Brett and Larry's Podcast #4 with Pastor Eric and Karen Smith (Ep 561)

Pastor Eric Smith and his wife Karen witnessed firsthand the suicidal act of a young man on the Coronado Bay Bridge last week. This podcast will tackle the complex issue of suicide.

Episode Transcript

(00:06):
Hello everyone, It's Thursday at fivepm and you're on the Brett and Larry
podcast show on IQ Podcasts. We'rehappy to be with you tonight. We
got you know, when we starteda podcast, right Brett, we didn't
want to have like real heavy subjects, but sometimes you got to do it.
So we've been doing our sewage thing, and tonight we got another kind

(00:28):
of heavy subject. But we're alreadygetting compliments from people that are happy we're
going to tackle this. So ourguests tonight are pastor Eric Smith and his
wife Karen Smith, and tell thepeople what we're going to talk about.
So you're right, we don't liketo tackle issues that are very dark,
but unfortunately there's a lot of thatgoing around. And I think with the

(00:50):
film that we all were we workedon there, the executive producers of course,
and thank you for your support,yes, because it really added a
lot more to the film. It'sour pleasure. I think it was all.
It was all the right reason.Somebody's like the other day said you
know you did it. It cameup to me, you did a really
good job on the film, Isaid, stop. I said, first
of all, the reason that filmworked was because we had a phenomenal team.

(01:12):
Everybody had something they brought to thetable and it made it what it
was. So it was a teameffort to make that film Pastor Eric and
Karen really so, I think.But because of that film will segue into
the subject. I think what happenedwas we we found that. I mean
that, I mean, you're verytrustworthy and Corneto, everybody trusts you.

(01:37):
Nobody knows who I am. Theydo now because when they see me,
they're like, oh, you're thebig dump and I'm like thanks, that's
a true story, and everybody,of course laughs. But we've developed no
nonsense trust within our own community andI think even abroad with topics that I
think that we've got that we doveinto. So one of these topics,

(02:00):
of course, we're going to talkmore about this in your experience. It's
about suicide and the suicide rate that'shappening on the bridge in Cornado. Yep.
That's where we're going to tackle tonight, folks. Tough stuff. So
why don't we start with Eric orKaren and tell our audience listeners what happened

(02:20):
eight days ago on a Wednesday night, Ash Wednesday and Valentine's tell Okay,
well, I think I'll tackle thisfor you. So we were on our
way to our ash Wednesday service withour faith community here in Coronado. Eric
and I live in La Mesa,and so we were coming over the bridge.

(02:43):
The car in front of us,a little sporty thing, began to
slow and then eventually stopped directly infront of us. A young man got
out. He had put on hisflashers. He moved to the front of
his car, real, oh,maybe he's having some car problems, and

(03:04):
instead of lifting his hood, helooked over the side, put his foot
on and jumped. It all tookabout six seconds. Wow. It was
horrifying, horrifying. We didn't believewhat we were seeing. No, and
so we managed to go around.Of course, I was a mess and

(03:25):
you will be for the rest ofyour life. Yes, yes, yeah,
my child psychologist daughters insisting that Ispeak with someone because these things do
stay with you. You know,it's very very difficult. I mean I
do replay the film, you know, that sort of thing. But ultimately
what happened was we managed to getover the bridge and pull off, and

(03:50):
Eric contacted the police and we gavethem as much description and everything that had
gone on as we could, andthen thankfully, actually it was a blame
thing that we were headed to bewith our faith community because we needed that.
We needed that in that moment,and certainly the the concept of the
Ash Wednesday service, the imposition ofashes took on a deeply profound meaning that

(04:15):
evening the it so stunning, itdoesn't begin to describe it. But to
I guess what impacted me so muchwas the sense of this of a human
being, the spirit of a humanbeing, UH, who was in such

(04:39):
pain. Obviously to me that insuch pain to uh to take his own
life is uh, it's it's likethe universe got rocked. I don't know
it, uh to to be awitness to that, I know there are
terrible things that happened in the worldall around all all the time. But

(05:00):
to be right right there, Imean we were, we were riping,
we were feet away from him,and and then to watch this and then
to realize what had just taken placeand uh, and let that allow that
impact to hit It was like it'slike we watched Oppenheimer not too long ago,
and they talked about the residual wavesthat came in after a bomb went

(05:24):
off. It's like that. Itwas like a soldier in war. Really,
You're like, so, you know, here's the thing. Knowing both
of you and I believe that thingswould happen by accident, don't happen to
you. They happened for you.As sad as that situation is. You
are the two individuals that then youknow what I'm probably going to say,

(05:46):
I want to finish what I'm saying. Well, they got everybody we know,
all our friends, all the peopleat the Coronado Community Church now to
focus on this subject. Eric andKaren have statistics, statistics which maybe you'll
go over a little bit. Surepeople, Sure, And so that's part
of it. They're making the subjectgo. That's that's part of it.
And and I I'm sorry that ifI always so aggressive when I go after

(06:12):
things or see things, because Idon't mean to be that way. But
you guys have also taught me toget more involved with my feelings. When
I put the sewage and you know, you and I talked about it.
We didn't want to be those wedidn't want to make that our thing absolutely,
but you said, well maybe youhave to be. It seemed to
have presented itself, put itself inyour path at that time, and so

(06:33):
there you go. So I thinkI don't think that this is an accident
either. I think if two peoplehad an impact on getting the message out
and really really helping solidify why itisn't happening, why it's going to take
till twenty twenty seven, I thinkwhen we're averaging, I heard you were
from two to three jumpers a week. That's what we've been told. We

(06:55):
we just I just had to goout and collect information as quickly as I
could. That was sort of myway of processing things there. And I
found out that suicide rate has goneup thirty six percent in the last fifteen
years. Well, that's that's ahuge number of people. There's a there
is a suicide taking place in thiscountry every eleven minutes, every eleven minutes.

(07:20):
And the thing with our bridge,you know, the thing with the
San Diego Cornetta Bridge, is it'sit's too easy. You know, if
somebody's got a difficult they're in adifficult time in life, and all of
us have difficult times in life whenwe just aren't sure which way is up,
how things are going. Well,I was listening to one researcher talk

(07:41):
about about suicide prevention, he said, there are those people among us who
have a leaning just by our genetics, or by by who we are,
the way that we're made, ourchemistry, we would lean more easily toward
being affected by big events in ourlives. And when one of those big
events comes along, like you losea job, or your economic force changes,

(08:05):
or your your breakup with your withyour wife or with your honey,
and and it's a final kind ofthing. All of those kinds of things
can pour somebody to a point wherethey're in so much mental pain that they
don't think beyond. They don't thinkthere's any way to get out of that
pain, and so you know,off they go, Well, the Cornado

(08:26):
bridge is too easy, if anything, as a step for step over the
edge, and he's gone, justlike that, just like that. So
the people who try to talk thepeople down, which sometimes happened, it
didn't happen in this incident, whatdo you think they say to the people,
what would you guess? Wait?Stop, I mean by other stuff

(08:48):
like think of your parents, thinkof you're with your friend. You know,
I really think it's situational. TheI mean, I would love to
tell you there's a program for this, but I I think you just start
talking and get their attention and whateverit takes here to be engaged in conversation
and then say, you know,why are you here? What can what

(09:09):
can I do? I care aboutyou. We may not have met before,
but I care about you. Idon't want you to do this anything
that you can do. This isactually something that I thought about quite a
bit since witnessing this, and becausethe agony for both of us, I'm
sure being right there that close thatthere was absolutely no time. There was

(09:31):
no time to even open the door. You were prepared, there was no
not at all. And since thenI keep thinking, had there been time,
if only, that's the if onlyfeeling that you have. Had there
been time, what would I havesaid to this young man? And the
only thing that I could come upwith as soon as I would have opened
that door would have been, youare loved. Don't do this. You

(09:54):
are loved, I love you,don't do this. Well. Pastor Eric
said that next time he sees it, if it happened, happened again,
immediately, he's going to jump outof the car. He's going to say
no, there's not there. He'sup. I told that's for me,
that that was for the congregation,that's for all of you who are listening
right now. If you see acar stop on the bridge, get out
there right away. Don't assume thatthey are not jumping off the bridge until

(10:18):
they convince you they're not jumping offthe bridge, because there's just not time
just go do that. So let'slook at one thing about what you're saying.
Uh, if somebody is that desperateto do something like that, what's
going to stop him? If there'sstop that time for finding another way of
doing it again. Well, allwhat I think is that we're constantly in

(10:41):
change. We're constantly changing our thoughtsgo through our mind. We don't we're
not in stasis. We're in constantmovement. They you know, are,
everything's moving all the time. Whatyou think right in this moment is not
what you're going to be thinking fiveminutes from now. And what somebody thinks
when they're standing on the bridge thatthey're going to go off. Give them
thirty minutes and they're gonna be thinkingsomething different than what they're thinking right and

(11:03):
then doesn't mean if somebody really decidesto do themselves in and can't let go
of that idea. There's really notmuch that can be done to stop them.
However, I think I don't knowhow many. I don't know what
the statistics on that are, butI'm certain that not everybody. It becomes
it becomes a moment of opportunity.You know, I'm on this bridge here,

(11:24):
it's easy to do this. Ican go there do this. You
know, it's simple. I knowthere's no mess afterward for people. I
mean, all this kind of allthe crazy kind of thinking you can if
you take away the easy part ofthis, it slows everything down and people
tend to start thinking differently with moretime. I would like to share that

(11:48):
that a woman actually reached out tome, because you guys all know Wayne
Strickland, who's here in Coronado andhas in years past done this bridge memorial
service, which he, by theway, is going to be doing again
in June June ninth and uh tohonor or to remember these souls who you

(12:13):
know under the bridge or near thebridge. So so there was a so
I was commenting on that, youknow, on his page and so forth,
and we were in conversation and thena woman reached out to me and
asked if she could direct message me, and I said, she said,

(12:35):
because I was a friend of hisand she was from l A. And
I said, of course you can. So she wrote to me and I
gotta tell you, boy, thiswas This was difficult because her thing was,
this has been bugging me. Canyou please tell me, if possible?

(12:56):
Did he what did he look likehe'd been crying? Was he angry
or or or was he just determined? What was his demeanor? And so
I had to think about that.I thought, Oh, I don't you
know you were close enough to seeif he was crying? Well pretty close?
We yes, we were close,but he had sunglasses on, and

(13:18):
so I had to say, well, unfortunately, there you know, I'm
sorry to say there was no time, he took no time. He was
very decisive and it's to his demeanor. I can't tell you because he had
sunglasses on. But she she's toldme that this guy as a young guy,

(13:43):
very she's called him a bit naivebut a really sweet soul, right,
and that this is so totally outof the ordinary anything he would do.
Yeah, they were good friends,and but she also shared that he
does have or did have an issuewith depression, and that his medication had

(14:05):
been changed two days before this.Now he drove down here from La really
to do it on the corner break. I don't know if that was his
purpose, but it kind of seemsthat way. You know, his family
is actually Eric was able to I'lllet you address that. No. I

(14:26):
talked with his brother in law becauseI don't think his sister was able to
have the conversation, but they're inVirginia. We connected and were able to
talk. Well. I think wecould say I think it would be all
right for us to mention his firstname. Could we could do that?
His name is Keith, Yeah,and talk to Keith's brother in law who
related it all and we and thenKaren talked to the friend, and you

(14:50):
know it just I feel I feelthis this bond with this person and was
so eight days agoing in know theguy right all And now you're oh,
yeah, interesting. So what doyou think out of this tragedy? What
can come out of it in someway? Because both the two of you
are very good at finding ways tosolve just try to combat issues. Is

(15:13):
there something you want to do morewith this or do you want to tell
you. I tell you the mainthing right now is there needs to be
the preventative net or whatever it isthey're going to put on the bridge.
Okay, I can't. Yesterday istoo long, Okay, I mean,
what's a human life worth? Right? Right? How many more if we
wait till twenty twenty seven and there'san average of two to three a week?
How many lives is that? Youthink? Well? Who was it

(15:35):
said that? There? Maybe youtold me this honey about that there were
an average of four hundred deaths offthat bridge every year. And the thing
is, I shared this with somefriends of mine right when I was when
after this happened, you know,I was with some friends and we were
talking about it, and they said, you know, you said that,
But I looked in the paper.I didn't see anything, and I said,

(15:56):
you won't. You won't see anything. They don't advertise it, they
don't. And so these people,these people who are in pain and who
are suffering, who make this momentarybad choice. Uh, they are basically
forgotten just like that. And they'renot you know, their names are not

(16:18):
mentioned. They're not there's Wayne Strickland'snot forgetting them. No, no,
thank goodness. No, but world. Part of the part of the problem
is this is one of those thingswe don't talk about. Well, it's
very comfortable for a lot of people. It's very it is. But the
only way to get comfortable with it, which we don't want to get,
you know, I don't I don'tmean too comfortable, but but to be

(16:40):
able to have the conversation is tohave conversations about it, like we're doing
right now. Uh. It's it'shard to find the words to say here's
what I think, here's what Ifeel about this, and then to imagine
yourself. You know, I wantto know have you ever had suicidal thoughts?
I'm not talking about a victim,I'm just talking about anybody. I

(17:00):
want to know about people in thecongregation, about people around town that I
mean, have you ever had suicidalthoughts? Well, some people have some
I think everybody probably has to alittle bit. But some people have had
big thoughts about it, and othershave thought, oh, that's really not
something that I would do that,but they thought about it. I don't
think I ever did. Yeah,I mean I had low points, but

(17:23):
not like suicidal thinking. I don't. So I'm humble to talk it,
and I've talked to you about this. I tried to kill myself at one
time. I tried to It wasI was in my mid twenties, and
so I understand a little bit aboutLuckily the bullet didn't come out of the

(17:44):
gun. I heard the click,and the bullet never came out. WHOA,
I was ready to go. Andso there's an area where when you're
so in such a dark area andthere was no drugs involved. It was
after watching a family member sold mygrandfather solely pass away until we were taking
care of him, and then Iwent into this really deep depression because I
had never gone through something like thatand I really loved him. And then

(18:07):
when he left, I saw peoplefighting over his things before he was even
buried. I just went into areally dark area and I didn't know any
way out. So I have alittle bit of an idea. And I
lived on the streets for about ayear. Yes, so I have a
little bit of an idea. Youknow, I'm not an but I can
I can feel why it would behard for some people to say, you

(18:29):
know, I can't do this anymore. This happened before you met her,
right, I was only twenty five. Okay, Sarah, lucky, you're
here to the greatest in the world, Brett's White. So I saved his
life. I don't feel no,she did. There's no question she hasn't.
She saved me many other times withother things. That's another story,
other subjects, but right, butit's not something I'm proud of to met.

(18:52):
But I don't think that was anaccident either, And I think that
it gave me insight to be ableto help other people. So if there's
a way we can utilize what we'retalking about today to reach out and figure
out whether it's getting the netting completedfaster than twenty twenty seven, which I
don't know what the answer is tothat. But you know what's nice about
that, We were never ever lookingto be the ones to give the answers.

(19:17):
We always wanted to be the catalystand putting people together to help through
a think take type think take typeenvironment where all these great minds and we
have great minds in Cornado, Yesto come together and say, okay,
well and maybe we'll hear something wehaven't thought about. But honestly, they're
I rely believe that there needs tobe a faster process. And I don't
know what that means. I heardsomething last night that I never thought about.

(19:40):
Throw it out a second, almostdone, but another few minutes.
So barriers. So I told personthat, you know, why would they
spend money for barriers when people havesaid the guys was a lost sully?
Would it did it somewhere else?That kind of stuff. So, you
know what the person told me,It's not just for the victim, it's
for all cars of inconvenience for hoursand hours. It's it's like if there

(20:03):
was a problem with some kind ofsecurity, they can't get through, if
there's problems happening with fires or allkinds of different and I never thought of
it. I go, So it'snot just money spent for the victims,
it's for like the whole the goodof the hole. And when we came
back over the bridge two and ahalf hours later, the police cars were

(20:26):
still there. Thanks, We're stillback down. So I have I have
an idea that just came to me, And it sounds kind of crazy,
but it just came to me.There should be some some type of barrier
or an individual or individuals in acenter and in some type of small unit
where they're sitting where they're able towatch things react really quick, where they
can stop the person and you know, either with a combination of cameras,

(20:48):
something there that can automatically, youknow, push that button or whatever it
is to say, you know,there's somebody getting ready to get out,
or maybe they have some way ofmaybe even it's a police maybe the police
devistation there, some kind I don'tknow what, but I mean something that
reacts quick. So we got togo. We're getting close to going.
So I want a closing remark fromPastor Eric and a closing remark from Karen

(21:11):
on this or anything you want totell our audience, well, having gone
through this particular experience, it's andlisten, everybody goes through traumatic things once
in a while. This was newto me watching someone actually take their life,

(21:32):
and I I'm grieving with his family. I feel all of the things
with his family and his friends,and I just hope that what we're talking
about today ends up ends up beinga catalyst to make things happen a little

(21:52):
more quickly for the kind of supportand protection that we needed the bridge.
I think thank you. I thinkabout this in a theological way, I
can't help myself with that. Butthere's a famous theologian of the twentieth century
who said, we're not human beingshaving a spiritual experience. We're spiritual beings

(22:14):
having a human experience. And thevalue that God, the universe, whatever
you want to call the grit,the spirit, the force, all of
the how, whatever name you wantto attach to all that places immense value
on every human life. That's whywe're here and we need to do that
too. That's what I want todo. Well. I thought this was

(22:37):
great and we had to do it. You couldn't have two better people than
Pastor Eric and Karen's the Cornado CommunityChurch. Great, great place. I've
been searching for something like that mywhole life. One or two quick things,
real quick. Karen found an articleabout the Big dump and about the
sewage that says one hundred million gallonsbillion a hundred billion billion folks came in

(23:03):
in five years. Right. That'samazing. So we want to keep you
guys up to date a little biton the sewage every week. The other
thing I want to mention is thatthe Padres were playing today Brett Dog Listen,
Yeah, Padres and the Dodgers.So I get it out. It's
like one ten right on the head, and I say, I want to
see if the game's on. SoI open up the Union Tribune. It
says they're on at one ten onESPN, so I turn it on right

(23:26):
away. I got like the firstpitch. So Musgrove is pitching. He
can't get the four first, fouror five guys out. He pitches twenty
four pitches to take him out ofthe game. Bottom line, the Padres
lost to Day fourteen to one.So I don't know, folks, you
got to get him better. So, yeah, you did that. Surprise
you, Yeah, surprise me.Surprised me. The Dogs probably one of

(23:47):
no they have one of the bestrights, one of the best lineups in
Major League Baseball. Real quick runsrunning for Republican Central Committee. The election
is on March fifth. He isa tremendous candidate. I think he has
a great political future ahead of him, right, I mean, he's really
good. So it was really nice. Is last night at the event at
Labello's Pizza and Schula Vista where Igrew up with a lot of people from

(24:11):
elementary school showed up that I hadn'tseen it in a while. People within
the community showed up and I hadRepublicans, Democrats, and Independence at that
event because they know that I workwith I try to work with everybody,
but there needs to be a lotof improvements. And one thing we need
to improve on is learning how tolearn how to respect each other again and

(24:32):
be kind and say, well,you don't agree on this, but let's
work on these problems together. SoI think that's that's kind of what the
seat's going to be for me,bringing people together. March fifth, or
for Brett or for Brett real quick, if you want to read my book,
Directions to a Happy Life is onAmazon. You can buy it on
Amazon. You get it like ina day. I love that book.
Leary one of my favorite. It'sone of my favorite books. And Brett

(24:56):
talk about your training and then givehim a closing word they really have enough
time? Yeah, we got that, I and then give him some clothes
wisdom. My background, of course, was fitness at one time. Still
apparently is people remember me for that, and they're rememory for other things,
of course, but there's something abouttaking somebody that's challenged mentally and physically and

(25:18):
finding a way to bring those twothings together and help them become stronger and
better. So I think that's whypeople continue to reach out. I've had
families where I've trained the great grandmother, the grandmother, the daughter, the
daughter's daughter. I've had four orfive generations of family members that I've worked
with. That's how old I'm getting, Ampy trails again. Till we meet
again. Final wisdom for everyone,Remember it's not what you say, it's

(25:44):
how you say it. Very good, Thanks, thanks Karen, thank you
great. See you next Thursday,five o'clock. Brett and Larry's podcast on IQ podcast