Folks,
What is your strategy for suicide prevention in your home or in homes with gun owners?

Gun death claims in the media are totally spurious--we knew that already, but what was chilling to learn is that suicide makes up ~65% of the 33,000 gun deaths each year, and more than 1/2 of all suicides are men age 45+. 15% of suicides are female. For every death, there are 25 attempts, and women are 3x more likely to attempt suicide.

So, if a friend or loved one started showing signs of suicidal ideation (and how would you actually know?), what is your strategy to remove lethal means, such as guns? And how do you do so without going nuclear so that they run afoul of the "no-due-process" laws that are showing up in Olympia?

Under 594, are there options other than a police locker to temporarily store firearms?

I honestly don't know. I'm pretty good at convincing people that whatever I want is in their best interest, but I've never put that to the test with firearms. And with suicidal ideation, the afflicted not infrequently have a backup plan, even if it's a crappy back up plan. So I honestly don't know. I'm sorry.

Thanks for your honesty. I don't yet have a good strategy either. Suicide is this great big huge elephant in the room that nobody wants to talk about. And everyone is surprised to learn that a loved one isn't as happy and put together as they appear on the surface.

I've been talking with a couple of therapists and putting together some resources that I'm happy to share; in the meantime I'm curious as to how we in the gun community could be/should be/are dealing with it.

That percentage of suicides by firearm doesn't agree with data provided by the CDC here -- https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/suicide.htm -- which gives the figure at 50%. Also, the page you linked to used as one of the foundations for its "findings" a database provided by Mother Jones, which is hard, hard left (any journalistic outlet that touts itself as progressive is probably not a good source). I didn't look up any of the other stats in the article you linked.

According to the CDC, drug overdose deaths outnumbered suicide-by-gun by more than 3x. Opioids accounted for almost 68% of those.

Suicide is much larger than the method used. Taking away one method will only push someone towards another. Intervention needs to focus on the causes, not the tools.

If there are 33,000 gun deaths per year. And the CDC says that firearms make up approx. 23,000 suicides per year. How are suicides not about 2/3 of firearms deaths?

Sorry, you're right. Since the OP was focused on impacting suicide rates, I was thinking of the percentage of suicides that included firearms, not the number of firearms deaths that were ruled suicide. My mistake.

Great resource, thank you!
Totally agree with you re: Mother Jones.

The fivethirtyeight.com site appears to underestimate total number of firearm deaths (they say 33,000, CDC says 38,658 in Table 11), but the death by suicide number is not too far off: 22,938 firearm suicides re: CDC / 38,658 total firearm deaths re: CDC = 59.34% vs. the ~65% estimated by fivethirtyeight.

Despite the discrepancy (and the source), the series of four gun death articles on fivethirtyeight article does a very, very good job of refuting the left's hardline stance on gun control.

And you're absolutely correct in that those experiencing suicidal ideation absolutely need help addressing the underlying causes and feelings lack of connection, lest they find another method.

We can offer resources and support, and we can at the least make it harder to obtain firearms until they get help.

Good topic. Great way to be proactive about real life situations.

It is a mistake to think you can prevent suicide. What you *can* do is deny access to *your* firearms by unauthorized persons.
If the person at risk is a family member, i-594 allows for an exempt temporary "transfer" of their firearm to you. Now that it is temporarily yours, execute on your responsibility to deny access (safe storage) for the duration.

My strategy is to be kind, be compassionate, and be there for people who are hurting. And keep my own firearms properly secured. As for someone else's firearms, the only way I would try to remove them is with permission from the owner. To use any other means of removal is immoral, IMHO.

Same.

In a nut shell.

The strategy is that this has nothing to do with guns or access to guns and we should stop pretending that it does because we get screwed every time.

The proof is that Belgium, Japan, South Korea all are rich, developed first world countries with almost no access to guns and have higher suicide rates than us. Until last year France did too.

Suicide has NOTHING to do with the method. People will kill themselves with objects you cannot remove. With knives, with pills, with razors, with buildings, with bathtubs and pools, etc.

I am tired of the false association with guns and suicide. We won't reduce suicide by doing anything with guns, and if the goal is just less suicides by guns but the same overall (like Belgium, France, Japan, etc) then that's pretty sad.

Stop helping this narrative. We literally cannot win. The moment we let them assign blame for suicide to an object is the moment we lose.

Suicide is a result of choices or mental illness or both. In a free society where citizens are not chained to beds 24/7 there is little you can do to remove easy access to suicide. You need to deal with people themselves, not with objects.

Normally I agree with your positions, but in this case I disagree (mostly).
We can agree that suicide is suicide, no matter how it is executed. I think we can agree that it is valuable to know what we can/should do to help a friend or loved-one if they begin showing signs and symptoms.

However, I believe that I (we?) as a gun owner need to ensure that my firearms are not available to someone who is contemplating suicide, be they family or guests in my home. I also believe that there have to be ways to help fellow gun-owners stay safe without resorting to the draconian measures being forced upon us.

Let's pull this out of the anti-gun narrative, as that's a fight for a different day.

Suicide is an huge problem. What can we do to help minimize that? Guns being used in suicides is an huge problem. What can we do to help minimize that without permanently infringing on rights?

I knew a vet that had a massive collection of beautiful firearms. He experienced some significant changes in his life and became a mild concern. With some counseling and other VA assistance, he worked through it and is now nowhere near a risk. What would've been the best approach to help him during this rough patch?

Someone very close to me had a brother who committed suicide while she was watching. There are a gazillion what-ifs, including, if the firearm had not been available could someone have recognized signs and helped him?

So, back to the original question: what is the strategy for dealing with suicide risk amongst family members or friends?

I don't mean to sound dismissive, but this is probably the question people ask if they've never dealt with a genuine suicide risk within their inner circle. For those who have, the demons tormenting their loved one go far beyond guns and razor blades.

So let's say you take away someone's guns. Are they any less depressed? Are they in any less physical pain? Are their problems in any way reduced? Nope. Meaning you've done precisely zero for them but at least you feel better. They might still walk out into the woods and hang themselves with their shoelaces because you've dealt with the tools that were obvious to you, but that's done nothing to actually help them.

Lock up your stuff so someone who shouldn't have access to them doesn't. That's about the extent of any firearms-related suicide prevention plan. The rest of helping someone who's suicidal? That's a whole lot harder and it has nothing to do with the Second Amendment.