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Donna’s Law: A New Suicide Prevention
Tool
I wept when I heard Katrina Brees share the
story of her mother’s death on the CBS
Morning Show. For more than a decade, Katrina
and her mother, Donna, worked side-by-side
producing parades in New Orleans. Her fond memories
of her mom include “just her dancing in a
parade, just her feeling the music, feeling the
audience, giving love.”
But the person who seemed so carefree was a
tormented soul, in a constant battle with bipolar
disorder. In 2018 she wrote a letter to her
psychiatrist:
“Dear Doctor, it has been nine
months since this episode began. I am not doing
well. How long must I endure this?”
Katrina’s mother answered her own question
just a few days later. On June 26, 2018, she bought
a gun and fatally shot herself. She did it beneath
the Tree of Life, a New Orleans landmark.
- “It was the most special spot she
could choose,” said Katrina.
“It’s where many of our friends have
had weddings. We’ve had funerals there. The
space is so sacred. It feels to me like she laid
herself on the cathedral of our community and
died there.”
My tears were for Katrina, her mother, and all
those who have experienced deaths of despair. I am
all too familiar with those feelings. Following
years of depression and feelings of hopelessness my
father took an overdose of sleeping pills.
Fortunately, he didn’t have a gun. He was
hospitalized and eventually recovered. I grew up
wondering what happened to my father, when it would
happen to me, and what I could do to prevent it
from happening to other families.
I faced my own dark night of the soul when my
mental illness caused me to temporarily lose hope
in ever feeling good again. Fortunately, with my
wife’s support, I was able to reach out for
help and get into therapy. I wrote about my
experiences in an article, “Being
Bipolar: Living in a World of Fire and
Ice.”
Professor Mike Anestis, who appeared with
Katrina on the CBS Sunday Morning show, heads up
the New Jersey Gun Violence Research Center at the
Rutgers School of Public Health, said that many
people survive suicide attempts using other
methods.
“Intentional overdose?
Only 2% to 3% of the folks who attempt
suicide using an overdose
die,”
said Anestis.
“Almost 95% of folks who use
a firearm do. They don’t get a second
chance.”
When we think of guns and violence, we often
think of homicide deaths, mass killings, and
horrible tragedies like school shootings.
“Suicide accounts for anywhere
from 60% to 65% of all the gun deaths in the
United States in any given year,”
said Professor Anestis.
“Guns are the main cause of
suicide deaths. More than half of all suicide
deaths in any given year are caused by
self-inflicted gunshot wounds. So, that’s
somewhere in the vicinity of 25,000 firearm
suicide deaths in the U.S. every single
year.”
According to University of Alabama law professor
Fred Vars,
“In 2020, there were 66 gun
suicides every day, which is more people than
died in the worst mass shooting in U.S. history.
And we don’t see it. You know, it
doesn’t make the news. It happens one
person at a time. Unless it’s a celebrity,
we just don’t hear about it.”
But Vars is trying to change that, raising
awareness while pushing for new gun legislation. He
says there is “absolutely” a correlation
between stricter gun laws and fewer suicides.
He’s working with Katrina Brees on legislation
called Donna’s Law, named after her mother. It
would allow potential gun buyers to put themselves
on a “do not sell” list.
“An individual would have the
opportunity to suspend their ability to buy a
gun, voluntarily, confidentially put their name
into the already-existing background check
system,” said Vars. “And if they
attempted to buy a gun, that transaction would
be denied.”
When asked by the CBS Morning Show’s
interviewer,
“Do you have confidence that
people who are suicidal would voluntarily
request not to be sold a gun?”
Professor Vars replied,
“During a suicidal crisis or
depressive episode, I think it is unlikely that
anybody would sign up. But there are a lot of
people who’ve been in that dark place who
come out the other side and know they’re a
danger to themselves. It’s more like an
advance directive. Here, while I’m feeling
better, let me prepare myself for that, and just
get the gun out of the equation.“
Dr. Vars speaks from personal, as well as
professional, experience. In his book, Weapon of
Choice: Fighting Gun Violence While Respecting Gun
Rights, he shares his own experience with
depression, bipolar disorder, and thoughts of
suicide earlier in his life.
“I sank into a deep
depression,”
he remembers.
“It was months before I could
go back to work full time. Because I feared
hurting myself, I stayed away from the apartment
windows and kitchen knives. Since that time, I
have been back on the psych ward only once more,
another manic episode, confirming my diagnosis
of bipolar disorder.”
This makes very good sense to me. I would
absolutely put my name on a “do not sell”
database to protect myself and my loved ones from
the danger of my making an irrational decision at
the depth of despair rather than when I was feeling
more hopeful. I believe many clients I work with
who are dealing with depression, addictions, and
other health challenges, would also want the option
of this kind of protection.
So far, Donna’s Law advocates have not yet
convinced Congress to act, but three states,
Washington, Utah and Virginia, have passed it, and
Maryland recently held hearings. Mental health
advocate Bryan Barks testified in favor of the law,
saying,
“This bill would give people
prone to suicidality the agency to make
decisions about their own access to guns when
they are not actively suicidal.”
Katrina Brees says there are also
other tools we could use to lower the risk of
suicides. In reflecting on her mother’s
death following a 30-year battle with bipolar
disorder, she wondered why her mother had gone
out and purchased a gun, since all her life she
had been vehemently opposed to them.
In an Op Ed she hopes to have published
she wrote in part:
“My mom died by gun suicide, and she
couldn’t have done it without Google. The
day she died, my mom searched how to hang
herself. She had been struggling with suicidal
ideation brought on by a medication side effect
and was under the care of a psychiatrist. A top
recommended article by Google explained that
suicide by handgun is statistically more
reliable.
“In a fragile state, my mom took
Google’s advice and searched for gun stores
near her. Google then provided directions to a
gun store a couple miles away. She bought the
only gun she would ever own and shot herself.
After her death, I searched Google myself for
information on gun suicide. I was bombarded by
targeted advertisements encouraging me to buy a
gun. Even the news article about my mom’s
death presented an algorithm-derived
advertisement telling me where I could buy a
gun. As if that weren’t enough, I saw
advertisements suggesting I could get a free gun
— and “Buy Now” options with
local pickup.
“Google’s business model is
earning revenue by maximizing click-throughs.
It’s not a passive bystander in the
business of selling guns and other dangerous
weapons, it is an active participant.
“When considering whether tech
companies should be legally liable for the
harmful content their algorithms promote, I hope
the Supreme Court will consider that even if
Google may not be technically liable, its
failure to direct suicidal searchers to the
National Suicide Prevention Lifeline (988) is a
failure of moral responsibility and a danger to
society.”
For more information:
©2023 Jed
Diamond
See Books,
Issues
+ Suicide
* * *
Wealth can't buy health, but health can buy
wealth. - Henry David Thoreau
Jed Diamond
is the internationally best-selling author of seven
books including Male
Menopause, now
translated into 17 foreign languages and his
latest book, The
Irritable Male Syndrome: Managing. The 4 Key Causes
of Depression and
Aggression. For over
38 years he has been a leader in the field of men's
health. He is a member of the International
Scientific Board of the World Congress on
Men’s Health and has been on the Board of
Advisors of the Men’s Health Network since its
founding in 1992. His work has been featured in
major newspapers throughout the United States
including the New York Times, Boston Globe, Wall
Street Journal, The Los Angeles Times, and USA
Today. He has been featured on more than 1,000
radio and T.V. programs including The View with
Barbara Walters, Good Morning America, Inside
Edition, CBS, NBC, and Fox News, To Tell the Truth,
Extra, Leeza, Geraldo, and Joan Rivers. He also did
a nationally televised special on Male Menopause
for PBS. He looks forward to your feedback.
E-Mail.
You can visit his website at www.menalive.com
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