Remembrance Event coming to Henderson for survivors of suicide
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HENDERSON, Ky. − Gone, but not forgotten.
It’s a familiar phrase, a short and solemn epitaph noting that someone is remembered even if they are the dead.
It also applies to the third-annual Remembrance Event scheduled Sept. 23 in Henderson to permit those who are the survivors of suicide to memorialize their loved ones.
The event is sponsored by Infinite Hope, a local support and awareness nonprofit whose mission is “to ensure no one has to experience suicide loss alone.” Approximately 50 people from some 15 families attended last year.
“When people come to the Remembrance Event, they see they’re not alone,” Infinite Hope founder and Executive Director Cindy Weaver said in an interview.
Weaver established Infinite Hope in 2020 after experiencing the losses of several friends and loved ones to suicide dating back to 2003. Those culminated with the 2018 suicide of a young man who had served in the children’s ministry of the church that she and her husband, Mark, attend, followed by a young woman who took her life the following year.
In the latter case, Weaver asked a surviving loved one, “What can I do for you?”
The answer: Create something like the Team of Mercy in Terre Haute, Indiana, which assists survivors following an attempted or completed suicide.
The need is real. Suicide ranked as the No. 11 cause of death in the United States in 2021, according to the Suicide Awareness Voice of Education (SAVE) organization. An American is nearly twice as likely to die by suicide than to be a victim of homicide.
Kentucky, meanwhile, has the 20th-highest suicide rate in the nation — and from 2012 through 2017, the Tri-county had some of the worst rates of suicide in the state. Over that period, Union County had the fourth-highest rate of suicide, while Webster County ranked 17th-highest and Henderson County ranked 20th, according to the Kentucky Environmental Public Health Tracking program based at the University of Kentucky.
This year isn’t looking good.
“Henderson County has already hit 10 (suicide deaths),” Weaver said. “We usually only have seven or so, and it’s not even the suicide season” that falls during the year-end holiday season and the wintertime seasonal affective disorder (SAD) period of short, gray days, both of which can contribute to an unhappy or hopeless person’s despair.
Infinite Hope provides assistance to survivors in a variety of ways, such as being summoned by a coroner or law enforcement to dispatch a two-person loss team — consisting of an Infinite Hope administrator and a survivor — to the scene of a suicide to provide immediate support to survivors.
“If we get there immediately, they cling to us,” Weaver said. “Our survivors show people you can make it, because here I stand.”
Further, “We try to get (survivors) to therapists” as quickly as possible, she said. “We partner with three agencies in town” — Stability Counseling, Lighthouse Counseling Services and the St. Anthony’s Hospice bereavement program, which provide grief counseling.
Infinite Hope can help survivors quickly secure biohazard scene cleanup services (just over half of all suicides are by firearms). It provides grief support groups and can provide financial support.
“To me, getting them help is part of suicide prevention,” she said. “Research shows that if a child has a parent die of suicide, it greatly increases their chance of doing so as well.” Providing rapid assistance might prevent that.
Participating in the upcoming Remembrance Event can be part of the healing process, Weaver said. “It’s a time when they can celebrate the life of their loved ones,” she said.
For example, survivors will be given the opportunity to write a note about their deceased loved one that will be attached to one of the biodegradable balloons that will be released at the event. “When that balloon comes down, it will biodegrade,” Weaver said. “But someone might find” the attached card that memorializes a survivor’s loved one — a small but potentially meaningful way for a victim of suicide to be remembered in a meaningful way.
As Weaver put it, “They were much more than the way that they died.”
Further, survivors are invited to send Infinite Hope a photo and the name of their loved one, along with dates of birth and passing, for making a memory sign that will be displayed at the event. Photos and information should be sent to care@infinitehopekentucky.com by Monday, Sept. 18. The signs are free of charge.
“We currently have 24 memory signs from (the Remembrance Events in) 2021 (and) 2022,” Weaver said. “We will add many more this year once we have had a chance to contact our new survivors.”
The event will begin with a community suicide prevention awareness walk sponsored by the Future Business Leaders of America (FBLA) chapter at Henderson County High School. The walk will begin in a parking lot at the corner of Third and Main streets at 4:30 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 23.
A former local FBLA officer died by suicide several years ago, and the school organization — the largest FBLA chapter in Kentucky with more than 200 members — had done a suicide awareness walk until it was interrupted by Covid. This year, it decided to pair the walk with the Infinite Hope event, according to Brooklyn Burris, vice president of the local chapter and regional FBLA president.
“I’m hoping for at least 100” people to join the walk, Burris said.
“I have my own family experience with suicide,” she said. “It’s something that really speaks to me.”
The Remembrance Event will begin at 5:30 p.m. Sept. 23 in Central Park.
There will be music provided by Maggie Hollis and nachos provided by Tacoholics. Healing Reins will bring its miniature horses Rocky and Spud for attendees “to love on,” in the words of Healing Reins’ Monica Fella.
After some inspirational and consoling spoken remarks, there will be the balloon release and a butterfly release, and gifts will be given to surviving families.
The event will coincide with National Suicide Prevention Month.
This article originally appeared on Evansville Courier & Press: Remembrance Event coming to Henderson for survivors of suicide
