(photo from njhopeline.com)
Have you ever been bullied? Most probably have at one point in their life.
We’re gonna change subjects here from writing to a serious topic that needs brought to light.
Teenage suicide.
It’s on the rise and nobody will talk about it.
On April 27, 2006 my friend Jennifer took her life in her home. She was fourteen years old; actually she was fourteen that day. She killed herself on her fourteenth birthday.
I’m going through my days almost ten years later racking my mind about it.
I myself faced a tremendous amount of bullying during my high school years. It was so much that after just two months into my freshmen year, I withdrew and continued through cyber school.
I’m not here to pass blame to the kids and families who may cause the damage or the students and teachers who can ignore it, but to raise awareness to this real thing that affects everyone.
I had no idea Jenn had it so bad. I can’t understand what it was like, a young girl Googling how to successfully hang yourself. Did she fail the first few times? How many times did she almost do it but stopped at the last second? Or what was that last week like that pushed her over the edge? Did she truly have no one she could turn to?
What potentially angered me the most was how nobody cared about her until she was dead. “She was such a nice person.”
None of them knew her.
It’s the falsehood, the pretense, the fakes that come in pretending to care about a person or the issue suicide itself because it seems like it’s the good thing to do.
Here are the facts.
In 2014 there were 41,149 reported suicides in the US.
According to the NY Daily News, teenage suicide has risen in 2009 to 2012 from 6.3% to 7.8%.
A semi annual survey performed by the Youth Risk Behavior Surveillance System last conducted in 2013 found that 1 in 12 teenagers have attempted suicide.
Whether it’s bullying in a school or in a home, Help wherever you can because a rope isn’t hard to acquire. Google can tell you whatever you need to know and there are plenty of freaks who encourage people to do it.
Jenn fought it until the end, and the end was way too soon.
We must stop being reactive about this and become proactive. After it’s done, there’s no going back.
Jennifer Lauren Fongheiser, 1992-2006
I will never forget you.
Thank you for reading
Zac Zinn
ZinnWrites 