newspapers in order to achieve some goal?

Turns out that one newspaper box was videotaped and the perpetrator was finally caught stealing the newspapers. The Vanderbilt police talked with the news hound and he admitted to having done this dastardly deed, agreed not to do such a thing again, and will pay restitution for the papers he stole. The justice system is not planning to prosecute the man at this time.

I began to wonder whether this man was some right wing nut, some fundamentalist/religious fanatic who hates gay people and who might have a mission to eradicate such “filth” at least in his small corner of the world. Being a mental health provider, it is not ethical for me to speculate about this man’s intentions without clinically interviewing and evaluating him so I don’t really know why this particular man performed these acts.

What I can do is to wonder why someone would do this. It seems that this man has had a very ill spouse who has been hospitalized for many months and that he is the only person helping to care for her during this lengthy hospitalization. What I do know about is that taking care of a loved one in a hospital for months on end can make any of us crazy-feeling and crazy-acting. The grief and exhaustion alone are enough to cause even the healthiest of us to act out in some ways, this man being no exception.

Without making light of the hate crime nature of this man’s behavior, if I had been in this man’s shoes, having to be at a hospital for months at a time, I may have wanted to eat all the ice cream in the cafeteria. Self-destructive rather than other-destructive. Or, I may have gone screaming into the night as I left my loved one, while I felt helpless about her illness and powerless to change the situation. She may have been in great pain and not recuperating well from surgery, and it is very painful to watch our loved ones suffer. Many of us do not always act appropriately when dealing with such major stress.

On the other hand, maybe this poor man was from out of town, staying night after night with his wife, sleeping poorly, eating fast food all day, worrying about finances. and being away from his natural support systems. A few years ago, when my father was in a hospital in Mississippi, I watched a hospital handle his case all wrong (in my opinion). I felt agony about his illness and also felt helpless for awhile. But, then my mother and I challenged the doctors and demanded different treatment. Things changed. But, such challenges don’t always have such good results.
The obvious guess is that this man objects to or outright hates the LGBT community and anything that reminds him of the existence of people who are very different from him. Or maybe he had unconscious fears about being gay himself, maybe he had been abused as a young child, or maybe someone molested his child. Perhaps no one taught him how similar LGBT people may be to him, even though there are also differences. Maybe he was taught all his life by his family, church and/or community that being gay is an abomination, that gay people will go to hell, or that they are predators of young children. We don’t know what this man’s beliefs are or where they came from.

What I can say is that I can get very active sometimes when faced with injustice toward any minority, when people are not being treated equally, and when there is little fairness about legal consequences for certain types of people vs. other, more privileged types. I am glad that I can speak out about my concerns and that sometimes newspapers even print what I write about in my outrage.

Maybe this guy wants to be an activist but he doesn’t use his voice to speak up. And, like many people, perhaps all he knows to do is to act out (like we all do at times) in a way that helps him to feel powerful and better about himself and the world. Unfortunately, his act was indirect and criminal, full of hate and/or fear, unproductive to say the least. That sometimes happens when there is no dialogue, when people are unable or unwilling to discuss issues about which they disagree. At times it may be easier to crucify “the other” rather than try to get to know them and work with them to create a more peaceful planet.

Let’s not crucify this man. And, also, let's not crucify each other. 

LGBT Rights in Nashville: regression and progress

By now many of us have heard that Davidson Academy, a private, Christian Nashville school, denied admission to a couple’s children - just because their parents are gay. But, this is not a battle between the Christian and LGBT communities.  These two communities have always overlapped. 

Chris Sanders, the Executive Director of the Tennessee Equality Project says about the family of Brian Copeland and Greg Bullard: "Every family has dreams of a great education for their children, so we can all understand how heartbreaking Brian and Greg's story is.  Their courage and grace give us models for starting the kinds of conversations that need to happen in Tennessee.  I believe, whether they like it or not, Davidson Academy is going to have that conversation internally and with the public now.”

This school says that they “strongly believe in a strict interpretation of the Scriptures regarding the institution of marriage.” I would imagine that this school doesn’t investigate the heterosexual behavior of their staff and the families of students but perhaps they do.

Didn’t Jesus say, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these?”  Did he add, just not  the children of a certain sort of couple?

This couple just wants their children to have a Christian education and as Copeland has stated: “discrimination and inequality [are] alive and well. ” On January 23rd, the Human Rights Campaign (HRC) condemned the actions of Davidson Academy. Ellen Kahn, the Director of HRC’s Foundation’s Children, Youth and Families Program said that the school “contradicted its own Christian values with this decision - discrimination is not a Christian value.” But, there is a Christian value about loving each other. 

Hold onto that thought while exploring some other news of the past week here in Nashville. Nashville Public Radio reported on January 21, 2015:  “Oral Histories Reveal Decades of Closeted LBGT Lives in Nashville.”  (Link) “For the past 7 years Nashville’s Brooks Fund has collected the stories of what it was to be homosexual in Middle Tennessee before 1970.”  Nina Cardona told a few of the tales that have been collected, noting that the Brooks Fund is continuing to collect such stories from Mid-TN’s LGBT community and that these are being archived in the Nashville Public Library. A documentary is also being made of the first 25 stories. Isn’t that a sign of progress, honoring and commemorating these people and their historical experiences? If so, then it seems that both progress and regression are happening in Nashville these days.

Having just celebrated the life of Martin Luther King, Jr., I recall his words: “The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice.”  And, even though we have many different types of people in our nation, our Pledge of Allegiance still says, “…one Nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”  Let’s define “all.”

Does “all” mean only the ones who think like me, look like me, worship like me, fall in love like me? Davidson Academy and other Christian schools throughout the nation will be re-evaluating their missions and their screening criteria partly because of Davidson Academy’s letter of rejection to this Nashville gay couple. What an excellent opportunity resulting from prejudice and bias even though private schools certainly have the option to select the students they want to educate.

Let’s also think about how we were raised by parents, religious institutions and schools and how we often hold onto some of the values that we learned through osmosis and role modeling, even during our rebellious phases.  I was raised in a Christian church in the Mississippi Delta in the 1960’s with compassionate and liberal parents.  I was taught that being Christian meant what Jesus preached: loving our neighbors as ourselves and calling out injustices between people and groups.

It is time for everyone to take a step back and reassess what they believe and if they call themselves Christian, why are some casting out other Christians, judging them harshly and denying them services, while they accept others? Isn’t it about time for our nation to put to rest the discrimination toward LGBT people and move into the 21st century?  We have come a long way but we still have such a long way to go.

Another factor in our town’s regressive behavior may be that many Americans are still pretty uptight about sexuality, sexual behavior, and sexual lifestyles.  Sex itself is sometimes an anxiety-ridden topic, not just a biological process but loaded with innuendo, values, beliefs, emotions, and judgment. Why can’t all adults just practice love and sex with other consenting adults?  Why does the non-LGBT population get so scared and angry about those unlike themselves?  What do they have to fear?  One size does not fit all.  Even within the Christian community, there are as many diverse beliefs, activities and opinions as there are people, all unique, all just trying to experience love, joy, faith, and community with others in their own ways.

Now that the Supreme Court has decided to hear marriage cases originating in the 6th Circuit that upheld state-level bans against same-sex marriage, we hope that the Supremes will finally make an excellent decision for the LGBT community.  I believe that denying equal rights to the LGBT community is an abomination.