Re: [asa] Society Ignoring Serious Boy Problems

James,

I think we're probably in very different situations.

If a caller at Samaritans is a Christian, and if I think it would be
helpful to explore that - what their faith does for them; does it
bring comfort etc, then I would pursue it, and pick up that thread in
the conversation. However, I would not be able to reveal my own
religious beliefs in the process.

You say that of your patients 99.5% are Christians. I would say that
99.5% of callers I get who are suicidal are probably agnostics or
atheists. One of the things that we always do is to ask about
suicidal feelings (because it is a taboo subject, and people fear the
reaction they might get - so we "give permission" to talk about it.
If the caller is suicidal, we often explore such things as what it
means to the caller to be dead. Very often the response is that it
would be a welcome exit into nothingness. I don't believe
"witnessing" would achieve anything in those circumstances; however
there is evidence that if you listen non-judgmentally and try to get
alongside a suicidal person, then they often find the feelings
alleviated, and a reason to carry on. Further on down the line, one
hopes, they will be in a state to hear the gospel, but that is
somewhere, and someone, else.

My wife and I also had a Christian friend outside of Samaritans who
went through a period of suicidal depression. One of here
descriptions of what it was like was "I look inside myself and I find
nothing". This loss of self coincided with a complete inability to
pray or have a relationship with God; though this was previously one
of the strongest parts of her life. Nor were we able to offer much
spiritual support, or pray with her. Instead we undertook (with her
agreement) to pray on her behalf every day, which we did for four
months until she found herself able to pray again. However, one could
not offer such support in a Samaritans situation; for one thing, when
someone rings up, it often isn't the same person who answers the phone
- and we avoid giving out duty times, because it can lead to unhealthy
dependencies of callers on volunteers, which in the end doesn't help
them.

Your data on the beneficial effects of religions belief does indeed
sound fascinating (and I believe there are similar studies cited by
Alistair McGrath in one of his books on Dawkins). However, it
probably only applies to someone who is already a Christian believer
(as are 99.5% of your patients). I'm wondering if you have any data
on my friend above's experience - that depression leads to an
inability to pray - have a relationship with God? Interestingly,
atheist Lewis Wolpert, who had a bout of depression, and writes about
it in a book called "Malignant Sadness" - describes it as a
"soul-loss". (Though Wolpert doesn't believe in souls, it was the
nearest he could come to describing how depression felt).

Iain

On Mon, Jul 6, 2009 at 12:05 PM, James
Patterson<james000777@bellsouth.net> wrote:
>> Samaritans...is an entirely secular organisation.
>
> Ian, understood. However, let me rephrase the question, and preface it a
> bit.
>
> There is a large literature base on the importance of religion and
> spirituality to mental health. By large, I would say that there are over
> 2000 publications. The vast majority, I would say > 97%, are positive, in
> that having an active spiritual existence or being involved in organized
> religion is good for you in many different ways. It decreases depression,
> suicidality, teen pregnancy, drug use; it increases resilience, social
> involvement, life span, etc. The data truly is impressive. A few of these
> studies are quite large, with n's > 10,000.
>
> So, that being said, my question would be: Are you allowed to discuss
> religion/spirituality at all, and if not, why not, given the above?
>
> You don't have to push your religion, of course. Or even witness, by telling
> about yourself. In that sense, I have to agree, I rarely "witness". I simply
> educate my patients about a very important resource to them. You likely have
> a more culturally diverse population than I do, and so religion likely means
> many more things than it does for my patients. I have about 99.5% Christian,
> 0.5% atheists, and so far 1 Buddhist in 7 years.
>
> So exploring this realm of the patient's social history and how it is
> impacting their current status may be helpful to them.
>
> James
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu [mailto:asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu] On
> Behalf Of Iain Strachan
> Sent: Saturday, July 04, 2009 4:01 AM
> To: James Patterson
> Cc: ASA
> Subject: Re: [asa] Society Ignoring Serious Boy Problems
>
> Hi, James,
>
> The large volunter/paid staff ratio is explained by the fact that
> large numbers of volunteers are needed to man the telephones 24/7.  At
> our branch (Oxford) we have between 110 and 125 active volunteers.
> Each day there are five double-manned shifts  (four at three and three
> quarter hours and one night shift of nine hours with a three hour
> break in the middle when the phones divert to another branch).  So
> there are 70 slots to fill every week.  In practice we need over 100
> volunteers to do this because many people can't do shifts during work
> ours.  The basic volunteer commitment is for one duty per week.  On
> top of that there is one shift "leader" for each shift who can be
> contacted at home for supporting volunteers who are on duty (
> sometimes emotional support is required after a particularly
> distressing or abusive call).  Not a single volunteer in our branch,
> including the branch Director, is paid.  There is a central general
> office which has full-time paid staff.
>
> As regards your question about witnessing;  Samaritans, despite its
> Biblically inspired name, is an entirely secular organisation.  In
> fact we are forbidden to discuss our own religious views with callers.
>  (In fact we are forbidden to disclose any personal information - the
> idea is to focus on the caller and provide a listening service).
>
> It was founded by an Anglical vicar, Rev. Chad Varah in 1953 - and the
> story might be of interest to those interested in psychology.  Varah
> intended to set up a listening service for the suicidal, and got
> himself trained up as a counsellor to handle the job.  He set himself
> up in the crypt of St. Stephen Walbrooke's church in London, and got
> folks from the congregation to help out by chatting with and making
> coffee for the callers who were queued up to see Chad.  However, he
> made the interesting discovery that often when they got to see him
> they had had much of their distress alleviated, simply by talking to
> someone who was prepared to listen and not judge or give advice, but
> simply to empathise.  I think in essence he had discovered
> independently the value of Karl Rogers' patient-centred psychotherapy.
>  On discovering this, he saw the potential for a volunteer based
> organisation.
>
> There are some volunteers in my branch who are Christian, but equally
> there are others who are atheist or agnostic in their views.  The last
> time I was on duty with one of the atheist volunteers; a lovely warm
> woman, we had quite a chat between calls about science, religion etc.
> Despite her atheism, she doesn't think much of Richard Dawkins, it
> seems!  It's quite good to chat with other volunteers about science,
> religion etc, because as Samaritan volunteers, they instinctively
> won't be confrontational like the Dawkins style of "new atheist", but
> will tend to listen to you and do their best to understand your point
> of view.
>
> There are a few branches of the Samaritans in the USA; quite a big one
> in Boston, I believe.  However, the majority are in the UK - there are
> 202 branches.
>
> I'd be interested to know your views as a psychologist of the value of
> email as an emotional support system.  Since we get loads of emails
> from americans , I'm guessing that such a service doesn't exist in the
> USA.  It seems to me that people find it therapeutic to write down
> about their troubles and feelings, and know that someone else is going
> to read it in complete confidence, and respond.
>
> Iain
>
> On Sat, Jul 4, 2009 at 3:35 AM, James
> Patterson<james000777@bellsouth.net> wrote:
>>> The ratio of volunteers to paid staff across the organisation is 236:1.
>>> The national average ratio amongst other charities is estimated at 34:1.
>>
>> Impressive. I had no idea, never heard of the Samaritans as a group. Keep
> up
>> the good work. Given the growing secularization of Europe, do you witness
>> too, as a part of this service?
>>
>>
>> At least in the USA, females attempt suicide quite a bit more frequently
>> than males, and males complete suicide more often than males. This is due
>> presumably to the more lethal and violent means that males use compared to
>> females. Rate of depression higher in females. Males (presumably) more
>> impulsive.
>>
>> James
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu [mailto:asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu] On
>> Behalf Of Iain Strachan
>> Sent: Friday, July 03, 2009 2:02 PM
>> To: James Patterson
>> Cc: ASA
>> Subject: Re: [asa] Society Ignoring Serious Boy Problems
>>
>> James,
>>
>> You may be interested to compare the uk figures which you can get from
>> the Samaritans:
>>
>> http://www.samaritans.org/PDF/SamaritansInfoResourcePack2008.pdf
>>
>> Tables 17 onwards give the relevant data.  It seems to bear out the
>> observation that suicides are more prevalent among males  (11 per
>> 100,000 in 2005) than females (3 per 100,000) for age 15-25 (UK and
>> ROI).
>>
>> From what I've picked up as a volunteer at the Samaritans, I believe
>> it's the case that though there are more suicides among males, that
>> females are more prone to depression and mental health issues.
>>
>> The tables also show interestingly that suicide rates have declined
>> significantly since 1995, from 17 per 100,000 (boys 15-25) in 1995.
>>
>> However, mental health support in the UK is absolutely abysmal, and
>> many mentally ill people rely on the Samaritans, which is
>> volunteer-led, because they can't get proper support from the local
>> health authorities.  It is a sobering thought that a group of amateurs
>> (admittedly ones who are carefully selected and highly trained) are a
>> vital component of the mental health support in my country.
>>
>> Samaritans also offers and email support service
>> (jo@samaritans.org.uk), which receives emails from all over the world.
>>  Many of our email contacts are from the USA, so I would gather that
>> the service we offer in this way (non-religious, completely
>> confidential, and non-judgmental) is something that is quite unique.
>>
>> We are also now growing an SMS text support service, though I'd guess
>> this would be restricted to UK.
>>
>> Anyway, I hope you find the information in the link to be useful.
>>
>> Iain
>>
>> On Fri, Jul 3, 2009 at 1:27 PM, James
>> Patterson<james000777@bellsouth.net> wrote:
>>> I can speak to this, it's what I do for a living. One of my main hats is
>> as
>>> an emergency psychiatrist. The suicide rate, whether in boys or girls,
>>> starts being a problem in adolescents. However, this is just a symptom of
>>> the cultural "avalanche" that has been the past 50 years.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> http://www.cdc.gov/men/lcod/04all.pdf
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> http://www.cdc.gov/women/lcod/04all.pdf
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Suicide and homicide rates are often in the top three causes of deaths
> for
>>> folks 10-45.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> The average patient that presents in my psychiatry crisis unit is from a
>>> broken, non-nuclear family, has suffered some form of abuse or neglect,
>>> abuses or is dependent on drugs or alcohol, has not completed their
>>> education, is unemployed, has a significant history of violence and/or
>> legal
>>> problems, AND on top of that, may very well have a "true mental health"
>>> issue, like major depression or bipolar disorder.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> The first report of major increases in mental health crises was from the
>>> 80s. The APA's report here:
>>>
>>>
>>
> http://archive.psych.org/edu/other_res/lib_archives/archives/tfr/tfr200201.p
>> df
>>>
>>> is illuminating. It's 101 pages long - read page 5 for why there is a
> need
>>> for a task force. This was published in 2002.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I've been managing the Crisis Unit for the past 7 years, but we have
> stats
>>> for the past 12 years. In that time, the population of our community has
>>> increased 8%. The increase in our patient population has increased by >
>>> 200%, and the majority of that is in the past 5 years. The slope of the
>> line
>>> is going up.the rate is increasing. There's not that many more
>> people.people
>>> are getting sicker.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> The APA report, on page 5, states that "Deinstitutionalization and later
>>> efforts at cost containment including managed care have tended to place
>> more
>>> fragile patients in the community." While this is true,
>>> deinstitutionalization ended in Louisiana decades ago. The vast majority
>> of
>>> patients I see are not from institutions nor are they in need of
>>> institutionalization. They are the product of the decline in social and
>>> moral values in our society, the product of radical feminism, the product
>> of
>>> sexual freedom (this really begin in the 50's with the Kinsey reports)
> and
>>> drug use, and the result that all of that has had on the nuclear family.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I could go on.I just recently presented on this topic here where I work,
>> and
>>> am writing a manuscript on it.
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> James Patterson, Shreveport
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> From: asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu [mailto:asa-owner@lists.calvin.edu] On
>>> Behalf Of Dave Wallace
>>> Sent: Thursday, July 02, 2009 4:34 PM
>>> To: ASA
>>> Subject: [asa] Society Ignoring Serious Boy Problems
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> Boys' suicide crisis?
>>>
>>> Another serious problem is suicide rates, Kleinfeld points out.
>>>
>>> In her review, she cites data from the National Center for Health
>> Statistics
>>> to show the "alarming" suicide rate among boys. From 1995 to 2005, the
>> rate
>>> of suicide among 20 to 24 year-old boys was 20.7 suicides per 100,000,
>> while
>>> the rate for girls was just 3.5 per 100,000. Among 15 to 19 year olds,
> the
>>> rates were 12.5 per 100,000 for boys and 2.8 per 100,000 for girls.
>>>
>>> And the difference between the gender suicide rates is rising. "In 1933
>> the
>>> young male suicide rate was 1.54 times higher than for young females. In
>>> 2005 the male rate was 4.63 times higher than the female rate," Kleinfeld
>>> said.
>>>
>>> http://www.livescience.com/culture/090701-boys-issues.html
>>>
>>> :-) I assume this study must be using a completely bogus methodology as
>> most
>>> feminists north of the 49th parallel would totally disagree. :-P
>>>
>>> Dave W
>>>
>>> ps my comments were black humour
>>>
>>> To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@calvin.edu with "unsubscribe
>>> asa" (no quotes) as the body of the message.
>>
>>
>>
>> --
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>
>
>
> --
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> Non timeo sed caveo
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> (='.'=)
> (")_(") This is a bunny copy him into your signature so he can gain
> world domination
> -----------
>
>
> To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@calvin.edu with
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>
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