September is that month I tend to gloss over. Here in Arizona, we are months into sweltering summer temperatures and I honestly have my sh*t full of it by the time September rolls around. It gets a ‘meh’ from me and I eagerly look forward to October, like some kids look forward to Christmas and presents. October is overwhelmingly a reset button for me. More than January. Years ago though, I became aware of September being Suicide Prevention Month and as a result, I feel I owe it a bit more as someone who has hit rock bottom and navigated their way out of feeling like there wasn’t something left to live for. And it’s not that I don’t like September. I just don’t like the September we get in Arizona. The high today was 115 today, and maybe last weekend or the one prior we had a sneak peek at fall with a high of 88. That was lovely.

With summer temperatures coming to an end eventually, I want to close out Suicide Prevention Month with a bunch of gratitude. This month our nation was again rocked with needless gun violence and my heart still stings for those families that lost loved ones in the September 4th school shooting in Georgia. There is nothing I or others can say to provide full justice for the victims, but I feel our nation is making steps in the right direction by starting to charge parents whose negligence are contributing factors to the events that unfolded. We saw it first with Jennifer and James Crumbley earlier this year and we see it with charges being brought up for Colin Gray, the father of Colt Gray, the student who shot his classmates and teachers earlier this month. The next steps outside the courtroom our nation will take though remain to be determined.

Knowing that so much is in the air, I want to cautiously say I don’t want people in the Republican or Democratic camp to rush judgement on this idea that so much of gun violence is rooted in mental health problems. What we’re seeing are anger management issues more than anything. Ticked off teenagers not getting what they want in life and resorting to violence as their “solution.” Again, I say this cautiously because there is a stigma about mental health and to hit gun violence with a wide brush as being caused by mentally ill persons further marginalizing those with mental health conditions. I have been open for a bit about dealing with PTSD for years and NOT ONCE when my life was feeling like it was falling apart did I ever considering harming someone else with a firearm because I couldn’t cope with life. Even when I contemplated self-harm, my goal wasn’t to find access to a firearm. The plan I had was still pretty dark, but utilizing different methods, and in spite of my self-hatred, there have been plenty of years I’ve safely used and maintained firearms. I have a deep respect for firearms, because I served in the Marine Corps and it is not a love for the M-16 that I was allowed to possess that kept me from abusing it. It was that the Marine Corps trusted me to possess it, use it safely, and return it to the armory when I was done with it. I still think (and I don’t want to scare anyone with this statement) on my darkest day if I had a firearm in the hotel room where I contemplated suicide, my mind would have still left it alone and only considered the other method.

I now utilize my healthcare through the VA, and I can almost bet I will forever have conversations with my care team at least once a year about whether I have access to firearms. They know my history of contemplating suicide in 2005, and I’ve talked to them about the positive coping mechanisms I work to utilize to reduce stress in my life. When they ask me questions, I know it’s from their responsibility to keep veterans and others in the community safe. They have to ask if our veterans have suicidal ideation or homicidal ideation. Those uncomfortable questions they have to ask in the nature of their duties matter, and if the parents in these school shootings had taken the circumstances more seriously preceding their children bringing weapons to school and assaulting their peers and done something similar, on their own or with the appropriate care teams, we might not have the additional gun deaths we do now. These human losses were something I brought up with my care team this month when I had a regular checkup. These attacks made me more on edge. It hurts me to know that more and more children are seeing their classrooms become warlike environments. Coming back from Iraq and seeing my fellow Americans have to fear going to school, shopping for groceries, driving down the interstate, this is not what America should be. And it can get better when we find gun access solutions that all political parties can get behind to reduce the frequency and intensity of gun violence. I know it’s unrealistic to say it will completely go away. Our communities started to change with the Columbine shooting April 20th, 1999 and it’s only gotten worse. What we’re currently doing isn’t working, so we must assess more policies and practices in place that pre-dated that particular tragedy and see if that helps, even though it must still be supplemented by a lot of new technology we find is working and training among community partners must continue. Preparedness is not to be discarded.

I dumped a lot more on here than originally intended. My heart has been full attending to my own family and struggling with these additional deaths. I love being a parent and to know others lost their babies is not something I can ignore. The extra days I’ve gotten with my own child in the aftermath of the September attack is not lost on me. We’ve had more time to do YouTube pilates workouts during the week. We went out to a fancy restaurant earlier this month as a family. Today, her and a girlfriend enjoyed a local trampoline park and I got to watch our fourteen year old and her friend be kids. I took photos of these young girls catching up for the first time in months. (They go to school online.) These girls are the same age as the assailant and, more importantly, the two students who died. But I did not just watch these girls have fun. I witnessed a community surrounding a little boy named Lincoln celebrate his ninth birthday. A handful of parents pulled up chairs adjacent to the trampolines to keep a close eye on younger kids, likely 3 or 4 years of age. The cashier and all the coworkers I saw were clearly teenagers. We live in a world where we should see our kids grow up and not die in their classrooms.

So to keep a long story from getting into too much of a longer story, decompressing has been a big part of the month for me. I’ve been working on appreciating my favorite month is around the corner. I hoard and share with friends a number of fun ghost images I find online, keeping me from needlessly purchasing autumnal decor and Halloween pumpkins. I opt to borrow library books, but I make exceptions for books I know I want in my personal collection. Kelly Bishop’s memoir is one such treat, because Gilmore Girls is my all-time favorite show. (Sookie Saint James is my favorite character from the series, and I think Melissa McCarthy was the perfect actress for the role.) Cooking also plays a big role in my life, which is why I relate to Sookie so much. It kept me busy when I was on terminal leave in 2005 and I see that it has helped in managing my PTSD. I am not the best at always staying present when stress creeps in, but cooking forces me to slow down and pay attention. When I don’t, I screw up something in the recipe (usually, it’s adding an ingredient in late or not at all). The yeasted rice and coconut recipe I shared below is from In Bibi’s Kitchen: The Recipes and Stories of Grandmothers from the Eight African Countries That Touch the Indian Ocean by Hawa Hassan with Julie Thursten. It’s a recipe that requires planning ahead, so I am constrained to make it during the weekend when I have more time to soak the rice. If all goes well, I can make it tomorrow. If I screw it up, it’s next weekend’s project. To close things out for the night, I am enjoying Trader Joe’s Ginger Drink warmed up. It’s still hot AF (103 currently outside), but I’ve been indoors for a bit and the A/C is making me chilly. Since you took the time to stick with me for this long-winded entry, I want to say thank you. I wish you and yours a safe and happy weekend and a good month ahead. See you back here in October.

~Cheryl