1. Alternatives to Suicide Peer-to-Peer Groups
These groups have been nurtured and developed within the Western Mass Recovery Learning Community (RLC).

2. Examining our beliefs about suicide

3. I believe suicide is okay in some situations, like when someone is terminally ill.

4. I believe that people should be stopped from killing themselves by any means necessary.

5. I believe certain thoughts and feelings are always a predictor for suicide.

6. I believe that people who kill themselves are selfish.

7. What do we bring to the table?
What did this exercise bring up for you?
What did you learn regarding your own beliefs?
How might these beliefs impact your ability to talk openly about suicide?

8. Values Self-help with focus on relationship
Mutual respect, support, and empathy
Non-clinical and non-coercive
Instead of one expert, everyone is the expert of their own experience
Respectful of each person’s privacy
Maintain transparency; share any limits to privacy

9. Framework
Mutual support group and not a clinical group or treatment program
People join for as long as it suits them
No ‘red tape’ or ‘hoops’ for anyone attending (e.g., no assessment, intake, or discharge)
Facilitators openly identify with the experience of suicidal thoughts
No documentation or records kept (beyond total numbers)

10. The Gist People share from their own experiences
Ordinary, non-medical language is used
Curiosity-based vs. fear-based responses
Value of meeting and accepting people as they are
Willingness to sit with deep distress; not jumping to clinical interventions

11. Freedom Attendance is completely voluntary and self-determined
Freedom to interpret experiences in any way
Freedom to challenge social norms
Freedom to talk about anything; not just thoughts of suicide

12. Out of the Box No assumption of illness
No assumption that suicidal thoughts are connected to mental illness
Differences between suicide and self- injury are acknowledged and respected

13. Practical Matters
Group meets in the community, not in a clinical setting
Group open to people not using services
Group open to people from other geographical areas
No clinical pressure on facilitator to report back to anyone else

14. The charter and guide to groups
Alternatives to Suicide Groups: mutual support groups around extreme despair and suicidal feelings
Alternative Conversations Groups: adapted from Alternatives to Suicide values for provider settings that limit fuller groups

15. PROCESS FOR STARTING/HOLDING THE GROUP

16. Alt to Sui Values for non-peer providers
Partnership
Role to avoid: Risk assessor, protector, decider, etc.
Transparency
Role to avoid: Secretly calling for help, keeping the individual in distress ‘busy’ while someone else calls for help, pretending you are not affected by their distress, etc.
Continuity
Role to avoid: Seeing the individual as ‘taken care of’ or ‘no longer your problem’ once referred elsewhere
Partnership: The support person(s) will regard their role as that of a partner in identifying concerns and potential options. (Role to avoid: Risk assessor, protector, decider, etc.)
Transparency: The support person(s) will be honest about his or her own concerns and need for support in difficult situations, including when they feel they need to call a supervisor or colleague during a given interaction. (Role to avoid: Secretly calling for help, keeping the individual in distress ‘busy’ while someone else calls for help, pretending you are not affected by their distress, etc.)
Continuity: The support person(s) will be aware of their own limitations in time and availability, but will seek a way to maintain a connection with the person they are supporting, even if that individual chooses to go to the hospital, etc. (Role to avoid: Seeing the individual as ‘taken care or’ or ‘no longer their problem’ once referred elsewhere.)

17. Possible Questions/ Helpful Statements
What’s going on?
Did something happen that triggered you feeling this way?
Have you felt this way before?
How can I help?

18. Possible Strategies/Interventions
Reflect and validate.
Develop a plan that includes concrete steps to check in later that day and the next day, and resources to get through the next 24 hours.
If in person, offer to go for a walk with the individual.
Offer to call emergency services with the individual.
Reflect (“It sounds like your…”) and validate (“After everything you’ve been through, it makes total sense to me that you’d be feeling this way.”

19. Q & A

20. Val Neff val@namifoxvalley.org (847)337-5343
Contact Us
Val Neff (847)
Funding for this conference was made possible by NITT-HT grant, CFDA from SAMHSA.  The views expressed in written conference materials or publications and by speakers and moderators do not necessarily reflect the official policies of the Department of Health and Human Services; nor does mention of trade names, commercial practices, or organizations imply endorsement by the U.S. Government.