September is Suicide Prevention Month, so I’m going to say the quiet part out loud on a Friday. For a long stretch after 2005, I did not want to be here. I’d lost men, I was drowning in survivor’s guilt, and I was doing it the way a lot of us do, alone, behind a face that told everyone I was fine. What turned it was one counselor, and the mindfulness he put in my hands when I had nothing left.
I don’t tell that to sit in it. I tell it because the men most likely to be sinking are the exact ones who look the most squared away. The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention will tell you men die by suicide at close to 4 times the rate of women. We were trained since we were boys to carry it in silence and call that strength, and that training is quietly killing us.
That’s the steepest cost of self-sufficiency, and it’s why this lane exists. The armor that keeps you standing in the fight is the same armor that won’t let you say “I’m not okay” at your own kitchen table. It reads as strength right up until it takes someone we can’t afford to lose.
So this is the Friday debrief, and this month it runs two directions. First, honest with yourself:
Who have I been performing “fine” for, when I’m not?
What’s the true sentence I haven’t said out loud, and who is safe enough to hear it?
Then, pointed outward:
Which man in my life has gone a little quiet lately?
What would it cost me to call him today, not to fix anything, just to ask how he’s really doing?
If you’re the one in the dark right now, hear me on this. Reach out. Call or text 988, the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline, any time, day or night. You are not a burden, and the story your exhausted brain is telling you is not the truth. I’m walking proof the next chapter can look nothing like this one.
So who are you reaching for this weekend, yourself or someone else?
If this one landed close to home, don’t just sit with it alone. Forward it to the guy you thought of while you were reading.
And if you want a quiet, private starting point, our free Focus Score is a quick check on where your attention and focus stand right now.