It’s that time of year in schools... after spring break and the
PSSAs. The weather starts getting warmer, and the year just starts to fly by.
Well, at least for me anyway.
This Wednesday in our crisis prevention and intervention
class, a professor from the Department of Pathology, Microbiology, Immunology,
and Forensic Medicine at PCOM came to speak to us about suicide and child abuse.
It was nice to get some cross-departmental interaction, as we have little
knowledge about the field of medicine and non-school related law.
It was a very informative and interactive presentation,
although depressing at times. We discussed identifying manner of death (which
is not as easy as you would think!), how to recognize signs of child abuse, and
suicide. We talked a lot about how traumatic it would be for a young child to
discover a loved one who had taken their lives. While this would be disturbing
for anyone, let alone a child, and certainly require some mental health
intervention, I thought more about the person actually committing suicide. What
was going through their minds just before? What brought them to this point that
suicide was viewed as the only option? Where were the warning signs? I wrote my prevention
program proposal for class on suicide prevention programs in youth, so I was
particularly interested in this guest speaker. I’ll leave you guys with
something a little more uplifting. This is a video clip that our practicum
professor shared with us after a night of heavy topics. There is a whole series
called Kid Snippets in which kids come up with a dialogue that is acted out by
adults. Enjoy!
