Local non-profit organization helps families who’ve lost a loved one to suicide
***Editor’s note: This article contains content related to suicide. If you or someone you know struggles with issues related to mental health, you can contact on-campus Counseling and Psychological Services at 435-757-1012 or the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 988.
Suicide was the 9th leading cause of death for ages 10 to 64 in the U.S. in 2020, with one estimated suicide death every 11 minutes, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, or CDC.
American Foundation for Suicide Prevention reported 45,979 deaths by suicide in the U.S. and an estimated 1.2 million suicide attempts in 2020. There was an average of 130 suicide deaths per day.
Suicide was the leading cause of death in 2020 among Utahns for ages 10 to 24, the second leading cause of death for ages 25 to 44 and the fifth leading cause for ages 45 to 64, according to Utah’s Public Health data. It continues to be ranked in the top 10 consistently.
There were 651 suicides in Utah in 2020 and the state averages 648 suicide deaths per year, according to the CDC.
Cache County saw a huge spike in suicides in 2021. Cache Valley Daily quoted David Zook, the Cache County Executive, in 2021 saying the county saw 13 suicides in the first two months of the year. Zook said four or five of the 13 were USU students.
From 2017 to 2021, Smithfield and Hyrum combined had 15 suicides, North Logan had 15 suicides, Brigham City had 30 suicides and Logan had 57 suicides, according to Utah’s Public Health data.
That’s where Avenues of Hope, a non-profit organization in Cache County dedicated to helping families who have lost a loved one, steps in.
“We lost two members of our family to suicide,” Makenna Burnell, co-founder and daughter of the founder of Avenues of Hope, said. “I lost my older brother and my younger brother to suicide.”
After their loss and going through their own grieving process, Burnell and her mother, Lisa Mitchell, decided to find a way to help others in similar situations.
The thought started at a Wingers with some ideas written on a napkin. Since 2019, when the organization started, it has grown to have 10 board members and continues to have new ideas blossom for how to help families and prevent suicide.
Their most recent idea — gift baskets.
“Our goal with the baskets is to bring that sense of community and get our products out there and get people the help they need to work through their grief,” Burnell said. “It’s to be able to reach out to those that have lost a loved one with things that might bring some comfort.”
The items inside the baskets differ and are designed to be customizable for the needs of the person or family it’s being given to.
Avenues of Hope relies on donations, either from companies or anyone who wants to, to make the baskets.
Some examples of gifts in the baskets they’ve already made include, a Planet Fitness membership, an Amazing Grace Salon gift certificate, an Angie’s gift card and a Spark Your Soul yoga class.
The baskets can also include handwritten letters to give hope and so people know they aren’t alone in what they’re going through.
How do they find people to give the baskets to? By word of mouth and relying on referrals from other people.
Unfortunately, people who’ve been affected by suicide aren’t as hard to find as some people may think.
Heather Jackson, a first-year student at Utah State University studying finance, knows the pain all too well.
Jackson said she played on the tennis team in high school and her team became her second family.
“After my senior season ended, one of the couples on my tennis team broke up and then one of them committed suicide,” she said. “10 days later, the other one committed suicide.”
Jackson explained how she felt lucky to have her whole team as a support system and to help her through her grief. She said it changed her perspective and made her more aware of what people around her were going through.
“Anytime someone posts anything that could be seen as remotely concerning, I always check in,” she said. “Now I know that if there’s something I can do, I’m going to do it.”
Randy Anderson, president of the board for Avenues of Hope, said their organization has the same goal — to do everything in their power to help.
He explained it’s not just about supporting people with their grief but also preventing further suicide.
“If one person commits suicide in the family, the suicide risk to the rest of the family is much higher than if it had never happened in their family,” Anderson said. “Our major goal is to prevent that next suicide; we want to be there for support.”
Other than the gift baskets, Avenues of Hope offers resources including yoga classes, support groups, equine therapy, life coaching, talk therapy, artwork healing and music therapy.
Lisa Mitchell, Avenues of Hope founder, said some of the resources they offer are some of the things that ended up saving members of their family after her sons suicides.
She said spending the time creating an organization to help others the same way has benefited her own grief.
“We’ve always been told that serving others is really what heals yourself and I’ve seen that in myself and in my daughters and my spouse,” Mitchell said.
Healing can look different for different people. For Jackson, staying busy at work and having good roommates to talk to helped her a lot.
Both Mitchell and Jackson explained that it’s not a wound that can fully recover with time either. Their resources, like grief, don’t have a time limit.
“You don’t ever really get over it,” Jackson said. “It still affects me pretty prominently.”
“It’s not a hill you can climb and get over, it’s just taking a breath one moment at a time, one day at a time,” Mitchell said. “Let people love you and give yourself the time and the space you need.”
Avenues of Hope is there to be that someone to show love and they chose the sunflower to be their organization’s symbol to represent that.
Sunflowers are attracted to the light of the sun, and turn up toward it during the day. However, on a cloudy day, people think they turn to the ground — in reality, they end up turning toward each other for energy.
“The circumstances of our lives — we have no control over, but we can control how we respond to them,” Mitchell said. “Just don’t give up, keep going.”
“There are too many deaths by suicide and it’s something that isn’t going to go away,” Anderson said. “If we can stop one suicide, it’s worth it.”
To donate or send a referral to Avenues of Hope, you can go to their website at avenuesofhope.net.
If you or someone you know is struggling, you can contact a professional through the SafeUT app or talk to the suicide crisis lifeline at 988, both available 24/7.
Through USU, you can schedule an appointment with Counseling and Psychological Services, or CAPS, by calling 435-797-1012 or go to their website at usu.edu/aggiewellness/caps/. Therapy sessions are available Monday through Friday 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. and are free for students.
-Jacee.Caldwell@usu.edu
Featured photo by Jacee Caldwell