daveklepper From the Veterans Administrtion Website, Suicide Prevention Management: This blog is intended for providers who care for Veterans that are at risk of suicide. SRM provides free consultation, support, and resources that promote therapeutic best practices for the providers working with at-risk Veterans. VA’s Suicide Risk Management Consultation Program (SRM) provides one free hour of consultation services for community or VA providers who work with Veterans at risk for suicide. SRM consultants collaborate with providers and offer tailored, one-on-one support for risk assessment, conceptualization of suicide risk, lethal means safety counseling, strategies for how to engage Veterans at high risk in their own treatment, best practices for documentation, and provider support after a suicide loss (postvention). SRM’s expert consultation and resources promote best practices informed by research conducted in VA and in the community. SRM experts only consult with PROVIDERS on suicide risk management and does not provide any direct care or support to Veterans. If you are a Veteran in crisis — or you’re concerned about one — free, confidential support is available 24/7. Call the Veterans Crisis Line at 1-800-273-8255 and Press 1, send a text message to 838255, or chat online. Find Veteran Suicide Prevention information and resources on the Veterans Crisis Line website. Requesting a consultation Community leaders and other organizations working with Veterans may also request suicide prevention resources, information and education (e.g. presentations). Learning how to identify someone at risk of suicide and ways to offer support are popular examples. Long Description The Suicide Risk Management Consultation Program (SRM) is ensuring providers have access to suicide prevention resources to continuously improve Veteran care both inside and outside VA. Once a provider submits an email request for consultation, an SRM staff member schedules a time to speak with them. Staff can also answer a question via email if preferred. In the SRM staff’s reply to the provider is an included triage form for the provider/applicant to complete and return. Providers complete and submit the triage form prior to the scheduled consultation. All information discussed during the consultation process is confidential. To request a consult, or to learn more, please email srmconsult@va.gov or visit www.mirecc.va.gov/visn19/consult. Kaesean Joseph is an Air Force Veteran and VA employee.
From the Veterans Administrtion Website, Suicide Prevention Management:
This blog is intended for providers who care for Veterans that are at risk of suicide. SRM provides free consultation, support, and resources that promote therapeutic best practices for the providers working with at-risk Veterans.
VA’s Suicide Risk Management Consultation Program (SRM) provides one free hour of consultation services for community or VA providers who work with Veterans at risk for suicide.
SRM consultants collaborate with providers and offer tailored, one-on-one support for risk assessment, conceptualization of suicide risk, lethal means safety counseling, strategies for how to engage Veterans at high risk in their own treatment, best practices for documentation, and provider support after a suicide loss (postvention). SRM’s expert consultation and resources promote best practices informed by research conducted in VA and in the community.
SRM experts only consult with PROVIDERS on suicide risk management and does not provide any direct care or support to Veterans. If you are a Veteran in crisis — or you’re concerned about one — free, confidential support is available 24/7. Call the Veterans Crisis Line at 1-800-273-8255 and Press 1, send a text message to 838255, or chat online. Find Veteran Suicide Prevention information and resources on the Veterans Crisis Line website.
Community leaders and other organizations working with Veterans may also request suicide prevention resources, information and education (e.g. presentations). Learning how to identify someone at risk of suicide and ways to offer support are popular examples.
The Suicide Risk Management Consultation Program (SRM) is ensuring providers have access to suicide prevention resources to continuously improve Veteran care both inside and outside VA.
Once a provider submits an email request for consultation, an SRM staff member schedules a time to speak with them. Staff can also answer a question via email if preferred.
In the SRM staff’s reply to the provider is an included triage form for the provider/applicant to complete and return. Providers complete and submit the triage form prior to the scheduled consultation. All information discussed during the consultation process is confidential.
To request a consult, or to learn more, please email srmconsult@va.gov or visit www.mirecc.va.gov/visn19/consult.
Kaesean Joseph is an Air Force Veteran and VA employee.
No, I did not overreact. I was apparently mistaken about what was going on. But in the context of what I perceived him to be saying (about me), my response was not an overeaction.
I plead guilty to a mistake. I might as well give Charlie the benefit of the doubt. Charlie, I apologize. Mea culpa.
I still don't really understand how we go from my asking a question related to my confusion about a single specific post to having someone quote me (and only me), then write "Typical, just typical. You ... "
If I had been commenting on thread-drift, CH's comment would probably have made sense to me, despite my having no idea about who was being quoted. But I was not commenting on thread-drift. I was commenting on what seemed to be a really absurd post, without realizing that the absurdity was intentional.
But in any event, I'm ready to move on.
To be honest, I wish I had realized what Convicted One was doing with that post, as I love absurd humor. And re-reading it now, it's quite funny. I feel pretty dense about missing that. Maybe I read it too quickly, initially.
Overmod, I sincerely very much appreciate all the railroad things you have explained to me since I've been on this forum. And I hope you will continue to do so. There's a lot I don't know, and I'm not ashamed to admit that. I welcome info and input from those more experienced and knowlegable than myself, and I came here mainly to learn. But you didn't, and still don't, have a dog in this hunt.
Lithonia OperatorA) Staying staying out of it would have been an excellent idea. B) I didn't/don't watch Fawlty Towers.
(B) explains (A). He was quoting a line from a John Cleese character. It was not intended to be serious. You took it too seriously. Waaay too seriously, in my opinion. Hence my not staying stayed out of it.
Since that misunderstanding was behind my posting in the first place, I will get back to staying out of it, except I think you can take him at his word in this case, no further digs required.
Okay. Perhaps I misunderstood. My apologies, if I can take you at your word.
But I was not commenting on thread-drift. Not realizing the poster was being facetious, I was asking specifically about his post; that's all.
Lithonia Operator CH, you were clearly implying that my being confused about something is typical. You quoted me, then wrote that. If that was not the point, what was? In what way does your post relate to what I had written?
CH, you were clearly implying that my being confused about something is typical.
You quoted me, then wrote that. If that was not the point, what was? In what way does your post relate to what I had written?
Jeez. I really wasn't replying to your bewilderment per se. I was responding to the bizarre, tangential thread shift off the topic, which you had correctly noted.
The thread shift is what is typical, from serious to silly, especially when some folks feel uncomfortable.
Overmod A) I was staying out of this B) But how can anyone mistake a Fawlty Towers reference for anything but ongoing humor?
A) I was staying out of this
B) But how can anyone mistake a Fawlty Towers reference for anything but ongoing humor?
A) Staying staying out of it would have been an excellent idea.
B) I didn't/don't watch Fawlty Towers.
Lithonia Operator Paul Milenkovic Lithonia Operator Why should people on a suicide prevention forum be expected to know anything about railroads?? I'm missing something. I think it is a mild jibe at the discussion of mental health intervention as being off-topic on a forum about trains. I see. That must be it. Thanks, Paul, for the polite and informative reply. Unlike the guy who chose to insult me, and did not answer the question. You know, the guy who's always complaining about others' behavior here.
Paul Milenkovic Lithonia Operator Why should people on a suicide prevention forum be expected to know anything about railroads?? I'm missing something. I think it is a mild jibe at the discussion of mental health intervention as being off-topic on a forum about trains.
Lithonia Operator Why should people on a suicide prevention forum be expected to know anything about railroads?? I'm missing something.
Why should people on a suicide prevention forum be expected to know anything about railroads??
I'm missing something.
I think it is a mild jibe at the discussion of mental health intervention as being off-topic on a forum about trains.
I see. That must be it.
Thanks, Paul, for the polite and informative reply.
Unlike the guy who chose to insult me, and did not answer the question. You know, the guy who's always complaining about others' behavior here.
Nobody, including myself in there, was insulting you. Sorry if the Fawlty Towers quote was a bit too esoteric.
Lithonia OperatorUnlike the guy who chose to insult me, and did not answer the question. You know, the guy who's always complaining about others' behavior here
I was staying out of this, in part because I'm enjoying the evolution of the suicide humor but 'shouldn't' because the underlying subject is so serious. In particular, Paul's extending the discussion to GE suicide in tunnels was brilliant.
But how can anyone mistake a Fawlty Towers reference for anything but ongoing humor? Are we all too serious sometimes when we are the besservissern on the pointy end of the commentary ... or think we perceive we are?
charlie hebdoIn the words of John Fawlty, "Typical, just typical. You....."
I'm almost willing to pay for Britbox just to watch those too few episodes again.
York1 John
I
I think it is a mild jibe at the discussion of mental health intervention as being off-topic on a forum about trains. It is in perhaps bad taste because we were discussing the loss of a young man who stepped in front of a train and who could have had mental health difficulties. A speeding train like a bunch of other things ends up as a means for a person to take their life, which has repercusions to a whole lot of people, including the locomotive driver who has witnessed this and was powerless to stop the train short, so yes, it is a feature of the railroad industry.
If GM "killed the electric car", what am I doing standing next to an EV-1, a half a block from the WSOR tracks?
In the words of John Fawlty, "Typical, just typical. You....."
Convicted One tree68 Nah - that's just a bunch of (ahem) old men... I recently visited a suicide prevention and emotional support message board and asked them how locomotive dynamic brakes work. As is to be expected almost everywhere, replies received ranged from crackpot theory to near encyclopaedic dissertation. But the most accurate replies looked suspiciously like cut-n-paste jobs from elsewhere. So I decided to put them to the ultimate test, and asked them why tunnel motors have their radiator air intake down low. Just as I suspected, not a one of them seemed to be the least bit aware of the radiator fan assemblies being beneath the coils. Buncha POSERS!! So much for "uninformed" opinion? ROFL!
tree68 Nah - that's just a bunch of (ahem) old men...
I recently visited a suicide prevention and emotional support message board and asked them how locomotive dynamic brakes work. As is to be expected almost everywhere, replies received ranged from crackpot theory to near encyclopaedic dissertation.
But the most accurate replies looked suspiciously like cut-n-paste jobs from elsewhere. So I decided to put them to the ultimate test, and asked them why tunnel motors have their radiator air intake down low. Just as I suspected, not a one of them seemed to be the least bit aware of the radiator fan assemblies being beneath the coils. Buncha POSERS!!
So much for "uninformed" opinion? ROFL!
Ah, the irony, an emotional support message board and someone has to go all O.T. and change the subject to locomotive dynamic brakes. But you are trying to pull our legs here, Mrs. Robinson? Aren't you?
But now you got me going. "Tunnel motor" locomotives are meant for operation in, tunnels? And the air up top gets hot from the locomotive exhaust and radiator fans exhausting upward that the logical thing to do is to place the radiator intakes at a lower level? And maybe put the electric-driven cooling fans below the radiators, because they too benefit from cooler air, but this is at the expense of making them harder to repair? And that there is no such thing as a GE tunnel motor because they have always had a mechanically driven cooling fan below the radiator drawing air from even lower down on the carbody? And that a GE unit just deciding to shut down for no good reason didn't need heat and smoke in a railroad tunnel for motivation?
Just asking.
daveklepper Going back to the thread's subject, with a question: Have any of you been in a position in life where a lot was expected of you, perhaps in several areas, not just one, and you simply felt terribly inadequate to fullfill even of a large fraction of all that life seemed to demand from you?
Going back to the thread's subject, with a question:
Have any of you been in a position in life where a lot was expected of you, perhaps in several areas, not just one, and you simply felt terribly inadequate to fullfill even of a large fraction of all that life seemed to demand from you?
Let's just say that more of us have indeed been in the situation you describe than we let on. There is a strong social taboo on talking of such things, and you are a courageous person to bring this up.
The second thought is if the person who had acted on these feelings had only known how much their life meant to other people. Frank Capra's "It's a Wonderful Life" is about just such a situation, a person placed under extreme pressure and only focused on that one thing instead of seeing the bigger picture. I bring this up as an example, but I am not able to watch it anymore because I know of when it was real life, only it didn't have the happy ending as in the movie.
The third idea is that one can have dark thoughts as you describe, but I am hoping that your human as well as animal instincts of self-preservation remain strong in you.
Like the Holodeck in Star Trek the Next Generation, I think we have "safeties" where we can entertain fantasies but thankfully lack the impulse to act on them. I don't think it is just Catholic dogma -- I think self preservation is a strong, natural instinct. A person who acts on such an impulse must not only have the despair that you speak of, the built-in mental safety features must have been disabled somehow or were not there.
We should also think of the locomotive engineer. I guess it is regarded as more impersonal to step in front of a giant locomotive than to step in front of a car, but the horror and guilt felt by the driver must be much the same.
Former acoustical consulting client still sending me notices, which I appreciate, since I am concerned with the welfare of all my old clients:
Convicted One divebardave I am frustated that the VA has recently hired a number of inexperanced non-vets to deal with our care. The girl that I taked to today in Omaha is young enough to be my granddaughter. They are probably depending heavily upon the abundant supply of qualified analysts available at most railroad enthusiast messageboards?
divebardave I am frustated that the VA has recently hired a number of inexperanced non-vets to deal with our care. The girl that I taked to today in Omaha is young enough to be my granddaughter.
They are probably depending heavily upon the abundant supply of qualified analysts available at most railroad enthusiast messageboards?
Thanks to Chris / CopCarSS for my avatar.
tree68Nah - that's just a bunch of (ahem) old men...
Convicted OneThey are probably depending heavily upon the abundant supply of qualified analysts available at most railroad enthusiast messageboards?
Nah - that's just a bunch of (ahem) old men...
That said - the government isn't always the highest paying option for those seeking employment in professional fields.
Larry Resident Microferroequinologist (at least at my house) Everyone goes home; Safety begins with you My Opinion. Standard Disclaimers Apply. No Expiration Date Come ride the rails with me! There's one thing about humility - the moment you think you've got it, you've lost it...
divebardaveI am frustated that the VA has recently hired a number of inexperanced non-vets to deal with our care. The girl that I taked to today in Omaha is young enough to be my granddaughter.
Not having (thank the Eternal) had to actually use the VA's health consultation services myself, I was not aware of these shortcomings. Apologies.
charlie hebdo Dave K: Thanks. Actually I know the chief psychologist at the SF VA going back to graduate school. To say the least, they have lots of programs, but are pretty short on real services due to chronic underfunding and staff (provider) shortages.
Dave K: Thanks. Actually I know the chief psychologist at the SF VA going back to graduate school. To say the least, they have lots of programs, but are pretty short on real services due to chronic underfunding and staff (provider) shortages.
Charlie, just go to the VA Website and you can find all the information you want. If you are a person dealing with the situation professionally, you will get all the help you want that is available from them, just because some of your clients/patients may be veterans. And Tree68, can you report on what the specific presenter presents at your next-month meeting?
BaltACD tree68 zugmann Also, being a football player - who knows how many concussions he's sustained over the years and what damage those have done to him. This is an area that only recently has gotten the attention it needs to get. This could well mean that this young man had, indeed, suffered some concussions in the past - including some that weren't recognized (or were simply ignored) by the coaches and others. As noted, not everyone has the ability to recognize and deal with such situations - and sometimes they're too proud to admit to a problem. It's an issue the fire service (which has it's share of PTSD and suicides) is grappling with. I don't know the level of drug testing for PED's that happens in High School these days - PED's have also been known to be related to 'clouded' thought processes in their users. 30+ years ago - I used to use a local High School's track for my personal exercise area. I would see the football players hitting the weight room every day that school was open, and even when school was closed the coach made arrangements so that the players could access the weight room. This particular school did not field 'elite teams' in the state. Better performance through chemistry is a most effective lure for kids with big dreams, who just know they will live forever despite anything they put in the bodies.
tree68 zugmann Also, being a football player - who knows how many concussions he's sustained over the years and what damage those have done to him. This is an area that only recently has gotten the attention it needs to get. This could well mean that this young man had, indeed, suffered some concussions in the past - including some that weren't recognized (or were simply ignored) by the coaches and others. As noted, not everyone has the ability to recognize and deal with such situations - and sometimes they're too proud to admit to a problem. It's an issue the fire service (which has it's share of PTSD and suicides) is grappling with.
zugmann Also, being a football player - who knows how many concussions he's sustained over the years and what damage those have done to him.
Also, being a football player - who knows how many concussions he's sustained over the years and what damage those have done to him.
This is an area that only recently has gotten the attention it needs to get. This could well mean that this young man had, indeed, suffered some concussions in the past - including some that weren't recognized (or were simply ignored) by the coaches and others.
As noted, not everyone has the ability to recognize and deal with such situations - and sometimes they're too proud to admit to a problem. It's an issue the fire service (which has it's share of PTSD and suicides) is grappling with.
I don't know the level of drug testing for PED's that happens in High School these days - PED's have also been known to be related to 'clouded' thought processes in their users.
30+ years ago - I used to use a local High School's track for my personal exercise area. I would see the football players hitting the weight room every day that school was open, and even when school was closed the coach made arrangements so that the players could access the weight room. This particular school did not field 'elite teams' in the state. Better performance through chemistry is a most effective lure for kids with big dreams, who just know they will live forever despite anything they put in the bodies.
Probably not 30 years ago and at the high school level, but today at the college and pro level, there's entensive testing and penalties for the use of performance enhancing substances.
When you are working with sick "dirty" people you are likely to get mud on your hands as well.... The people who's job is to listen and consoll the unwashed masses like my VA consolor,Bartender,Barber,Rabbi,Preist who hears my rambleing confessions,.Bus driver,Amtrak Conductor, Ect--Need our Prayers as well.
It would more helpful if this VA person could state in a few sentences what specific resources are actually available.
charlie hebdo I know you don't like hearing this from a professional but it's a wee bit more complicated than what you posted. Also Dive bar Dave posted a lot of valuable information that you might not like either.
I know you don't like hearing this from a professional but it's a wee bit more complicated than what you posted. Also Dive bar Dave posted a lot of valuable information that you might not like either.
There's no question that it's a complicated issue - those were just a couple of observations, not an attempt to sum up the entire issue.
Suicide is a very definite problem in the world of public safety - both police and fire. Last night was a perfect illustration of why - a critical incident debrief was held for those who responded to a double fatal crash involving two teens. Again, just one factor, but folks in this profession (career and volunteer) all too often feel they have to "suck it up" and deal with it themselves.
I was not at the debrief as I was not on the call.
We have a regional team that can respond for defusing sessions immediately after a bad call, and they will conduct the CISD a day or two later if requested. As a fire chief, they're in the back of mind for incidents that might have an effect on my people. Even if I don't see the need for a group debrief, I'm watching my crew for signs of distress.
My fire department will be hosting a seminar next month. One of the presenters will be a clergyman speaking on this very topic.
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