♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ speaker: It's like I never had any normal-- speaker: It's like, it's hard to explain.

Nicole Halvorsen: Yeah, people want suicide grief to follow a pattern or follow a--you go through the 12 steps of grief in an hour, every hour, every day.

So, like, somebody told me that the grief from suicide is, "Oh well, it's closer to grief from homicide," and I'm like, "No, 'cause then there isn't anybody you can even be mad at, you know?

I mean, it's not the healthiest, but at least then you have somebody that you can shake a fist at in the night, you know, kind of a thing.

But it's like, when it's your loved one, what the hell are you gonna do, you know?

You can't be mad at them.

So, I don't know, anyways.

♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ Virgil Moorehead: You know, Humboldt County is roughly a six hour drive from San Francisco, right on the beautiful Pacific Ocean coastline.

It takes a while to get from one place to another.

That's all windy roads to get to Hoopa, windy roads with often road construction to get to Orleans, to get to Klamath.

This is just an example of, I think, the open space, the ruralness, of Humboldt County, and it's isolated from any major city.

I think the closest city, bigger city, is Redding which is a three and a half hour drive from McKinleyville, or Santa Rosa, four and a half hour drive.

So, remote.

[wind blowing] [wind blowing] [wind chimes tinkling] Frankie Wruck: My name is Frankie.

I'm 18 years old.

I live in Humboldt County in California.

Stacy Whitley: She was my partner.

I was a stay-at-home mom until I divorced when she was about six and we did everything together.

And even after divorcing, we, you know, we'd pack up in our van and we were all over the county.

She was my shadow and the love of my life and the bane of my existence, all rolled into one because that's what kids are.

Before middle school, she's very brave and she was pretty outspoken.

She was independent and funny, smart, and quick.

She's quick on her feet.

There was never a dull moment.

We always had a great time.

Frankie: Like, even though she never told me how much we were struggling financially, I could tell, like, we went from living in a two-bedroom house to living in this tiny room.

There was no heat, no running water, all that fun stuff, no separate rooms, just maybe about, like, as big as the room we're in right now.

That was where we lived.

I felt, like, very alone.

Felt like no matter what I did, I felt like I always stood out, I could never fit in, and that all took a big toll on me.

I felt like, "Well, if I'm not gonna be good enough then why bother, like, continuing?

I know no matter what I do, I'll never be able to prove myself, so why even try?"

Stacy: I definitely started to notice changes in middle school.

Instead of wanting to go into a store and, "Mom, I can do it on my own," you know, she wanted me to be right beside her and she wanted me to do all the talking.

A lot of issues with anxiety, and I think eventually the anxiety led to depression.

Frankie: I wasn't sure at the time, like, I knew logically it was a good idea.

I was just scared about opening up to someone 'cause so many times when I had tried, I had been shut down because my dad thought, like, "Oh, it's just your friend group, like, you're just trying to fit in.

You're not actually experiencing these.

You just wanna fit in with this group of friends you have."

Like, to an extent, yeah, I wanted to fit in with them, but I was also feeling very real feelings and very-- really struggling.

Lea Nagy: ACE scores, which stands for Adverse Childhood Experiences, is a survey that you can take, anyone can take, online.

It's a matter of points and then you add up the points to figure out how much risk factors are in your life.

For instance, if you're a kid from divorced parents or you've been abused or anything, all these different categories, you score, there's been many reports lately that the ACE scores in Humboldt County have really escalated and, of course, we know and the research proves that the higher the ACE score, the more mental health challenges individuals have.

Humboldt County is really high in kids with issues.

That's why we really wanna help these foster kids that age out and other, you know, transgender kids.

They need all the support they can get.

♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ Nicole: My name is Nicole Halvorsen.

I was born and raised in Humboldt County and I lost my brother, Chase, to suicide in January of this year.

He was a dreamy kid, you know.

I think I brought it up in his obituary when I wrote it, you know.

When he went to T-ball, his whole focus was go in the outfield, pick all the grass, stick it underneath my baseball cap, because that'll die my hair green.

And I mean, he just was a sweet little boy, smart, but not in ways that traditional schooling super likes, right?

So, he would finish all of his class work and then be drawing in the margins or he could take apart his radio and put it back together with almost all of the pieces, you know?

But then, having to read out loud in class wasn't really his thing.

I think he struggled in school a little bit, but he always had enough of a sense of humor that he kind of skated by, I feel like.

Virgil: Most tribal organizations have a department of their tribe or their organization that focuses on suicide prevention.

And I think we've done a really good job of preventing and, at the same time, we know that within rural communities such as ours, within Humboldt County, there is elevated rates of suicide, but I think that we're on the right path.

Nicole: So, we kind of exist in this in-between place, right?

Because we are more Shasta than we are Karuk.

The Shasta tribe is not federally recognized.

So, I, for instance, am enrolled as a tribal member with the Karuk tribe, but we weren't involved with the community of the tribal members growing up.

And so, and like, my grandpa, for instance, never signed up for the tribe.

He didn't want, you know, he grew up in Mount Shasta where being Native American was--you were a second class citizen.

Virgil: Sometimes, lack of opportunities.

I think that there can be a tendency to encounter more sort of structural systemic issues such as poverty, such as lack of resources, that increases your likelihood of feeling despair, which is loneliness, lack of purpose, lack of meaning, and in many rural communities, that existential despair often is more intense.

Lea: The main resiliency factor for our kids is one adult that will be that kid's mentor.

It could be the school janitor, it could be an uncle, but research has shown that if a child has just one person that monitors them and cares about them, and connects with them, that can make a huge difference.

And you hear success stories all the time of these kids-- people that have overcome all kinds of difficulties and actually are amazing.

But part of it is because they've had somebody that cared.

Nicole: My mom left when I was ten.

It actually was the first time our bio dad had hit my brother across the face hard enough to leave a mark, and so she left him, which was great.

We were homeless for a little while, couch-surfing.

We slept on--in sleeping bags in, you know, empty rentals and stuff for a long time.

When I was 13, my mom married our stepdad who was a great influence and then we were able to move to his beautiful house in Bayside which was old, but it was fun.

It was like an old farmhouse.

And so then I had a big shift because I went from being the second adult in the family, right, until now I've got all these rules and regulations and lights out by 9, and I think Chase kind of had trouble with that shift too.

He did okay until, you know, he moved out of the house and was kind of on his own and then his drinking got really bad.

He was always telling me, like, "Well, don't worry about me, like, you've got your own stuff going on.

Like, don't worry about me."

And so he would really downplay the situation a lot.

And as long as he had an apartment to live in, which he did, with a good friend from high school for a long time, he kind of kept it together.

But once that roommate moved out, then Chase didn't get another roommate in and then chose to leave the apartment or got kicked out, I'm not sure, it really took a downhill, you know.

He was homeless in Arcata and he was drinking so heavily that I got a phone call when he was on a road trip with some friends because I think to also make them not worry, he had decided to just stop drinking for the trip.

Well, he was so dependent on alcohol physically that he had a seizure while they were heading down to go to their friends's wedding.

I had hoped it would be a big wake-up call.

It definitely clued me in to, oh, no, no, this is a problem, and yeah, unfortunately, it still didn't really get paid attention to.

I feel like there was always an assumption that, like, oh, well, we'll see the signs and we'll stop it, and then that kind of clouds your vision, right, so that you're not actually seeing the signs.

I had made a lot of calls locally to, like, rehab centers to try and figure out, you know, like, well, where can he go?

We don't have the money to send him to something super-fancy, and what I ran into, which I understand, because of privacy policies and stuff, was, you know, "Well, we can't give you any info over the phone," and I'm like, "Well, can you at least tell me, you know, is it two weeks of not talking to anybody and then you can have a phone call, you know, can you give me a basic outline, like, I'm trying to pitch a sale here, is basically what it felt like.

Like, I have to be able to give him everything because, you know, one of the things about my brother that I think nowadays would have gotten diagnosed as some kind of neurodivergence was the unknown was paralyzing to him.

And so, for me, I'm going, like, "Okay, okay, like, just tell me, like, we've got to check in and then, like, what is the date, look--" they wouldn't give me any of that info.

And so then, I didn't make the sale.

Stacy: I knew that she needed help.

I believed her when she told me, so we attempted to get her help.

There was probably nine months where I knew she was in crisis.

I didn't understand the extent, and so I started calling every provider that I could and was turned away over and over and over again.

There's just simply not enough providers in Humboldt County.

Frankie: I know she was trying really hard to find me help, but there's no one out here.

Like, it's incredibly hard to find any sort of help out here.

Stacy: The reasons just piled on, one on top of another.

At first, it was just I couldn't find someone who was accepting new clients.

And then I had a friend who said, "Here's someone who I know is accepting new clients.

Give them a call."

So, I gave them a call, and they weren't interested in working with children.

She had insurance through myself.

She had MediCal, she had insurance through her dad and insurance through her stepmom, and I still couldn't find a provider for her and then, at one point, I actually walked into the place where I worked but for a different program and asked and they said, "Yes, but we only take MediCal," and I said, "That's fantastic.

I have MediCal.

And she also has this and this," and they, "Oh, we can't take her unless she only has MediCal."

So, it was just, you know, either people didn't take the three types of insurance that she did have, they weren't accepting new clients, didn't wanna work with children, or she was over-insured.

I just could not find help for her.

Lea: You know, there's never enough docs and psychiatrists especially.

Our docs age out and then there's not a lot of young people drawn to this area to be providers.

The airport can be difficult.

So, I think to get and keep a well professional workforce is challenging.

Nicole: He got a DUI and then he got a second DUI.

He couldn't possibly keep up, right?

So, then he stopped even trying to keep up.

And I tried to get him to move in here in my spare bedroom and what he told me was there are no bars in Loleta.

That's where he had his friends, that's where he talked to people, and when you have no mental health support, you have no therapist to talk to, I think seeing the exact same face at Blondies every day is reassuring.

So, you know, people dismiss it as him choosing alcohol over getting help, but I'm like, I think he was trying to get help in the only way that was accessible to him.

Stacy: So, after her attempt, I took her to the ER and, at that point, everything was taken out of our hands.

We were pretty much told what was going to happen.

She spent, I wanna say two or three nights in the ER, because there was not a bed locally, you know.

The county was going to send her somewhere residential, but there is nowhere in the county for adolescents.

There was a point where they told me they were going to send her to San Francisco.

I rode with her in the ambulance and so, ended up for a week in San Francisco with the clothes on my back.

It was incredibly difficult, having this girl who had just always been by my side, you know, even though her dad and I had split custody, we were always really close, to only be able to see her for an hour a day with her dad and in a room full of other people.

There wasn't really much of a chance to talk or to connect or, you know, really get a sense for where she was, besides that she was miserable.

Nicole: I mean, there was a good year, I didn't know how to find him, I didn't know how to call him.

I offered to put him on my cell phone plan, and he wouldn't.

"Oh, no, no, no, I'm gonna, you know, as soon as XYZ, I'm gonna get my own.

It'll be okay."

And I remember telling him, I would say, "Chase, can I buy you one of those burners just so I know."

And even when you were offering him help like that, I think he still felt like he was a burden.

Chase and I and Danne were so trauma bonded from our childhood that it was a constant, you know, I don't know where my brother is, I don't--you know, sending him memes on Facebook because at least if he liked 'em I knew he was alive.

♪♪♪ Virgil: When we're talking about suicide and we're talking about struggle, human suffering often, it's complex.

And oftentimes, it's a combination of biological, psychological, social issues and we need to take that seriously.

How we should talk to them is first listen.

Is to show through your actions that they're important, that they matter.

And then you get in conversation with them, asking open-ended questions.

More times than not, people that are feeling suicidal will let you know.

But those questions being open-ended, it kind of gets you down to the core of what they're thinking and feeling, right?

Because you could ask somebody right at the beginning of a conversation and they maybe say no, but if you listen to them, if you build the relationship, if you're respectful, if you're kind, if you really see them, and their inner experience as much as you can, it makes them often feel comfortable and safe to share and be vulnerable about some of their struggles.

And so, you know, for me and us at Two Feathers, I don't think there's a one-size-fits-all, I'm gonna follow this protocol to assess for suicide.

It's more relationally based.

It's more treating the person with respect, with dignity, with kindness, and being really curious about their inner experience and what's going on for them.

That's one of the best kind of assessments that you can do.

Lea: The support groups I do with families, they can find out, you know, how to get into the system, who to call, what to do.

Like when my son had issues, I knew to contact the mental health clinician in the jail because they were only gonna hold him three hours and let him go.

And he was mentally ill but they didn't--they reckon-- they thought he was just drunk.

But if families don't know how to intervene like that, he would have just been kept for three or four hours, sobered up, and let go again.

It's such a complicated system, mental health hospitals don't talk to each other, so a lot of times when your kid is in Red Bluff or San Francisco, they aren't-- they don't communicate with other people.

The jail sometimes can't communicate with other hospitals, so it's the whole communication thing, it's the family that keeps it together, you know?

The family knows where the person was and what the diag-- you know, so they--they're an integral part of all this prevention and treatment.

If I could wave a magic wand, everybody would see mental illness as a chemical, biological brain disorder, just like a heart.

If you go to the hospital with a heart attack, you leave with statins, you leave with a follow-up appointment probably with a cardiac--you leave with a lot of--a lot of care and follow-up.

If you go in, in fact, 89% of people have touched base with the medical profession before they actually end their life.

If that time when they touched that system, there was follow-up, prevention, maybe a peer coach, whatever, that could help reduce those suicides.

Nicole: And so I wish there was something, some kind of a walk-in service where you don't have to be so bad that they've decided, okay, I guess we'll see you, and some place where you're allowed to be good as well in the eyes, right?

A lot of times people think that I am just fine when I am losing my mind inside because I have learned to mask over the years, and Chase did too.

My sister did too.

Stacy: It was the most anxiety I've ever had with parenting to be afraid of making a misstep or saying the wrong thing or making the wrong decision and expecting that it could possibly lead to her death.

I just wish there were more options.

Frankie: If I could talk to myself back then as the person I am now, I probably would, it sounds cheesy, but it gets better.

Like, doesn't feel like it.

Feels like this is never gonna end, like this is reality now, but it gets better.

You get the help you need.

Don't be afraid to reach out to people.

There are more people there for you than you think.

You have a lot of people backing you in your corner.

The longer you keep pushing, the better it gets.

Virgil: Yeah, when I was growing up, we weren't talking about mental health like we are today.

And one of the things that we're trying to do at Two Feathers is improve the mental health systems and programming in Humboldt County to be a model.

And one of the things that I think is really important, because of the--how rural we are, is we have to go to where the community is.

It's often unnecessary suffering, and so how do you support somebody that's suffering?

You support them with kindness, you support them with trying your best to show that they matter.

So, making sure that you do your best to get them out of that state of crisis, to provide some safety and continue to work with them 'cause oftentimes it doesn't go away in the immediate.

We want to work with people, family members, work with people to set them on a path so that we prevent it in the future.

♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ Nicole: You got me!

♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪ ♪♪♪