Local residents are dying by suicide at a record pace. It's not who you think.
Like a lot of 14-year-olds, King Middle Schooler Kaliyah Williams had dreams about the future and an adventurous life. Suicide was never part of the picture.
She loved basketball so much she played for a local team and practiced all the time in the driveway of the family’s home in Milton. When she wasn’t playing basketball, she was being a big sister to her three younger siblings, getting good grades in school and singing in the church choir. She was still a little girl at heart in some ways, too, and adored the mischievous but affectionate extraterrestrial character “Stitch” from the Disney animated movie, “Lilo & Stitch.”
From shirts to toys, if Stitch was on it, she loved it.
“She was a Stitch girl,” said Kaliyah’s mother, Jackie Williams. “Matter of fact, we used to tell her all the time, Stitch is your spirit animal, because she loved her some Stitch. Stitch everything. She wanted to travel the world. Her dream was to play in the WNBA (Women’s National Basketball Association), but she also wanted to go play overseas so that she could travel the world. Her dream was to go see the Eiffel Tower in Paris. She loved Paris theme stuff.”
The Williams family is close. Jackie and Kenyatta have been together since they were 16 years old, growing up in the Atlanta, Georgia area. The family moved to Northwest Florida in 2016 to help an aging relative and both parents stay busy with family and working full time jobs.
Kenyatta is a truck driver and travels a lot. Jackie often works from home and keeps a close eye on their children, who are 14, 13, 8 and 4. They often talk and check in on each other throughout the day.
That’s one of the many reasons it was such a shock when Jackie received the devastating call last April that one of Kaliyah’s sisters had found Kaliyah after she had taken her own life. Living with it has been excruciatingly difficult for them all.
“It was an eye opener because I was like, ‘I'm with the kids every day and I did not see it,’” Jackie said. “I did not see it coming. I did not see any of this happening like this, but it also hurts. It hurts bad.”
Young people are struggling with mental health
The suicide rate in Escambia and Santa Rosa counties is higher than the state suicide rate and one of the age groups hit the hardest is young people.
Suicide is the second leading cause of death for people between the ages of 10 and 34.
So far this year, six people under the age of 19 have died by suicide in Escambia and Santa Rosa counties. Last year, four people in the same age group died by suicide.
Dr. Deanna Oleske, medical examiner for District 1 which covers Escambia, Santa Rosa, Okaloosa and Walton counties, keeps track of local and state data. She said the latest data from 2022 shows Escambia County had a rate of about 21 suicide deaths per 100,000 people and Santa Rosa County’s rate was close to 20 deaths per 100,000.
It appears to be up slightly from 2021. Age-adjusted data from 2021 shows both Escambia County and Santa Rosa counties had a rate of about 18 suicide deaths per 100,000; compared to Florida with a rate of more than 13.
“It’s a public health issue,” said Rachelle Burns, EscaRosa Suicide Prevention Coalition Chair. “This really holds true across the U.S. Typically, the numbers of those who die by suicide are double those who die by homicide. Normally, it's the homicides that get all the attention, but suicide is one of those things that we know is a problem.”
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Since the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, locally, there has also been an increase in young, Black girls taking their own lives.
Kaliyah’s mother said her daughter struggled with the same insecurities, stress and depression that often affects people of all ages and races, but she believes the constant stream of social media pressure and “bullying” from a teacher and other girls that went on at different times for years added to the isolation and pain Kaliyah felt.
Jackie said she often talked to her daughter about her personal struggles and even took Kaliyah to counseling last year at the teen’s request. She knew Kaliyah was sometimes down but didn’t realize her daughter had withdrawn so much that she was hiding her hopeless feelings from her family.
“They already go through an emotional roller coaster, chemically,” Jackie said. “Their body is always up and down, up and down, and then you have somebody picking on you and you have an adult sitting right there and not doing anything about it. That can send a kid over the edge.”
Providing help and hope to Escambia and Santa Rosa youth
Across Escambia and Santa Rosa counties, educators are also concerned about the risk of suicide among students and young people.
The Escambia County Public Schools has implemented a program called Suite360 for social and emotional learning. They also train staff and educators in using mental health first aid to recognize when students are struggling and get them help if they are.
The district works with counselors, social workers, and other mental health professionals in the community like the Lakeview Center and Children's Home Society to provide tiered levels of help for students and families, depending on their needs.
“Our boots on the ground, if you will, are our teachers,” said Holly Busse, school counseling specialist for the Escambia County Public Schools. “They are very much in tune to the needs of our students here in Escambia County. The schools have been trained in trauma informed care, we have the youth mental health first aid, we have bullying prevention campaigns, and we have Capturing Kids’ Hearts, as a program that schools use.”
Capturing Kids’ Hearts in an immersive training program that helps teachers connect meaningfully with students and colleagues. The district also has software in place that alerts administrators if a student types a message on their Chromebook or Google document that indicates they may be considering self-harm or violence of some kind.
Busse says the alerts come in on a daily basis across Escambia County schools.
"We have individuals at the district level who monitor those alerts who then notify the schools and, again, typically that notification goes to the administration and the school counselor so that the school counselor can then reach out to that child and meet with that child and if necessary do a screening on that child for suicide risk," Busse said.
"We get the parents involved and notify them what's going on," she continued. "A lot of times it ends up being something very benign, such as, 'I was doing some research on a paper where we were talking about Shakespeare,' so maybe a child is doing some research for a paper that would still alert because of certain terminology that we have devised that it's to notify us. We're getting information from a variety of sources to ensure that to the best of our ability we can make sure our kids', our students' needs are being met in the moment when they're with us."
No safety net is foolproof, but Busse said all district staff, from bus drivers and teachers to administrators, are trained to look for signs of problems.
"Unfortunately, because we do know students end up dying by suicide and that's very, very distressing to all of us here, and obviously to the families and their peers, so we do our best to try and prevent when we can," Busse said.
In Santa Rosa County, all year long they also provide mental health resources like contracted mental health counselors in every school who meet with students on a referral basis for either individual or group counseling of military families and others.
This year, Santa Rosa County also launched Hope Squads, a national organization and a peer-to-peer suicide prevention club for students, advisors and parents.
“It is meant for every student at the school to have one friend that they could talk to in crisis,” explained Cindy Peaden, mental health coordinator for Santa Rosa County schools. “Then they are trained in how to assist and get that person to someone who will be able to provide help and support. In addition to that, they have monthly themes and activities that go along with the themes, and it really promotes that change in the school climate to connectedness and kindness.”
Over the summer, the Santa Rosa County District Schools held a parent education series on three big issues facing parents, students and teachers: suicide, bullying and internet safety. They’re planning another series this fall.
There’s crossover with all three issues and experts say young people are experiencing pressure like their parents never did, but adults often don’t realize it.
“Back in our day, you get off the bus, you have a snack, you watch TV, you go play in the neighborhood or go ride your bike or do whatever,” said Peaden. “Now you can't get away from social media. As long as they have that connection in their hand, they can never turn it off and it's hard to decompress that way. I think that's part of the reason why there was a new bill passed this past summer that schools are supposed to really be regulating personal device usage during school hours, that they're not supposed to be using their phones during classes. There are designated places for phones to help put those boundaries back in place for kids.”
Experts say smart phones and social media can make it easy for people and kids to be cruel to each other because of the face-to-face disconnect. Some also lack healthy conflict resolution skills and the result sometimes becomes ridiculing and “picking on” others, in and out of the classroom.
The time young people spend on social media can also lead them to make unfair comparisons of themselves to celebrities and others who are held up as a media standard of success and attractiveness they feel they can’t reach.
Jackie said she saw some of that behavior with her daughter, Kaliyah, who sometimes felt as a young, Black woman, she was not as attractive as others.
“I said you're 5’8” and you're 135 pounds,” recalled Jackie. “I said you are the perfect size that anybody would want to be. Don't compare yourself to another race because everybody's race is different, everybody's body type is different. You cannot compare your healthy, beautiful self to this. They don't look at it as, ‘Oh, she did this and this to her body to look good.' They look at it as, ‘Oh, she's fine, and she looks good because she's skinny.’ So yes, I do believe social media is killing our generation.”
Suicide risk is higher for boys, men
Statistically, boys and men are at higher risk of suicide. Mental health advocates say nationally three out of four people who commit suicide are men and local numbers reflect what’s happening nationwide. This year alone, there have been a total of 46 suicides in Escambia County and 39 of those were male. In Santa Rosa County, 20 of the 27 suicides this year were male.
"Statistics don't lie and it's just something that we have to attack because men are just not taught to talk about their emotions," said Casey Johnson, founder of the mentoring program Men Empowered. "They're taught to suppress or taught to be macho and alpha males and provide and not show emotion and men can't cry because it's weak. It's all the stigmas that we place on men. My job is to come in and head bash those stigmas because suicide is real and if it's taking lots of men, it's for a reason because men don't have that outlet, they don't have that source, they don't talk to a therapist because once again, that's a sign of weakness and it's not about affordability, it's just about your pride."
Johnson, a Milton High School teacher and mental health advocate, knows what it’s like to experience those thoughts. The longtime educator, husband and father of three says he has often struggled with anxiety and feelings of low self-esteem stemming from his traumatic childhood.
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“I never knew my father,” Johnson said, “but I grew up in a home where there was abuse, physical abuse, sexual abuse, and so I had never really dealt with those things growing up. It started to come back and haunt me now as an adult. I was really suicidal in 2019. I’ve attempted a couple of times, so I've had to really talk myself into the positive light. It's something that we deal with, you know, and especially for me, as an African American man, it's been difficult because you know in the Black culture, suicide is something that's not talked about.”
Suicide can be a taboo topic in any culture, but experts say for men it can be especially challenging because socially they’re expected to be strong and suppress when they’re upset and hurting.
In response to the suicides Johnson saw among boys and young men where he previously taught in Houston, Texas, he started Men Empowered. It’s a mentoring program designed to bring young men together and help them deal with depression and improve how they see themselves.
When Johnson and his family moved to Milton in 2021, he brought the program to Northwest Florida, where suicide is also taking a toll. There are more than a dozen members in the group, ranging in age from 14 to college age.
They meet regularly to create a safe space where they can talk and have fun, as well as commit to community service projects to keep their minds moving in a positive direction. They also journal and work at other activities that build character and promote a positive self-image, including leadership skills, public speaking, no negative self-talk and weekly wellness checks, on the phone or online.
“We just check in,” said Johnson. “How's everything going? What bothered you this week? Did you and your parents get into it? How did you respond and what can you do differently? Just the little things like that to have that safe space to be able to communicate themselves and not have everything in there in them just burst like an erupted volcano.”
Johnson has been working with Jackie Williams and others to raise awareness with local leaders about how serious the issue of suicide is. Men Empowered is also active on social media, sharing encouraging messages of hope and how to get involved with the group.
They’re working to bring Men Empowered to Escambia County, as well as recruiting members and passing the torch to other mentors in Santa Rosa County, since Johnson and his family are moving back to Texas next summer.
Johnson said what’s important is that people of all ages have a safe place to share how they feel.
“I've always tried to tell everyone my story,” said Johnson. “I tell the guys I mentor my story because I don't want them to go down the same path and have those feelings of suicide and you're not valuable and life sucks and things like that. So, I use my trauma to help other people and I've just got to the point, at the age of 41, where I actually can unapologetically and without shame share my story. It's really helped me to accept what has happened and to make the choice now to move on and not be a victim.”
Surviving suicide
Suicide is hard on the people who suffer from suicidal thoughts and the loved ones of those who act on them.
Jackie Williams said every member of their family is grieving in their own way for Kaliyah and most are in counseling. She’s still trying to navigate what parenting looks like now and she struggles not to be overprotective.
“Get your kids help,” said Jackie. “Mental health is real. Let them talk to somebody if they can't talk to you, but have every avenue open for them to feel like they can talk to somebody for help.”
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Jackie finds comfort in sharing her story with others. She is now youth leader of her church and organizes community awareness events to get young people and others talking about the importance of mental health.
Counselors say feelings of loneliness, unworthiness and not belonging, are often at the root of cause of why many people experience suicidal thoughts, but it doesn’t have to stay that way.
“A lot of times because people feel so lonely and stuck in in their pain, they don't know sometimes that resources are available,” said Rachelle Burns, the EscaRosa Suicide Prevention Coalition Chair. “That's really the message we want to get out there, that people do care and there are resources available and there is hope.”
If you or someone you know is experiencing thoughts of suicide, you can call 9-8-8 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. Someone is available to speak with you 24 hours a day and connect with your local resources.
This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: Escambia Santa Rosa suicide rates rising counseling resources can help
