not a happy subject

1. lazied about in the sun for a few hours, did laundry (which i just remembered is still in the dryer) and started a new book. myths about suicide...uplifting! not. but very informative and interesting. 
2. had a great conversation with pookie and am very excited to be back at home!
3. started researching for the sections i'm going to write for the paper about acute suicide risk factors. i'm afraid of messing up but confident i can do well.

so i study a range of things but the primary concern of the lab i'm working in now is suicide/suicidal behavior/ideation/risk/assessment/prevention. it's not uplifting work but i feel that it's influential, so i'm going to briefly go over one of the major theories in this post. this is the work of dr. joiner and his students/colleagues. his theory of why people commit suicide is three parts. the first component is that the person must overcome the fear of enacting lethal self-injury. this can be accomplished in a variety of ways, the most notable being habituation to violence and pain and self-injury. this may come from working in a violent profession (police officers, doctors, etc.) or from engaging in violent behavior (binge drinking, self-injecting drug use, fighting, sports, etc.) or from suicidal behavior (cutting, burning, hitting, etc.). habituation is essentially just getting used to a stimulus. the most powerful of these would be the last--personal experience with inflicting self-injury is a powerful predictor of habituation to pain and fear of death, but the other factors i mentioned above are important too. once the fear of pain and death and self-injury is overcome (at least, up until that moment when it's staring the person in the face), the other two parts of the theory come into play for explaining why people act upon suicidal ideation: a low sense of belongingness and a perceived sense of burdensomness. when people feel socially isolated and no connection to the world in any way, it's clear to see how that would be a major red flag. feeling like one has no association to the outside world would make it seem that much easier to end one's life and cut off whatever remaining connections there were. a perceived sense of burdensomness is when a person feels like he/she is a burden on family, friends, employers, the world, whomever. it is often not the reality, but the person usually feels like those in his/her life would be better off if he/she were dead. the three components on their own are usually not enough to be lethal, but pose a risk for suicide. the combination of the three leaves one at high risk for suicide and requires immediate action. it's a really sad and taboo topic but the light that recent research is giving to the topic is crucial for understanding and prevention.
item: work for the suicide hotline.