Conversation 33 - The Impact of Client Suicide on Professional Counselors - Ohio Counseling Conversations

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Dr M Rybnik is the Director of the Criminal Justice
Coordinating Center ofExcellence at the Department of
Psychiatry at Neomed, a role shehas held since 2021.
She has over 15 years ofexperience in mental health and
crisis services, includingserving as a clinical counselor
at Kent State University atStark and as a crisis
intervention team coordinator inPortage County, and was even

(00:23):
featured last year by ABC Newson the value of crisis
intervention team training forpolice officers to help them
appropriately respond to mentalhealth crises.
At the Center of Excellence, drM partners with criminal
justice and mental healthstakeholders to improve
cross-systems responses forindividuals in crisis and
justice-involved people livingwith mental illness.
Her leadership includesexpanding CIT programs across

(00:46):
Ohio, coordinating the OhioCross Systems Mapping Initiative
and providing statewidetraining and consultation.
She's an active member of theOhio Attorney General's Task
Force on Mental Illness andCriminal Justice and other
statewide committees.
Dr M completed her PhD inCounselor Education and
Supervision in 2023.
Dr M completed her PhD incounselor education and

(01:06):
supervision in 2023.
Her dissertation, the Impact ofClient Suicide on Counselor
Supervisors, reflects hercommitment to addressing suicide
intervention, postvention andthe professional impact of
client loss.
In addition to her academic andclinical leadership, she
teaches, trains and collaborateswith organizations like Light
After Loss to support suicideloss survivors and educate
providers on the needs of thoseaffected.

(01:27):
With such an amazing backgroundand a wealth of knowledge, we
here at Ohio CounselingConversations are so excited to
be joined by Dr M Ribnick.
Thank you so much for beinghere with us today.
To start off, we want to know alittle bit about your journey
into counseling and what led youto the current role directing
the Criminal JusticeCoordinating Center of

(01:49):
Excellence at Neomed.

Speaker 2 (01:51):
Well, first off, thank you for saying that
correctly the first time A lotof people stumble over that very
long title.
It's a mouthful yeah, it is.
It was very hard to explain itwhen I first got this job.
So my journey in counseling I'min my mid forties, so this

(02:13):
started, you know, a little over20 years ago.
I really didn't think about myjourney in the counseling field
until I was in my PhD programand someone asked it was part of
a part of our class and I hadthe memory of what really truly
set me on this path was when Iwas little and I saw movie
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles andthere's a scene where there's
two characters talking andthey're talking about the one's

(02:36):
anger and, you know, talkingabout how, you know, turned
inward, this can be an enemy,how that other character is
choosing to face this enemyalone, and then it ends with, as
you face this, don't forgetyour family and don't forget me.
And it was really in that momentthat I connected with this idea
of wanting to help others,wanting to be of service.

(02:59):
And that's a movie I saw when Iwas 10, so you know, 30 some
years ago, the yeah, the ideagot planted that this is what I
wanted to do with my life.
I didn't always know what itwas, you know, I couldn't, I
didn't know what counseling waswhen I was that age right, but
it was always in there.
My entire career really hasfocused on helping others, being

(03:23):
of service.
I've almost exclusively workedin public service throughout my
career.
I was a hall director for awhile at Kent State University
and had experiences there.
I did have one student havetheir first psychotic break
while I was there.
I was part of the group thatresponded to a really sad

(03:49):
accident where a car full ofstudents from all from the same
floor, they had a horrible caraccident and and all of them
passed away.
So I was tagged to come in andhelp support other students
throughout that and that's justalways been what I've wanted to
do.

(04:10):
My first job in the field wasworking in crisis services.
So I worked in a 24 sevencrisis hub.
So for my county at the time wetook calls 24 seven7, you know
365, but we also stopped peoplein person.
We did community outreach goingto see people in their homes,

(04:33):
sometimes bringing them, youknow, back with us to the center
to talk to them more.
We were doing level of careassessments, pre-hospitalization
screenings and then, for thosewho did need to be hospitalized
at a psychiatric facility, wewere also coordinating those
admissions.
So we really walked with thoseclients from the moment they

(04:56):
walked in or they were broughtin, because sometimes they were
brought in by police or familyall the way to them heading to
the psychiatric facility.
So you know we would spend a lotof intense time with them.
I saw people of all ages butmost of my work was with those
with severe and persistentmental illness and that's always

(05:16):
been a passion of mine to helpthem have, you know, better
lives, have them help, help themhave a better experience of
their life.
Did that work for about fiveyears.
It's actually where I gotinvolved with crisis
intervention.
Team programs was during thattime.
Then I worked for 10 years atKent State University, at Stark,

(05:40):
at their counseling services,so focused on working with
college students.
It was very different because itwas not a residential campus.
So it was a different type ofcommunity, different diversity
of students who were comingthrough the door.
Lots of individuals from lowersocioeconomic status, lots of

(06:02):
trauma, you know, walkingthrough the door, but also still
individuals of that age wherethey were having, you know, some
early psychotic breaks, earlyshowings of potentially more
severe persistent mental illnessbecause of, you know, that
transitional age rangeExtraordinarily rewarding One of

(06:25):
the things that I always tellfolks that is a great part when
you work at a school, whetherit's a K through 12 or a college
is go to graduation.
It's something that we don'thave out in community mental
health right.
We don't get to see someone wework with necessarily achieve
things Like we don't necessarilyget to witness them in their

(06:48):
life.
For me, it became veryimportant to be at graduation
every semester to see studentsthat I worked with every year,
you know, walk that stageknowing what they had done and
the work they had done to getthere.
And then about a little overfour years ago, closing in on
four and a half years ago, I sawthis current position at

(07:11):
Northeast Ohio MedicalUniversity, so now I am the
director of the Criminal JusticeCoordinating Center of
Excellence, housed in theDepartment of Psychiatry, along
with two other coordinatingcenters.
One is the Ohio Program forCampus Safety and Mental Health,
so they focus on mental healthawareness and suicide prevention
at university and collegecampuses, and then the Best

(07:33):
Center, which focuses on bestpractices for schizophrenia and
other psychosis diagnosistreatment.
So they work a lot withtraining clinicians with how to
better work with individualsexperiencing psychosis.
Okay, it sounds like a lot oftraining clinicians with how to
better work with individualsexperiencing psychosis.

Speaker 1 (07:46):
Okay, it sounds like a lot of your work sits at that
intersection of mental healthand now the criminal justice
system.
What do you think is socritical about this
collaboration, especially whenwe're talking about suicide
prevention and postventionefforts?

Speaker 2 (08:03):
Sure.
So the over-representation ofthose with mental illness in the
justice system has been goingon for decades, and we know that
this happens because for somefolks, when they are
experiencing their symptoms,those can be very strong, they
can take over.
Symptoms can sometimes causefolks to behave in a way that

(08:24):
they wouldn't typically behave,or for someone with severe,
persistent mental illness whohas very severe symptoms, you
know, they may be doing thingsthat puts them in harm's way,
puts others in harm's way orjust, in general, might concern
people in the community, right?
So there's a lot of interactionbetween those systems, and so

(08:48):
what we try to do is work withcommunities in Ohio to bring
those two systems proactivelytogether as best as possible to
look at what is that experienceof individuals with mental
illness in their community thatcome in contact with the justice
system.
What services are there, whattools are there to potentially

(09:09):
deflect them to treatment asappropriately?
Or, for those that need to,still, you know, go through the
process of the justice system,working towards having
appropriate services for them sothat they are not becoming
sicker while engaged with thejustice system.
That's really what we come downto With suicide prevention as

(09:32):
soon as anyone has contact withthe justice system.
That is a risk factor.
There can be loss of face.
There can be a lot of loss thatcomes with interaction with the
justice system At minimum.
There can be shame that comeswith interaction with the
justice system at minimum therecan be shame that comes with it.
There can also be very concretelosses loss of job, loss of
relationships, and the mostconcrete one is loss of freedom,

(09:53):
even if it's temporary.
Higher risk, you know,potentially for suicidal
thoughts or suicidal behaviors,and that means that the staff
and the personnel of the justicesystem also need to be informed

(10:14):
about these to provide theirown interventions for safety of
folks.
For example, one of the thingswe do is we collaborate with the
attorney general's office toput on educational webinars for
jail personnel and correctionstaff to learn about things like
recognizing, you know, whensomeone might be at risk, making

(10:36):
sure that they're usingappropriate screening tools at
booking, really working withthem about what's appropriate to
do when someone has a crisis atthe jail, you know.
So we work with them on all ofthose aspects.
So for lots of individuals thatcontact with the justice system
, can you know, potentiallyratchet up that risk for suicide

(10:57):
and they're around a differentsystem than the mental health
system, but it is a system thatis trying to do well and trying
to make sure that people areprotected and alive and are
receiving the care that theyneed in order to continue to
participate in whatever processthey're going to be going
through.

Speaker 1 (11:16):
Yeah, yeah, and I know, like we heard in your bio,
how you've been a leader inOhio's crisis intervention team
expansion and I guess I'mcurious what are some of the
most promising practices thatyou've seen with CIT when it
comes to prevention forindividuals in crisis?

Speaker 2 (11:34):
Sure.
So in Ohio, crisis interventionteam programs are organized
locally.
So while my center, the CJCCOE,serves as a place for
consultation, technicalassistance, guidance resources,
mentorship, it's really thelocal CIT programs that lead the

(11:57):
expansion and the growth ofwhat happens with that in their
communities.
So they're primarily organizedby mental health catchment board
area.
So we have 88 counties, we havemultiple mental health boards
that have two, four, sometimeseven six counties under their
catchment.

(12:19):
It's really those programs thathave found their own ways to
enhance and expand what they'redoing Related to suicide
prevention.
Over my tenure here, looking atit from the state level, we've

(12:39):
seen CIT programs integratemental health first aid into
their CIT patrol officertraining courses.
We've seen the utilization ofQPR.
The utilization of QPR We'vepromoted QPR for first
responders, which is a question,persuade, refer training that
really is targeted towards howdo you do that with the first
responder population?
They are different and also howcan they help each other as
peers.
So we've promoted that.

(13:01):
Some of the things that thedifferent programs do is they're
carving out time and trainingsfor suicide prevention, not just
intervening when someone issuicidal or is making suicidal
statements.
Law enforcement officersunderstand why, because we know

(13:23):
that that's a big part ofempathy, for when you're in a
crisis situation of being ableto maybe not completely
understand what someone's goingthrough, but have some kind of
basic knowledge as to what areall the things that could push
someone to that moment of crisis, and that empathy really helps
them with with responding reallywell to individuals in crisis

(13:47):
to have patience, to give themspace to kind of talk things out
, help them kind of come out ofthe crisis at least enough to
get to the problem solving space.
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (13:59):
To deescalate.

Speaker 2 (14:00):
Yeah, to get them kind of past the peak of the
crisis.
So we're seeing a lot ofeducation, integrating this
information into trainingcourses.
But beyond that, as I mentioned, as a program locally, they're
also working with other criminaljustice and mental health
partners.
We have CIT programs that aresharing information about their

(14:21):
contacts right out in theircommunity with mental health
providers, sharing informationabout their contacts right out
in their community with mentalhealth providers, so mental
health providers can do anoutreach to folks that had
contact with law enforcement whodidn't need to go through a
crisis.
You know services, but sothey're getting follow up.
We're seeing policies andprocedures starting to be
developed that are focused onsuicide prevention and, as I

(14:44):
mentioned before, we're alsoseeing jails taking a higher
interest in suicide preventionwithin correctional facilities,
which in and of itself is kindof a standalone issue, as kind
of a microcosm issue withinsuicide prevention on the
justice side of things.

Speaker 1 (15:04):
With September being Suicide Prevention Awareness
Month, what does it mean to youto have meaningful suicide
prevention?
What does that look like at asystems level, especially for
maybe those who are justiceinvolved or with mental health
concerns?

Speaker 2 (15:22):
To me, meaningful suicide prevention is taking it
past a screening, taking it pastan assessment and looking at
what are the community-based andenvironmentally-based things
that contribute to someonehitting that point of crisis.
I mean we're talking aboutaffordable housing, you know,

(15:46):
affordable food, ability to keepjobs, ability to pay for what
their children need.
I mean there's these otherthings that are happening around
someone that the communitiescan work on to improve.
And while prevention is hardright, because there's not it's
hard to draw a direct linebetween, well, we did this thing

(16:06):
and it prevented this otherthing.
It's very hard to do that inthe prevention world, but what
we can do is put into place asmuch preventative efforts as we
can, because you never knowwhat's going to be the
prevention effort for that oneperson that it clicks with.
For some, for one person it maybe having access to a food
pantry.

(16:26):
For another person it's beingable to get their psychiatric
medications.
For someone else it's beingable to work with a family
advocate to regain custody oftheir children.
It's so diverse.
But when I think about suicideprevention while as a clinician,
I think about the work thatI've done one-on-one with

(16:47):
clients, you know, withassessment, interventions and
prevention, and you know theeducation and the awareness
piece, but I also view it in alarger sense of there's things
outside of the clinician'soffice that impacts, you know,
if someone is going to be in acrisis.
So I think of that in thatwider lens of what what going on

(17:09):
in communities can be improvedto really support people when
right, when you think of youknow good old Maslow's triangle
if you don't have thosefoundational things, it's really
hard to really do do much ofanything.
And those foundational thingsare often community-based
services, human and communityservice supports.

(17:30):
Those are the things that weneed happening out in
communities as a part of suicideprevention.

Speaker 1 (17:37):
Yeah, yeah, definitely.
We had a different episode onharm reduction and I feel like
it's those things too right Likethat.
It's just like meeting people'sreally basic fundamental needs
helps create a more tolerableenvironment.
Even if we can't get to like ahigher place than tolerable,

(17:58):
like it is something where wecan, at least we have the
ability to then keep working,absolutely yeah.
So your dissertation is sort offocused on the impact of
clients, who not sort of it didfocus on the impact of client
suicide on counselor supervisors.
What have you learned about howsuicide affects the counseling

(18:22):
profession and what kinds ofsupports are needed for them
after you know, in the aftermathof that?

Speaker 2 (18:29):
Sure, so this is going to be a long answer, so I
love long answers, kind ofbuckle in for a few minutes.
Yes, so when thinking of whatwas learned, part of my my
literature research was focusedon in general, what is the
impact of client suicide on alltypes of mental health
clinicians still focusing oncounselors and then later on
supervisors and the reality isthat it's grief.

(18:52):
It's grief and loss.
It's very comparable.
But then we as clinicians havethis added layer of perceived
responsibility I'll use thatphrasing and this perceived
responsibility comes from howthe rest of the world views our
positions.

(19:13):
You know, in society we're thehelpers.
We're there to help people makequote unquote better decisions.
You know improve their life.
You know make changes.
Hopefully those are positivechanges and I think we also get
that message a lot in ourgraduate programs and in our
training of you know we areresponsible to our clients not
for our clients, but to ourclients very muddy, as we will

(19:48):
naturally feel a sense ofresponsibility that can be
exacerbated if our peers view itas our fault or our
responsibility.
I know as a, as a clinician,survivor of suicide loss myself,
one of the first things Ithought was I shouldn't do this.
This shows I shouldn't do this,I shouldn't be a clinician and
I would overhear.
You know other clinicians saythings like I can't believe that

(20:11):
they didn't know how to handlethat situation in counseling.
So, other people were talkingabout it, having not ever worked
with that person or been a partof their situation that person
or been a part of theirsituation, so it's a lot of
grief.
It gets complicated veryquickly for clinicians.
I think for clinicians too, andsimilarly for doctors and other

(20:36):
folks within the health fieldthat are held to confidentiality
standards, there's a verynatural isolation that happens.
These are not things that youcan talk to your best friend
about these are not things youcan talk to your family about.
I was in a situation where afamily member knew about one of
the suicides and was talking tome about it and making

(21:01):
statements.
We'll go with that they had noidea that I was the last
clinician to see this person.
Yeah, so there's I thinkthere's an added layer.
I mean, being a suicide losssurvivor is isolating in and of
itself.
When your job as a layer ofisolation, it becomes really

(21:22):
difficult.
There's a lot of questioningshould, questioning of skills,
questioning of competency, andeverybody responds to that in
different ways, just as everyoneresponds to grief and loss and
trauma in different ways.
So one of the things that wealso know is being a clinician

(21:43):
survivor of suicide loss is alsoa workforce issue.
In 2016, ohio did a study theyhad a task force about this and
our Ohio Department of MentalHealth and Addiction Services
did a study of Ohio mentalhealth clinicians and the impact
of client suicide on them, andwhat they found was, you know,

(22:04):
blaming themselves, questioningof competency, questioning of
skills.
But what really stood out to mein that and I think this is
something we don't alwaysconsider when we talk about
suicide loss within our ownfield is about a third of those
individuals left the field.
Many of them considered earlyretirement.

(22:26):
Many of them moved out ofclinical work.
Some of them left the fieldcompletely.
When I was doing my dissertation, there were two participants.
Now my participants weresupervisors.
I had two participants who hadsupervisees that completely left
the field after a clientsuicide for different reasons,
but left the field because ofthe client, you know, in the

(22:49):
aftermath of a client suicide.
So this has significant impact.
It doesn't matter if you aresomeone like me who worked in
crisis and walked through thedoor with an expectation that
someone was probably going toeither die from natural causes,

(23:11):
which is very common with thosewho are severely, persistently
mentally ill and homeless.
Those two things going togetherreally shortened someone's life
.
But I also knew that someonecompleting suicide was also very
highly probable.
I walked into that fieldknowing that in my mid-20s-
Logically, knowing it one thing,experiencing it quite different

(23:34):
.
And I'm a seven-time suicideloss survivor in different
identities of my life, so itdoesn't matter if you go through
four, five, six, seven, if yougo through one.
They are impactful in their ownways, and so that was one piece
of the learning was the impact.

(23:55):
It is becoming more prevalent.
I was just in a trainingearlier today with a researcher
doing similar work to mine andwe promised to keep in touch,
where you know she's looking atdata for another country where
they're starting to estimatethat up to 50% of their mental
health clinicians will have aclient complete suicide during

(24:18):
the course of their professionalcareer.
So it's out there and it'shappening.
The other thing I learned was weneed to think about how we are
talking about suicide with ourgraduate students, yes, and our
folks that are learning andgetting ready to enter the field
and to work on it.

(24:40):
Because we have mental healthclinicians, we have our own
stigma about it because of thathelper role that we're supposed
to have and the perceptions ofthat that we hold for ourselves
and that others hold for us, andI think we need to take a hard
look at are we really talkingabout client suicide beyond?
How do you do an assessment?

(25:02):
How do you identify it?
How do you make a safety plan?
How do you make a safety plan?
How do you involve crisisservices?
We need to kind of step back andlook at the humanity of it and
the reality of this is a loss.
It may be someone who aclinician only talks to once
during intake.
That's still someone theyinteracted with that they could

(25:22):
have a loss and grief reactionto.
It.
Could be something that theyknew for years loss and grief
reaction to it, the opposite,and it could be something that
they knew for years, right,right.
So I think we as a, as a field,need to take on a little bit
more responsibility for havingvery open, transparent
conversations about what is thisreally like?
What is the possibility of thishappening at some point during

(25:43):
your career?
If you work in crisis, thatpossibility is probably going to
go up.
If you, if you work on thesubstance use and chemical
dependency side client, theprobability of a client death,
not necessarily a suicide, alsogoes up.
So there's there's just somerealities I think we need to
talk about, and talk about themin a way that are accessible.

(26:04):
I don't I don't think suicideis scary.
I talk about it often.
I talk about all client deathoften, but one of my goals with
my research and when I givepresentations about client
suicide what we could be doingin supervision and you know the
impact of any kind of clientdeath is helping it to become

(26:27):
accessible so people are willingto think about it.
As human beings we're not greatthinking about death.
It tends to be the big thing.
We deny for as long as possible, and that feeds into our work,
because we're all humans doingthe work.
But I think we have a lot ofopportunities to change course

(26:49):
on that.
The other thing I learned wassupervisors aren't really
getting a lot of education aboutthe impact of client suicide.
There's not a lot ofinformation or research
happening about how to navigatesupervision after a client
suicide and how can we bestsupport clinicians.

(27:10):
One of the standouts and itcame up on naturally on its own.
It wasn't a question I asked,but one of the other things that
I learned was the impact of howa clinician's organization
reacted to the client had hugeimpact on how they navigated it,

(27:30):
kind of what happened withsupervision.
unfortunately, most of it wasnegative, yeah, but that had
huge implications for howclinicians and supervisees and
their supervisors kind of movedforward was did the organization
have supportive policies?
Did they have an EAP to connectthem to another clinician who

(27:54):
can work with them?
On that?
Clinicians were not goodclients.
There's a professionalclinician who works with
clinicians as clients, so didthey have an EAP who helped them
with a case review?

Speaker 1 (28:11):
What was?

Speaker 2 (28:11):
the attitude kind of given towards the clinician.
So there was a lot of exploringand discussing.
Not only the supervisees youknow own individual reaction,
the supervisor's reaction alsohad a high impact on them.
If the supervisor kind offreaked out or got real anxious,
that was seen by the superviseeand impacted them.

(28:32):
But then also up to how didthey perceive the organization
reacted to?

Speaker 1 (28:38):
what happened.
And that speaks to that earlierstatement you made about like
specifically like just buildingmore conversations around it so
that we can normalize it butalso create a supportive space
where this isn't like a right it.
We're all going to feel thatinitial reaction, but like the

(29:00):
clinician, who, who is survivingthe loss, like is hearing those
you know like reactions too,and so like it might already be
on their mind, but if the systemthat they're operating in is
doing more of that, it's sort oflike I don't know, just
enforcing that belief that maybethey have.

Speaker 2 (29:22):
Yeah, and it's very common for clinicians who've
lost a client to suicide toperceive that others are blaming
them, to perceive that theirpeers are looking at them
negatively, even to perceivethat their supervisor
disappointed or upset with themas well, as then it starts to go
outward, you know, a perceiveda perception that the family

(29:44):
blames them, or that a spouseblames them, or maybe it was
something more high profile.
And how is the media treatingthat story?
Yeah, how is, you know, theindividual being portrayed?
You know, in the media all ofthat can, can enhance this
feeling of being isolated,feeling like you don't belong in

(30:10):
the counseling field anymore.
And I can attest to and thething that I say to clinicians
who are survivors of clientsuicide, and I will say this
over and over and over againbecause it was never said to me-
was.

Speaker 1 (30:28):
That person's decision does not negate all of
the incredible work you did withthem.

Speaker 2 (30:31):
Yeah, that's a conversation we need to be
having among our supervisees oursupervisors and our graduate
students.

Speaker 1 (30:43):
Yeah, wow, powerful and to your point, that you made
of, like what we're learning isa lot of clinicians and their
graduate programs are beingtrained in like risk assessment
and maybe preventative stuff tobe aware of, but like the
postvention part is very muchoverlooked.
I mean I can speak to my ownpersonal experiences like yeah,
I mean I never heard the wordpostvention in my graduate
program for context.
So tell us like how do youdefine post and why do you feel

(31:07):
like it's such an essential partof the conversation?

Speaker 2 (31:10):
Sure.
So postvention is a very broadterm.
It really it relates toactivities, interventions and
supports that happen to anyindividual that is the survivor
of a suicide loss.
So, as you can imagine, thatcan encompass a lot of things.
So from a societal side, thatcan be things like having

(31:35):
appropriate legal counsel tonavigate potentially probate
court or other things that comeup after somebody dies,
especially if they dieunexpectedly or significantly
sooner than one would think.
That can also be very concretethings.
Postvention can be a hazmatcleanup crew that has some

(31:57):
training on being appropriateand providing support while they
are going to take care ofsomething that family shouldn't
be seen or should be protectedfrom right.
So there's some very logisticalthings with postvention.
But it's also family support,it is work support.
It is a loss, obviously thatcauses grief and trauma.

(32:20):
One of the things that we oftenforget, even as clinicians, is
when someone completes suicide,it is highly likely that they're
doing it at their house orsomewhere on their property and
it is most likely that a familymember is the one who discovers
them.
So they are going to continueto live there, at least for a
while, with that new context fortheir surroundings.

(32:44):
So postvention can be evenunderstanding that when we talk
about postvention on a clinicalstandpoint, it's really looking
at providing support, providingresources, but also having the
awareness to work with anindividual on their grief, on
their loss, and recognizing itas traumatic loss and treating

(33:07):
it clinically as traumatic lossand understanding that the
unique aspects of loss andtrauma that come with being a
survivor of suicide loss it isdifferent from other types of
losses Very, yeah.
So being knowledgeable aboutthat and being able to work with
a client or a family, you know,kind of through that, I think

(33:31):
for us as clinicians it's alsoimportant to remember that we
may not be the first stop ontheir journey.
Going to therapy was not thefirst stop on my journey.
I gave a presentation with aclose friend of mine about our
two different journeys withsuicide loss and she's very good
and talks about how she wentinto therapy mostly immediately

(33:53):
and I will give my presentationand the joke is have you heard
about me going to therapy yet?
No, it's still coming.
This was really into my journeybefore I even considered doing
that.
So I think for postvention too,from the clinical sense, is to
remember that we may not besomebody's first stop.
We're probably going to belater on in the process.

(34:17):
How important peer support isfor those who've experienced
suicide loss.
To connect with other people,other family members, other
parents who have had a similarloss is very powerful and for
many of us we cannot always joinwith them in those experiences

(34:38):
in the same way that a peer can.
That's okay and that's probablya good thing.
That's okay and that's probablya good thing, and as clinicians
we should be supporting thatand making sure that our clients
are aware of those otherresources and different kinds of
supports.
That therapy might not be thedirect healing journey for them.

(34:59):
It may be a variety of thingsthat happen Right.

Speaker 1 (35:03):
Yeah, yeah.
What do you feel like are someways supervisors, or even like
counselor ed programs can do,like, or what can they do to
better prepare and supportcounselors in training,
especially like that mightexperience this type of loss?

Speaker 2 (35:20):
Sure.
So on the counselor educationside, we'll kind of start there
first, yeah, of course.
When you're looking at it fromthe academic side, in'll kind of
start there first.
Yeah, of course, thosescreening questions in an

(35:43):
initial assessment goes beyondsafety planning, goes beyond
doing risk assessments andreally talks about here's not
just prevalence but let's lookat different populations and how
this comes up.
If you want to work with theseverely persistently mentally
ill, this is how suicide kind offits in with that population.

(36:03):
If you want to work with firstresponders and law enforcement,
how does suicide fit into thatpopulation?
How does it fit into chemicaldependency work?
How does it fit intocorrectional work?
You know so, having some ofthose open conversations about
you know this, this is prevalent, it's a unique thing to
humanity.
It isn't going away and justreally opening those

(36:28):
conversations and encouragingstudents to really reflect on
what that means for them.
One of the things that waspowerful for me to realize as I
grew older and matured as aperson and in my career was that
my professional view of suicideand my personal view of suicide
can and does differ, and sothose have to be reconciled on

(36:55):
almost a daily basis.
But I will own that I havedifferent views in my
professional identity and in mypersonal identity and that took
a long time to get to, to becomfortable with that, to be
comfortable saying it, you know,to not hide it in any way or
pretend that that wasn't whatwas really happening.

Speaker 1 (37:09):
I'm so grateful you said it because I think it
speaks to our humanity ascounselors which, like I try to
do often, but like sometimes we,you know that like
perfectionistic thing comes inand says like we can't be the
human too.

Speaker 2 (37:28):
Yeah, yeah and and opening those doors to having
that reflection on.
I encourage um academicprograms to consider how, how,
how do you want to help educateyour, your graduate students,
about death and dying?
How do you want to help themreflect on their views of that
and their comfort level withwith pieces of that?

(37:49):
You know, really, look at grief, trauma and traumatic loss, uh,
counseling interventions,clinical work.
For the academic programs thatare also, you know, educating
supervisors, I think they reallyneed to take some more time in
educating supervisors about here.
Here's the impact of this.
Here are some things you can do.

(38:10):
The first step is what they'realready doing, which is learning
about it.
The second step is, insupervision, talking about it
before it happens.
Right, right, just sharing whatyou're willing to share.
In my dissertation, I encouragesupervisors to reflect on if
they feel comfortable sharingwhat they have gone through as a

(38:31):
clinical survivor of suicideloss, to share that, and one of
my participants talked aboutthey made the choice to share
that with their supervisee andthe relief that it brought for
their supervisee, how itimproved their supervisory
relationship and how it helpedthat supervisee in their healing

(38:52):
journey after going through notexactly the same scenario,
because every everyone is uniqueand different, but they were
able to see that someone theylooked up to, someone that they
respected, someone that wasseasoned in the field, had also
gone through this, you know.
So having, I think, having thatopenness to talk about it is
very important.

(39:13):
Having the openness to learningabout it is also very important
.
The openness to learning aboutit is also very important.
It's also important forindividuals to come to terms
with if they are not in a goodplace with those topics and
figuring out how you're going tonavigate forward from that.
You know, for example, many ofus in graduate school pick a

(39:36):
population, but I will neverwork with that population Right,
like we think.
We're going to have a list anda choice.

Speaker 1 (39:44):
I'm like, were you following me in grad school?

Speaker 2 (39:48):
Everybody has like their, their list of that's the
population.
I'm never, I'm never going towork with.
And sometimes you knowindividuals that are highly
suicidal is on someone's listand the reality is you're going
to you're individuals that arehighly suicidal is on someone's
list and the reality is you'regoing to see them.
Yeah, Because they'reeverywhere.
They're every socioeconomicstatus, they're in every
community, they're in everyschool.

(40:09):
You know individuals strugglingare everywhere.
That is why our entire fieldexists.
So I think that openness totalking about it, that openness
to encouraging reflection, to,like I said, it took me a long
time as a person and as aprofessional, to to to figure

(40:29):
out that dissonance for mebetween, as a professional, I
feel this and as a professional,I advocate this, and on a
personal side, I have a littlebit different view.
How can I respectfullyreconcile those and express them
in a way that is understood andthat I feel good about?

(40:51):
But that took a long time and Ididn't necessarily have a
mentor or someone, a supervisoror someone, even on the academic
side, who who was guiding that.
I had to do it kind of on myown.
I probably could have foundsomebody, I didn't.
So I, I, I, maybe I chose to dothat myself and I know what

(41:14):
that feels like.
So I think on the academic sideit's.
It's really looking at suicide,like we said, is more than
prevention there has to be.
I think recognition that thisdoes happen.

Speaker 1 (41:28):
Yeah, zoom out, but like also get specific about
some of the things that are inthat picture once we zoom out.

Speaker 2 (41:34):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely.
And then for supervisors out inthe community, again it's
talking about it, it's bringingup, you know, even concrete
things like what happens after aclient completes suicide, what
steps have to happen, what willbe tasked on the supervisor,
what will the supervisee beexpected to do, what are the

(41:54):
resources, what happens after.
And talking about that beforeit ever happens.
So it's not a surprise, it'snot.
You're not trying to take in orgive somebody new information
in the middle of a traumaticloss response.

Speaker 1 (42:12):
Again, I'm really grateful for your disclosure
because I think it's importantthat we bring humanity into the
profession and I know, if we'rereflecting on some of your other
experiences, that you spent agood amount of time helping
college students and supportingthem in crisis.
I wonder how that shaped yourunderstanding of suicide risk
and response, especially amongstthat population of younger

(42:36):
adults.

Speaker 2 (42:37):
Sure.
So in particular with,particular with with college
students.
I think what's what'schallenging for college students
is is that age and for, forthis matter of speaking, we're
going to talk about kind of yourtraditional age college
students, so we'll go to like 20, 23, 24, is that's a, if you
don't remember that time, it's arough, it's a rough couple of

(43:01):
years for most of us.

Speaker 1 (43:03):
If you saw my face, listeners my eyeballs just got
giant, because I'm like oh yeah,I'm with you there.

Speaker 2 (43:09):
And we can all connect to that.
That's a difficult time.
There's a lot of change,there's a lot of transition.
We ask as a community and a lotof our 18 to 22 year olds, when
they go to college, we'reasking them to figure out what
they want to do with the rest oftheir life.
We're taking them from a verystructured environment in high

(43:30):
school to basically no structurein college, living on their own
.
You know, like in a morecommunal environment.
There's a lot of new thathappens during that time and
then unfortunately, biologically, that time also coincides with
high risk time for the emergenceof more serious mental health

(43:51):
issues.
You know the exacerbation ofdepression, the exacerbation of
anxiety, and anxiety has takenthe lead, if you will, in more
recent research that reallyanxiety is the driving diagnosis
among that age group.
Depression's not far behind.
Because they are clinical bestfriends, anxiety is kind of the

(44:12):
lead there but also much moreserious mental illness such as
bipolar disorders.
We start seeing first episodes.
Psychosis, we start seeingfirst episodes, particularly for
males during that time period.
So there's a lot happening inthat particular timeframe.

(44:32):
For me it made me love workingwith them to see them start to
come into their own, start tounderstand themselves and make
decisions for themselves.
Many of them, when I worked atthe regional campus, were making
decisions to not just bettertheir own life but to better
their family's life.
Many of them came from poverty.

(44:52):
It was not uncommon for me tomeet with a student who, you
know, still lived at home butdidn't didn't have a bedroom.
They might be sleeping on thecouch so that other siblings can
have, can have bedrooms, or Imean they just came from very
different situations so thatthat age range, a lot, a lot is

(45:13):
going on.
You also get to start voting forthe first time, right?
I mean there's you can youcould be sent off to a war
conflict at that time.
I mean there's you can youcould be sent off to a war
conflict at that time.
I mean there's a lot that canhappen in that four to six year
period and it's it's veryconcentrated.
So there's a lot going on for.

(45:33):
For college students, yeah, andwhen you talk about, kind of
your your quote unquotenon-traditional college students
, right, individuals that mightbe older, coming back to school,
you know they have their owndifferent set of circumstances
because they may be coming backout of duress where, with
changing job markets.
They have to come back.
Yeah, they have to.

(45:54):
It's not like they're going forfun, right.
They're coming back for areason.
They're in a whole differentset of circumstances, with
probably trying to supportfamily and spouses themselves
living independently.
And then you put classes on topof that.
You know that's a that's aunique experience.
It's.
College is a unique, verycondensed experience that you

(46:16):
will never have the rest of yourlife.
Yeah, like you do when you whenyou go to college, because you
have all the regular stresses oflife plus classes on on top of
it, right?
So it's a very unique highstress time and again.
The majority of us get throughit with some of our bumps and

(46:39):
scratches, and for others, thatis the time when some real
serious stuff starts for them.

Speaker 1 (46:46):
Yeah, yeah, I couldn't help but think even
really with both non-traditionaland traditional, but like
especially with more traditionalcollege age students that it's
like not only these changes, butthat, like the expectations of
the people in their lives arechanging, like that their
parents are expecting maybedifferent behavior or things
from them and there's a lot ofpressure that comes from that.

(47:08):
I think that still can happenwith non-traditional college
students, whether it's partners,family, children, et cetera,
but that that entrance into thisstage sometimes tweaks what
your supports expect from you.

Speaker 2 (47:25):
I think one of the most fascinating things that
happens during this timeframeand we're going to go back to
the word I used earlier, whichis dissonance One of the big
dissonant things that happens isyou have been sent to college
where you are expected to be anadult, right, yes, and you're
supposed to be an adult everysingle day.
You're a big kid, you're anadult, you go do adult things.

(47:47):
The instant you set foot backinto your house, your parents
expect you to be a kid again.
Yeah, so that dynamic is alsovery unique.
Yeah, so that dynamic is alsovery unique, and it is something

(48:12):
that college students who don'tgo to live on campus experience
on a daily basis.
Where it's this conflictual.
It's conflictual pressure,pressure to be mature, pressure
to be an adult, pressure to goto college, do your chores at
home and, you know, come home bythis time and might still have
some of those kiddish,teenage-ish expectations or
restrictions placed on them aswell.
So that is also very, very hard.

Speaker 1 (48:31):
Yeah, yeah, you know, when we come back to the idea
of like the risk, especiallythat these are times when things
you know maybe are developingor emerging as we see, like
these more severe symptoms,there's a lot of stigma that
comes around like persistent andsevere, like mental illness,
but also around like suicide,and oftentimes not just stigma

(48:56):
but silence.
Yeah, and oftentimes not juststigma but silence.
It can be within a familysystem, on a college campus, in
clinical settings.
How do we break that silence in?

Speaker 2 (49:11):
responsible and healing ways, inviting
individuals that say things thatI say into spaces and promoting
.
Promoting those voices who arewilling to talk about our
experiences, are willing to kindof look at some of those topics
in our field that others couldview as being very dark or very

(49:34):
scary.

Speaker 1 (49:35):
Have the dark conversation.

Speaker 2 (49:37):
Yeah, have the dark conversation.
If you have it with me you'regonna laugh too.
So like it's okay.
But I think elevating thosestories, elevating those
questions like what you raise,like wait a second, if this is
how someone's impacted, likewhat should we be doing
differently or what shouldagency organizations and their

(49:57):
leaders be thinking about?
So I think it's inviting thevoices, because maybe someone
isn't ready to talk about itthemselves, which is fine.
Hearing someone else talk aboutit can be very powerful, even if
it doesn't change anything fortheir day to day.
But hearing someone else talkabout it and connect with

(50:20):
someone else's story and whatsomeone else is passionate about
can, can do a lot for healing,which again is why peer support
becomes such a big thing for somany different types of clients,
whether that's, you know,working through a NAMI affiliate
to, as a family, go and learnabout family to family, peer to

(50:41):
peer classes, or it's finding apeer support group, finding a
suicide loss support group.
Those all have different thingsthat they can offer us for
healing.
For us as clinicians, I thinkit's looking at again being
willing to talk about thesetopics if not willing to talk
about them, willing to listen tothis podcast as a willing to

(51:06):
take some time and just justlisten to this and reflect on it
and see what you want to dowith it.

Speaker 1 (51:13):
And so, for those of you listening, if you know
someone like that's somethingthat's this can be a resource to
be shared right.
Like that, that's somethingthat sort of gives a sense of
community around this experience.
It's heavy, right, it'semotional and it can take its
toll, as you mentioned.
Like that there are people wholeave or move out of like

(51:36):
clinical roles at minimum.
Can you speak to the emotionaltoll that this does take on
professionals and you know tothe degree you're comfortable,
whether it be in counseling orcrisis response?
Like how you personallynavigate the sustainability and
self-care of being in thesespaces?

Speaker 2 (51:56):
So as I mentioned, I might not be the best example of
taking care of oneself andaccessing appropriate resources
when things first happen, but Iown that as that was part of my
journey.
For me, part of what I share isthat in that moment that a
clinician finds out that one oftheir clients has died by

(52:18):
suicide, until you go through it, you have no idea how you're
going to react.
And one of the times when Ifound out about one of my my
clients who died by suicide, Icame in to start my shift and I
was.
I found out and I stayed inwork my whole shift and I threw
myself into that shift and Ithrew myself into every crisis

(52:41):
call, every pre-hospitalscreening.
I just threw myself intoeverything and it was after I
got home that I started having areaction.
So I had a very delayedreaction and that is often how,
even years later, should I learnof that?

(53:02):
It's still kind of a delayedreaction.
There's a little bit of shockat first and then the reaction
starts to happen, whether that'squestioning or being genuinely
sad.
Like this is a person who hasended, who has ended, and then
going through all the thingsthat I mentioned before of

(53:23):
questioning myself, questioningshould I, should I really be
doing this in this field?
Isolate it?
What I have found to be the mostbeneficial outside of finding a
good therapist is having twovery distinct groups of supports
.
The first group should be yourpeers, coworkers, supervisor,

(53:46):
academic folks, faculty peopleyou bonded with, other you know,
if you're a graduate student,other graduate students, right,
other clinicians who have gonethrough it, who can talk shop
about it and who you can havethose like I got to work through
this clinically type ofsituations right Can kind of
work through a case review or,you know, kind of do

(54:07):
consultation with you on the fly.
You know you need to have thosefriends of yours and supports
that are other clinicians youhave to.
But the other group youabsolutely have to have are
people who have no idea what wedo, that have no connection to
our field whatsoever.
None of my parents really workin this field and definitely not

(54:31):
on the crisis side of things oron the justice side of things
now, with my current position.
And I have friends who have noconnection with the mental
health field and they areimportant because they can
generally look at you and gothat sucks.

(54:51):
They can look at you and saythat wasn't your fault and they
don't have any of the clinicalbackground.
They have nothing but how theysee you and what they think of
you.
So it's very, I find, and Iencourage every clinician, every

(55:12):
supervisee I've ever had whichis hard when you're in graduate
school but to really find thosetwo groups and learn when you
need to access the differentones.
Obviously your friends andstuff like that you're not going
to tell sensitive informationto, but you can still share that
Like you had a loss rightRelated to likely they're going

(55:35):
to understand you can't talkabout it that much.

Speaker 1 (55:38):
Right.

Speaker 2 (55:39):
But they can still provide you support and what's
interesting is, in some waystheir support can feel a little
bit more pure, right?
Because, like I said, theydon't have the background and
the statistics and the stuffthat we think about.

Speaker 1 (55:51):
They're just there for you.

Speaker 2 (55:53):
You know so to me, I will always say that one of the
most important things forsupport is to have those
distinct, separate supports andaccess.

Speaker 1 (56:04):
both of them didn't have like a supervisor or peers
who really understood,professional peers.
I should say that if acounselor or crisis responder is

(56:26):
listening to this episode andthey're currently struggling
with the weight of this work ora recent loss, what would you
want them to hear or know?

Speaker 2 (56:33):
What I would say to them and I would ask them to
write it down is what I saidearlier, which is that
individual's decision does notnegate the good work that you
did with them.
It just doesn't.

Speaker 1 (56:50):
Hello there, my cat has joined the podcast, sorry.

Speaker 2 (56:55):
That's fine Good timing.
We all need a little bit ofanimal therapy.
But I would tell them, writethat down, read it, say it out
loud in your own voice.
Hearing me say it is maybepowerful for you, but hearing it
in your own voice is going tobe even more powerful because
it's you and that can be a firstresponder, a crisis worker, a

(57:20):
clinician.
It doesn't matter.
That individual's choice, thedecision they made, does not
negate everything that you didwith them.

Speaker 1 (57:34):
I love that We'll all be walking around with little
cue cards, right, likeeveryone's writing, writing that
down.
You know, I think we've alreadytouched on like that.
This is emotional and it isheavy and it's something that
you know.
Challenge maybe isn't enough ofa word, something that you know

(58:00):
.
Challenge maybe isn't enough ofa word, right to describe it,
but what gives you hope in thistype of work, especially when
we're talking about suicideprevention and healing across
these complex systems likemental health and criminal
justice.

Speaker 2 (58:11):
So one of the things that helped me regain hope, in
particular, after the firstsuicide loss that I that I
navigated, which and this is thefirst professional one there
was one when I was, when I wasyounger, but this, this was 16
year old and this is a young kid.
You know that that's a lot oflayers to deal with.

(58:33):
I was, you know, in my midtwenties I was young into my
career to deal with.
I was, you know, in my midtwenties, I was young, into my
career.
But even at that kind ofyouthful age and maturity in my
career please read that as stillbeing immature within my career
was I sat down and I don't knowwhat's motivated me to do this,

(58:53):
but I sat down and I lookedback at all my other cases me to
do this.
But I sat down and I lookedback at all my other cases, all
those other names, and I wasable to see that, while this
loss was absolutely tragic, itwas very sad, there were also a

(59:13):
very long list of other peoplethat I had interacted with that
didn't have that outcome.
You know that had gottenthrough a crisis, we'd gotten
past the period, maybe that youknow they got hooked up with
services, not even necessarilycounseling services.
Maybe they got hooked up with aresource that they needed and
that alleviated their crisis.

(59:36):
And I did that periodicallythrough my career, because when
you're early in your career andyou have an experience like a
client lost by suicide, youdon't always have a lot of other
experience to kind of weighagainst that, if you will, if
you will.
But it is important to rememberthat there are a lot of other

(01:00:02):
people on that other list.
Even if you don't know exactlywhat happened with them, you
know that you interacted withand didn't have this outcome.
And while that might seem insome ways a little cold, because
you're looking at numbers andnot necessarily you know the
experience, I think it can behelpful to kind of regain hope,

(01:00:24):
to remember and see veryconcretely in front of you yes,
this tragedy happened.
And there are all these othertimes that I worked with someone
and that wasn't the outcome.

Speaker 1 (01:00:35):
Yeah, yeah.
I think sometimes that visual,making things visual, is helpful
, even if, though, it maybeseems like, oh, this is just
numbers or data.
It's like, well, that'simportant data.

Speaker 2 (01:00:48):
That's important too, yeah, yeah, for me, continuing
to pursue this work and, youknow, kind of uncovering my
passion and my PhD work forunderstanding client suicide,
client loss through suicide andthe impact on clinicians and

(01:01:08):
what we as supervisors can dobetter like that also, you know,
instills hope with me, becauseI see things we could do
differently and I see peopledoing things differently.
That, also, on the morelong-term, you know, gives me a
lot of hope in my currentposition.
What gives me hope is seeingthese other systems that you

(01:01:31):
know if you've been, if you'veworked in the field for you know
a couple decades, you knowthese aren't always systems that
agree, these aren't alwayssystems that aligned, and the
reality is we're all trying todo the same thing.
And so what gives me hope isseeing, you know, the criminal
justice system very activelywanting to do better for

(01:01:54):
individuals with mental illnessthat are that are, you know, to
do better for individuals withmental illness that are moving
through their system, activelyseeing schools want to do
something different with youthLaw enforcement, want to have
different outcomes with peoplethat experience a crisis or
families that experience acrisis Just that desire, even

(01:02:15):
though it can take a very longtime to have systemic change.
Seeing the individuals comingtogether in different
communities all around the stateand wanting to have different
outcomes, wanting to see suicideprevention, wanting to see good
care and treatment availabilityfor those with mental illness,
that gives me a lot of hope.

Speaker 1 (01:02:36):
Yeah, that is promising for those with mental
illness.
That gives me a lot of hope.
Yeah, that is promising.
So we ask this last question onevery episode of our interview
format podcast.
So the name of our podcast isOhio Counseling Conversations
and we just like to know fromour guests what important
conversations do you thinkcounseling professionals should
be having with each other and ortheir clients in our state?

(01:02:58):
It can be what we've alreadytalked about.
It can be something entirelydifferent.
I'm going to toss it back toyou, dr M.
What do you think?

Speaker 2 (01:03:06):
I think there's so many conversations.
I think, at my core, though, Iwas thinking about this question
leading up to today, and thefirst thing that popped into my
mind was I think we really needto be talking about how to be
inspiring for each other in ourwork and how to realistically

(01:03:29):
support our field.
How to sustain our field, howto sustain graduate students as
they're entering this field.
I think inspiration ofindividuals to work in our field
, with us as our partners, asour peers, you know, shoulder to
shoulder in the work out incommunities.

(01:03:51):
So I think we really need tohave conversations about how do
we want to inspire not just ourfield that's already out there
doing the really hard work.
How do we also inspire othersto join us?

Speaker 1 (01:04:09):
I love that.
That.
That's incredible.
No notes, so so, so good.
No, I think that that justspeaks to something that gosh I
don't know that I could have putit any better, but yes, yes, I
like all the snaps.
Yeah, how do we get people tojoin us?

(01:04:30):
That's incredible.

Speaker 2 (01:04:33):
And how do we show?
Like I mentioned earlier aboutwhen I worked at a college, I
was lucky enough to attendgraduation right every semester,
yeah and to see those successes.
I think we need to share witheach other more about those

(01:04:53):
successes and we need to sharethe stories about and I try to
do this with law enforcementwhen I have the opportunity to
to tell stories that remindeveryone that those with
persistent and severe mentalillness are just as human as the
rest of us.
They're not any different inthat way.

(01:05:15):
One of my favorite stories isof an individual.
This happened a very long timeago and part of their symptoms
was when they started todecompensate, and this sometimes
happened even when they weretaking their medication.
We know that over time, bodieschange.
Medication doesn't have thesame effect.
This happens.

(01:05:36):
But when they started todecompensate, they would
experience that there weremultiple worlds kind of
happening at the same time, andone of the really scary worlds
was a was a world of cannibals.
So they would experience, youknow hearing people, you know
getting attacked and and so, orthat they would smell people
getting cooked.
It was very graphic for them.
So we were having thisexperience and they came up to

(01:05:59):
the crisis center that I wasworking at and I was there with
another worker just two of usand they come up and they knock
on the door and we let them inbecause we know them, like,
we're there, we're very familiarwith, and they come in.
We can see that they're upset.
We asked them you know what'sgoing on and they're telling us.
You know what they're hearing,what they're smelling, what

(01:06:19):
they're seeing, and in themiddle of describing this to us,
and they're very animatedbecause it's very upsetting what
they're experiencing.
So I wanted to make sure youguys were okay.
So, even in the middle of thatexperience, they had the insight
to come to a place that theyknew was safe, that they knew

(01:06:42):
the people there would help tokeep them safe, and they also
had a caring towards you know,wanting us to be okay, making
sure we weren't getting hurt,you know.
So I think we need to sharethose stories and we need to
share the stories of what we'veexperienced in the successes
with clients, and success for aclient looks different, and I

(01:07:05):
think it's okay to tell thosestories to our younger
clinicians and our graduatestudents.
For some clients, thosesuccesses might seem objectively
kind of low, but for them itmeans a lot and I think those
will help with that, that ideaof inspiration.
And you know, we, our, ourfield, doesn't really get the

(01:07:27):
best representation out in theworld on the news.
Yeah, there's not an abundantlypositive view of our field, and
so I give.
I think there's not anabundantly positive view of our
field, and so I think there'sreal testament to be given to
graduate students who may nothave a lot of exposure to other
you know representations andpersist in coming to school and

(01:07:50):
they want to work in this field.
And I think we have a lot ofopportunities to inspire and
show the positive impact thatour work has with very large
amounts of people and when weneed to use that information for
ourselves to balance out whenthings don't have the outcomes
we're hoping for as well.

Speaker 1 (01:08:11):
Yeah Well, this has been just a wealth of all that
knowledge that you'vecontributed and I just want to
say you're such an asset to theprofession, and Ohio counselors
especially.
We're so grateful for youhaving this conversation, and I
think you're inspiring people byhaving this conversation with

(01:08:31):
us.
So thank you so much, dr M.
We're happy to have you.
Thank you for having me much, drM, we're happy to have you.
Thank you for having me.
Yeah, we hope we will have youall share this conversation with
your other professionalcolleagues so that we can keep
that inspiration and the supportand conversations about the
tough stuff too, going.

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Conversation 33 - The Impact of Client Suicide on Professional Counselors

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Conversation 33 - The Impact of Client Suicide on Professional Counselors