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"Forget reasoning with a suicide on a ledge"

2022-02-22T04:09:29.059Z


Local Valencian firefighters and police officers receive training on how to act in the event of suicidal behavior and prevent deaths


"Suicide can be prevented."

That is the premise with which Dolors López works, a pedagogue who, after suffering in her flesh the consequences of the suicide of a daughter, began to look for answers that she did not find.

“I stopped looking for those answers and started researching,” she recalls.

It was after digging into many sources that she verified that, despite the existence of prevention plans, there was no training for professionals who intervene in suicide attempts or work with those who accumulate more risk factors.

She designed a plan for educators, the Prevention Teacher Training Plan, which is currently taught by four professionals, and now she is visiting towns and cities with a compact and

express course

aimed, above all, at local police and firefighters.

"Forget reasoning with a suicide on a ledge," he snaps at them.

“Up there, you are not going to get them to talk if it is not through emotions, you have to get them out of their mental tunnel,” he adds.

Suicide is already the first cause of unnatural death in Spain and, according to the Spanish Suicide Observatory, it already doubles those of traffic accidents and is 13.6 times more than those caused by homicides.

According to the WHO, every 7.5 minutes there is a person trying to take their own life in Spain.

In addition, suicide is, after tumors, the main cause of death between 15 and 29 years.

Both police and firefighters are the professionals who usually intervene first in these cases.

And he addresses them with very specific questions.

“You have to get him to accept your presence.

Do not make any movement without announcing it first, try to get him out of his mental tunnel, offer him a cigarette or ask him if he is cold, do not touch them if it is not with his permission, that they accept your presence and your word, "he exposes before the eyes of a few uniformed men who do not stop taking photos with their mobile phones at the projection in which he also details what should not be done.

"Don't tell them that everything will be fine, you don't know, don't give them false guarantees, don't fall apart with them and don't challenge them to continue with their intention," he continues.

This is also witnessed by Nacho Donet, who is in charge of the citizen security patrols of the Gandía City Council.

“It is a myth that has dismantled us and given us the tools to know how to deal with it because, until now, we lacked specific training.

There are protocols but we acted almost instinctively”, he admits.

"We are self-taught and we don't know if we are doing the right thing," adds a firefighter from the Valencia Consortium.

Objective: save lives

"Let's put ourselves in that whoever is leading the suicide attempt has just murdered his partner," he challenges the attendees.

“You are not going to act the same way because it is not strictly suicidal behavior, but a consequence of what he has just done,” she informs.

"You are not going to act the same because for you it is not the same either, your feelings are conflicting, but your obligation is to save him," she says.

This is one of the things that most attracts the attention of Ángeles Miñana, a police officer from the Gandía gender-based violence unit.

"We have to know how to face our feelings, but the goal is to save his life," she concludes.

Dolors López addresses them as “agents of life”.

And he smiles.

Almost always, smile.

He not only tells them how to deal with a suicide attempt, but also how to act after an attempt.

And not only for the services in which they can intervene, but also to know how to act before colleagues who have tried.

The suicide rate in Spain is 8.31 per 100,000 inhabitants, according to the National Institute of Statistics, but among police officers and civil guards it is much higher.

"We were talking about you and how concerned you had us, we know what has happened and we want you to know that we are here to help you."

Those are the words that López suggests before the return of a colleague who has attempted suicide.

"Don't ignore the fact, let him know he has support," he urges.

And he repeats, over and over,

Not just firefighters and police.

Social services workers also attend training.

“Many people come to us after a suicide attempt.

Although we have protocols, we did not have this training that is giving us tools to deal with them”, says Gemma Pellicer, an official from the Gandía City Council.

“It is very important that we take into account the need for a social network that you have told us about and that we know how to detect it,” she explains.

In addition to how to deal with attempted suicide, the course also deals with prevention.

Between 30% and 40% of suicides have had previous attempts, which makes it the main warning call, since there is no specific profile.

Warning signs, risk factors and not being afraid to face the subject, which is still taboo in many areas, are some of the keys.

"Talking about suicide does not increase the risk and it may be the only and last chance," maintains Dolors López.

She was ordered to do so when she lost her daughter.

"They told me to say it was an accident," she recalls.

She passed the duel and wrote

I name you

, a harrowing story of that "terrible journey" that mothers and fathers "orphaned" children go through.

She has become a benchmark when it comes to suicide and the President of the Government, Pedro Sánchez, counted on her for the announcement of an investment of 100 million for the Mental Health Plan.

But she identifies with the qualifiers on the flap of her book: “Universal Valencian, supportive, traveler and committed, feminist, teacher, friend, companion, daughter, mother, witch...”

Source: elparis

All news articles on 2022-02-22

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