watch the two videos posted under Week 3 regarding Amanda Todd (Amanda Todd’s Story Before Suicide and News Story Amanda Todd), who committed suicide at the age of fifteen after at least two failed attempts. Then, prepare a two to three (2-3), a doubled-spaced paper that addresses the following items:
1. Describe how Amanda Todd displays each of Shneidman’s six characteristics of people who commit suicide (use facts from the videos to show that each of the characteristics is present).
2. Choose one theory, model, or framework from pages 206-209 that you believe best explains why Amanda Todd committed suicide. Explain what the theory, model, or framework means and use facts from the Amanda Todd case to explain why you believe it applies to Amanda Todd.
3. Discuss whether any of the IS PATH WARM warning signs were present in the Amanda Todd’s Story Before Suicide video.
4. Imagine that you are a crisis worker and that Amanda Todd’s parents bring Amanda in to meet with you after seeing the video Amanda posted online. Amanda’s parents show you the video. What are some suicide intervention strategies you would employ?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vOHXGNx-E7E&feature=emb_title&bpctr=1590976112

Amanda Todd’s Suicide Story

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Amanda Todd’s Suicide Story

Amanda Todd displays Shneidman’s characteristics of people who commit suicide. She has unendurable psychological or mental pain as well as frustrated psychological needs. She reveals in the cards showing self –disappointment, high anxiety levels due to the two instances of body exposure, and her encounter with a guy friend whom she believed loved her. This mental pain is also seen in her state of loneliness and helplessness when she says, “I’m stuck, what is left of me…I have nobody I need someone.” (TheSomebodytoknow, 2012) Todd is searching for a solution to end cyberbullying and the past life that keeps haunting her. She displays lifelong coping patterns, including two previous attempts of suicide, namely overdosing and bleach consuming to end the pain and self-disappointment. The fact that she uses suicidal attempts (total solution) shows a constriction of options, which Shneidman states that suicidal people decide either complete solution or cessation.

Durkheim’s social integration theory best applies in Todd’s case. Durkheim argues that suicide is not a psychological act but an act influenced by power or force above the person, such as social disorganization and lack of social integration and solidarity. Todd’s cards show that her classmates turned their back on her, they formed a cyber-bullying platform, and in her new school, they promoted her beating, stating that she should die completely. The pressures, cyberbullying, and lack of social solidarity from her classmates and friends made Todd isolate socially, when she never left home during summer, stopped attending school, and felt she lost her place in society. When she asks why she is still living and what is left of her, she displays social isolation and being cut from mainstream society, making her commit suicide.

Before committing suicide, Todd displayed seven IS PATH WARM warning signs. Primarily, she had suicidal thoughts when she threatened to kill herself through bleach consuming and overdosing (Ideation) and excessively consumed alcohol and used drugs (Substance Abuse). She also felt hopeless (Hopelessness) with no purpose in life when she asked what was left for her (Purposelessness). Todd displayed high levels of anxiety to a point she did not leave her house (Anxiety), which resulted in feeling trapped without any way out but to die (Trapped). All these instances result in her withdrawal from society, as all her friends abandoned her (Withdrawal).

Todd’s video shows many suicidal warning signs requiring effective mitigation strategies to prevent, treat, and reduce Todd’s suicidal ideation. Hence, I would use universal strategies such as creating suicide awareness through media and school-based education on suicide to eliminate the role of her friends, classmates, and society had in this case. Individually, I would remove access to suicide tools such as her anti-depressant drugs with controlled observation from her parents. I would ensure she undergoes psychotherapeutic and pharmacotherapeutic systems (Menon, 2018).

References

Menon, V. K. (2018). Suicide prevention strategies: An overview of current evidence and best practice elements. International Journal of Advanced Medical Health Research, Vol (5)2, pp;43-51.

TheSomebodytoknow (Director). (2012). My story: Struggling, bullying, suicide, self harm [Motion Picture].