Managing students’ grief after suicide tragedy
INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — Students and teachers are in grief after a student killed himself in school early Wednesday at Shenandoah Middle School in Henry County .
The superintendent said grief counselors were on hand for students Wednesday evening and will also return Thursday.
Suicide is the third leading cause of death among 15 to 24-year-olds, according to the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry.
Mental health professionals believe that statistic can be reduced through conversation with young people, especially while coping with tragedies like that in Henry County.
“Shock right now, total disbelief, feeling almost surreal, this can’t be happening,” Assoc. VP of Eskenazi Health’s Midtown Mental Health Center Julie Szempruch said.
That’s what the clinical nurse specialist believes students at Shenandoah Middle School are feeling.
“They begin to identify who the person was in their mind and what that person meant to them,” Szempruch said.
She hopes the students will have conversations with the grief counselors the school is providing, especially when the shock wears off and other emotions set in.
“Feelings of guilt that maybe that person said something to someone,” she said, “They start thinking I should have said something, I should have told someone.”
She said after some time, the stages of grief will set in, often long after the crisis management team has left.
That’s where parents come in.
“These kids need absolute support at home,” she said.
“I think this is a good opportunity for parents to sit down and have some good open dialogue with their child about what’s really going on with their life,” Peyton Manning Children’s Hospital Clinical Social Worker Mandy Grella said.
Grella said it may often seem taboo to talk about this type of tragedy, but that it’s important, especially this time of year.
“We’re entering the holiday season this can be a particularly difficult time,” she said.
She also has some warning signs for parents to look for in their children.
“We would be looking for significant changes in their behavior, a drop in their grades, withdrawal from social activities or family functions,” Grella said.