lgbtqi

October is – – –

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October is a busy month, both personally and in important causes to many of us.

Some of them include:

Breast Cancer Awareness, Research and Treatment – women get your mammograms. Men, ask the women in your lives if they’ve gotten their mammograms or self-examined themselves this month.

Domestic Violence Awareness and Prevention – 1-800-799-SAFE (7233)

LGBT History Month and October 11th is National Coming Out Day. It’s a good time to reevaluate why you’re (if you are) still in the closet and why and if now is the time that you feel safe, both physically and emotionally, with coming out.

Suicide Prevention Month ended with the end of September, but the depression and reasons for suicide, both in adults and children and teens is still ongoing despite turning the calendar page to October. Please be aware of those people in your lives who seem a bit more off than usual or who reach out in whatever ways they need to.

1-800-273-TALK

I’d like to add something that is coming up in November – the 20th of November is Transgender Remembrance Day. Being transgender, either openly or closeted is not always a safe place to be, so in teaching your children and talking about men and women who are only different on the outside than what you usually think about when you ‘assign’ gender labels to people you see or know, please also think about how much more danger Transgender people are in than most others in the LGB community.

In many cases, where there are non-discriminatory and hate crime statuses for most LGB people, transgender is excluded, which increases their chances for poverty, sexual and physical abuse, verbal and emotional abuse and being murdered.

All of these ribbons – pink, yellow, puzzle pieces, rainbow, red, purple – wearing them is a nice reminder – for me it’s as a reminder of my murdered friend. However, there is so much more that needs to be done, including the simple awareness and respect for all people.

Suicide Prevention

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Now that Suicide Prevention Week is over, we mustn’t forget the struggle that men, women, and children are facing every day, wondering if it’s better for everyone if they ‘just went away’.

It is our job, our obligation, to show them, not that they are wrong, but how much they are appreciated, how they are not alone, never alone. There is always a better way than suicide and they (we) are strong.

We are courageous.

We are empowered.

And we are stronger together.

For those times that we feel that we aren’t, there are people, friends willing to drop everything to catch us, take us by the hand,  and pull us out if the depths of darkness and into the light.

We need to make sure that those in need know that we are here. I am one of those people on both sides of the darkness.

For a long time I was the hand pulling people up, holding tight when they wanted to let go, and pushing my own despair away to help someone else. It wasn’t until recently that I couldn’t do either. I couldn’t reach out and I couldn’t push down my torments that were barely on the edge of perception, in the shadows, the grey space that they had always been in, since childhood, unrecognized, unacknowledged and unidentified. Nameless.

Luckily, I had a couple of someones who reached their hands out and pulled me up, who continue to hold my hand.

I will keep talking about this. I will be there for the next person who doesn’t have anywhere to turn.

This is Suicide Prevention Month. We are approaching the holidays – Thanksgiving here in the US, Christmas, Chanukah, New Year’s, when folks reassess their lives and sometimes make bad decisions. Permanent decisions for temporary pain.

But they are not alone.

Trevor Lifeline helping LGBTQ youth: 866-488-7386

Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-TALK (8255)

Veteran’s Crisis Line: 1-800-273-8255, press 1