What I've learned was acquired the hard way. The irony of losing someone to suicide is that it also robs you of your own want and need to stay in this world. Finally you understand that desperate place they were at, the wish for peace and an end to feeling as awful as you do every minute of every day.
Today, we think about all the families affected by suicide, and recognise the role of those professionals and volunteers who provide care, counselling and support. We should also give some attention to people who the Courts have determined should be deprived of their freedom, because time spent in prison should not mean losing your life to suicide.
Today, on World Suicide Prevention Day, the focus is male suicide. Suicide is currently the single biggest killer of men aged under 45 in the UK, and men are nearly four times more likely than women to take their own life. It is great that we are, finally and collectively, encouraging men to get support. But surely the big, currently unanswered question is why men.
Theresa May wants to return to an outdated system where children are placed in segregated schools depending on their exam results. And the devil take the rest. She tries to hide her divisive approach by cloaking it in warm words, but however she dresses it up, this is still selection. Still winners and many more losers. Still a minority of schools classed as 'good' and the vast majority publicly branded as 'bad'.
According to one recent poll, nearly half the state school teachers in England are planning to leave the profession within the next five years. That's what Mrs May should be worrying about - not turning the clock back to an inglorious past when 75% of children were branded 'failures' at the age of 11.
We live in a country where more teenagers are self-harming than ever. We live in a country where the biggest killer of men is not guns, cars or cancer but suicide (men under 50, ONS). In the UK, one person ends their own life every TWO hours. It's Time To Change.
This u-turn in public opinion illustrates the flawed marketing mythology of the platforms where we share our thoughts and pictures, the myth that we're all part of some big global culture. We're not. That's just a sales tactic to buy our clicks and data with warm fuzzy feelings of togetherness.
Watching the new Maltesers adverts that launched during the Paralympics on Channel 4 has made me realise just how important, but also how easy, this normalised representation is to achieve. In three 20 second adverts, those with disabilities are seen as sexually active, attractive and popular, but most of all as people having a laugh with their friends and colleagues when telling awkward, brilliant and hilarious stories that many of us can relate to.
Dear 15 year old me. You probably won't read this letter because it's stuck in a pile of unfinished homework on your bedroom floor, next to the mouldy cups of coffee and your dirty underwear, that you're too bone idle to put in the wash bin.
From the age of 13, I had dealt with my own mental health issues and at 18 I ended up having suicidal thoughts myself, but it was something I'd managed to put behind me. I'm just glad that I was there that day to be able to give something back following the help and support I'd received years earlier, and use the skills I'd learnt to help save someone's life.
In a move devoid of any common sense, Theresa May's government looks set to capitulate to the demands of religious groups by relaxing admissions rules for faith-based academies, allowing them to select all pupils along religious lines. It's hard to think of a more retrograde policy than the facilitation of greater religious segregation of children and young people in our education system.
Putting aside your judgements and discomfort, your need to rescue, fix and make everything okay, your desperate need to brush it under the carpet because you don't know how to respond, or your need to fulfil your curiosity...put all of that to one side so you can truly be there for that person in that moment. By giving that person the space and time to talk about their darkest feelings, their fears and thoughts of suicide, to give them permission to cry, show their vulnerability, their true state of mind and feelings....might just help prevent them from ending their life.
Analysis of the referendum results by Chris Hanretty of the University of East Anglia suggests that 70% of Labour-held constituencies either probably or definitely voted Leave. Seeing as Labour's official position in the referendum was for Remain, this shows a huge disconnect with the views of the people the party claims to represent.
Brexit was always going to create uncertainty, but that uncertainty will not help businesses who need to plan and nor will it shut up the Brexiteers who will continue to insist that an Australian points-based system is the only answer.
We have to make sure that all children know that they won't be abandoned to deal with the stresses and strains of life. Wen you know someone is listening, things can and do get better. The first conversation might be the hardest, but plucking up the courage to speak to someone is the first step.
The Conservative Party has become cavalier about the security of the United Kingdom. Labour is even worse. As the Liberal Democrats' record shows ours is the only party that has consistently acted as a mature, prudent defender of our country's security.
Can we for once give the young people of today a break? Is it not enough that their parent's generation butchered the economy with their excessive borrowing and greedy bankers to the point where the majority will never be able to afford their own house? Should't they get this time to enjoy themselves when the harsh reality is that this is probably as good as it's ever going to get for them?
September 10th marks World Suicide Prevention Day, a day to reflect and reach out to those people who might be at risk or suffering in silence. Members of the transgender community are particularly vulnerable and awareness days such as this shine a much-needed spotlight on an issue which is rarely acknowledged, let alone discussed.
I just watched tear after tear queue up and then take sorrow's path to the smeared tiles below. After a few minutes he looked up and stared at me had through fierce eyes. Once he knew he could trust me he spoke uninterrupted for almost half an hour. His story was one of beatings, harassment, abandonment, forced marriage, daily threats and soul-piercing terror.
I have trained most of my life to reach the top level in sport, and there are many more athletes like me who are being excluded from being able to compete at the highest level. We need to see better equality for athletes with a learning disability.
If it means that even one woman swerves the evil HPV, or goes for a smear test who may not otherwise have bothered, then it's worth the embarrassment of sharing such personal details with you all. I may have missed out on being a mother, but thanks to the screening I'm lucky enough to be alive to tell the tale.
In a society where image often matters more than substance, people must make more of an effort to understand loneliness. Nobody chooses to be lonely. Human beings cannot help being introverted, shy or quiet. To finally combat the so-called last taboo, we could all do with remembering this.