Bader Field; How My Family Survived Suicide

0:00 This program is designed to provide general information with regards to the subject matters covered. This information is given with the understanding that neither the hosts, guests, sponsors, or station are engaged in rendering any specific and personal medical, financial, legal, counseling, professional service, or any advice. You should seek the services of competent professionals before applying or trying any suggested ideas. You know, one of the biggest challenges that we're starting to face even more and more is suicide, and there are a lot of organizations out there that are really seeking suicide prevention opportunities and so forth. Today, I'm going to have a really interesting fellow on this show as name as Carl David. He experienced suicide within his own family, and he's written a book and he has now become a suicide prevention advocate. And the focus now on suicide needs to be on mentioned. But what do families do? How do you handle this if you've noticed that there's a child that potentially is or in many cases you have no clue. And so what are some of the elements and things that we can develop within a family that will help to prevent any potential for those type of thoughts or for those type of issues to occur. So I'm really grateful to have Carl David on the show. He's written a book called bader Field, a story of how his family managed to move forward after his brother took his

1:33 own life. So please join us for a very sensitive and yet i think, very important discussion. At the end of the day, it's not about what you have or even what you've accomplished. It's about what you've done with those accomplishments. It's about who you've lifted up, who you've made better. It's about what you've given back. Denzel Washington, Welcome to Inspire Vision. Our sole purpose is to elevate the lives of others and inspire you to do the same thing. Carl, Welcome to the show. How are you doing. I'm well, Doc, thank you. How are you doing? Hey, I'm doing great, and it's so great to have you on the show again. What was it two years ago, three years ago that you that you came on? It was two or three years ago? Yes, yeah, yeah, And you know what, this topic has become even more more important in my mind. What so let's talk about most recent statistics. Do you have any read on the most recent statistics for suicide and suicide prevention and so forth. I do. There's still a million people a year who take their life, and actually whny times that have attempted and fortunately are not successful.

2:45 So suicide statistics in general change a little bit. It used to be mostly focused on young people and teens and all, it's the elderly and now it's a mixture. The more women than men from what I have ascertained from some of the statistics. But also there's been an uptick in law enforcement and military, both active and veterans, and that's really upsetting and that's kind of where my focus has been lately. I do a lot with law enforcement on federal, state, and local levels, and actually have become Although I'm an art dealer by trade, that's my profession my whole life, I've actually become a suicide prevention advocate because I do shows like this and try and reach out and hope that I reach even one person who decides to save their own life instead of taking it. Yes, And you know, it's interesting, I've kind of become an advocate too, and it kind of just fell into place.

3:42 I've done some studying and I ended up getting certified as a behavioral analyst, and some of the evaluations that I use that came from the company that I work with, really get into this whole concept of values and how do you communicate and on and so forth. But I was reading a study I was really fascinated because you know, so often you listen to these stories of children or young adults, of adults that have committed suicide, and so often it's coming from a highly ineffective family, you know, a troubled family type of thing. Well, I went on, I thought, you know what, there's so many that are doing this that are not necessarily from quote, troubled families. And there was a study that was done back east that actually studied quote, normal families, and they found that with their research, two of the main areas that were effectively relating to suicide was lack of proper communication number one and number two expectations. Now, what I realized is that that is merely a then slice of the pie for the causation for suicide. Okay, but I found that, Okay, there's at least one area that can be worked on. What have you found as far as as you've done your

5:14 research and so forth, what are the elements that are causing this? You know, you know, if you're working with PTSD people who have come back, that's one element. I know that there's an element where if someone has experienced a head injury that literally changes the brain dynamics and that can be one causation of suicide. So what are you finding? Are the number of causations that you've looked at and are there any some that really stick out to you? As far as causations there are you know, you have the standard kind of things like depression and drug use or overuse, overdosing and things like that.

5:57 And again you're right, the family breakdown has been traditionally one of the causes of the kind of loneliness or depression. There's peer pressure today's world with the Internet and bullying, which has been relentless twenty four to seven has taken lives. I mean, it's it's horrible. But the other thing that's that's resulted in greater instance of suicide has been COVID and lockdowns because it's created a greater online presence for this kind of bullying to take place. But also there's been a dissolution of disconnect socially and that's been really a dire had has had a dire effect on socialization with kids. Well, and now that we're out of COVID and it's been what two years since we had three years, I don't even remember. Yeah, that year was a bad one. But are you finding now even now that that's kind of become the foundation of a lack of interaction between people and so on and so forth. Yeah, it's kind of had an after effect. I mean, now things are getting back to somewhat normal, but at the same time, the lack of socialization has stayed with some of these kids, and even with some adults. You know, they've they've become loners and they've kind of they well, I don't need have friends or I don't want friends. You know. It's all sort of changed the dynamic of the life we live in. And it's gotten better a little bit. But then again, the rates of suicide have also gone up.

7:29 They were going down for a couple of years, and now they're going back up again. And I think this is a real the economic malaise that we've got, the overreach of government, they're all kinds of factors are causing all kinds of problems and um, you know, I just I hope it gets better. Well, I do too, you know, I had I've had two nephews from different different brothers that have committed suicide, so I totally get it. But you, you literally have also experienced that. I'd love for you to tell the audience your story because it's it's an amazing story. Oh thank you. Well, we grew up as an all American family, except we didn't have a do it. We had a station wagon and there were three visitor brothers, and you know, we had a nice life. We weren't rich, but we were rich together in tone and texture and you know, a lot of love in the house and everything. And when I was in high school, I was in twelfth grade and one night my middle brother, our middle brother, my eldest, and I was a younger, so Bruce was my middle next eldest brother didn't come home one night, and there was a real strange feel in the house. It was very unlike him because if he weren't coming home, he would call and we had no idea what was going on. In that morning, when I woke up, I said, I don't want to go to school, and my parents said, no, you have to go to school. You know, we don't know what.

8:46 We'll figure this out. And I kept having this fantasy that maybe he was in a car accident, he was in a hospital. We didn't know. I didn't know anything. So I had driven to school that day I was sixteen, and I got to the auditorium for the morning assembly. The principal the school called me up on the loudspeaker, called me up to the podium, and I started to shake. I didn't know what was wrong. Something was not right and it was going to be serious. So he said, there's been an emergency. You have to go home. And thank god he didn't tell me what it was. But I jumped in the car and was home. It should have taken me fifteen minutes took me six minutes. I jumped out and my eldest brother opened the door and said, Bruce's dad he killed himself. And I almost fell to the floor. It was like nothing I'd ever felt before, I seen before, and I ran upstairs to see my mom, who was just out of a hospital. My dad wasn't there. He went to find my brother, who actually was at the gallery on the fourth floor, and that's where he took his life. I can't even imagine my father's pain because that was just something that was literally it killed him. He only lived for eight years after that. And we had a hard time as a family tried to deal with this because we were in uncharted waders in no way to think of how we get out of this? What do we do? How do we survive this? Well, we all eventually got help with clergy. You know, we're Jewish. My parents went a rabbi was a close friend. I wound up going to a through a series

10:18 of doctor's usiness, to a psychoanalysis, an analyst who literally saved my life. It took me four years to unwind this stuff and figure out how to deal with it and teach me how to cope and Alan, my older brother, also had psychological counseling. And because soon aside the death, it's too big to manage by yourself. It's it's a strange death, it's not normal, and you need more than yourself to get through it, because you know, your first first response is shock. Then there's sadness, then there's anger, and then there's guilt, and then it's like, how do you deal with this? What do you do? You know, and people look at you. I went back to school two weeks later or and I got these looks. At least I perceived that I got these looks from kids like, Oh, that's the kid who's brother killed himself. You know. The teachers were, they were great, very kind. So it's it's something you just really have to learn and navigate. And it's different today than it was then.

11:18 This was nineteen sixty five. I was sixteen, my brother was twenty two, Alan was twenty five, and my parents were fifty and forty seven, and it's like, oh my god, you know, I just it's just so bizarre and so overwhelming. So as as that occurred, and and we're going to talk a little bit about those external comments and influences, I'd like to talk about that a little bit because I think that the audience needs to be aware that when someone's experienced that in their life, in their family or even a close friend or something, so often comments are made or attitudes are developed that are so disparaging and unkind and certainly not good. But we'll talk about that. Did you ever figure out did your family? Were you able to figure out what was going on with your brother that might have been ultimately the causation for him to decide to take his life. No, no, we still live with a question mark all these years later. I mean, my brother an't are the alms left? But there was no note, there was no clue, There was no indication that he was unhappy in any way, shape or form. His unit was supposed to go to Vietnam.

12:33 We thought maybe that was it, but not really. You know, that's not convincing enough for us. So we have no idea what demons he had in his head that he just couldn't deal with or couldn't come to talk to him. Had we known, we would have intervened. Yeah, and he had not been in Vietnam yet, so he had not he was not a return okay, So it definitely wasn't PTSD at from that perspective, and yet you've never been able to figure it out. No, no clue, wasn't drugs or now no drugs. I mean, this was a This was a kid who was happy. He was a great auto mechanic. He could take a car important put it back together again and would come out right. I tried doing that once I started a fire with a corporator. I'm better now than it was then, but now there was no indication. We just were blindsided by this whole thing. You live with a question mark like what could you have seen? What we miss? That is so amazing, isn't it?

13:39 That you just don't even know? And as you brought up the word perception, which I think is so key and understanding, some of this is that we really don't know what an individual's perception is of their life, of what's going on and the communication that's going on, any of that, and yet for them to appear very happy and so forth, obviously there's and I look at this interesting way because you know, as you get into this emotional guidance from a grand Hex or some of these others, you realize that we have two different types of emotions. We have that inner emotion, that innate emotion that not a lot of people may see, and then we have that social emotion that we're happy and we're you know, we're adventures where we love all of this type of thing, and yet no one is able to see that inner, inner, inner emotion that is creating the issues based on their perception of what's going on. I know I've approached my kids and said, hey, so you know, the expectations that I create a lot of expectations on your kids, and they just smile. I said that, ye had no idea. I go, okay, So what were they positive expectations or did it get to the point that they were, you know, not so positive and you weren't able to whatever? And you know, they said,

15:11 and they smile, we're in good shape here. And you know, they smile and said that, you know, you were really really good at being careful about the expectations. But they were there, and we felt them so in their perception because I was really working hard to try to avoid that. But from their perception, those expectations were there. The challenge is that when those expectations create within us that sense if I'm not good enough or I'm not worthy or whatever that happens to be, that becomes a real challenge. I think in Christianity, the guilt, the you know you're a center, you're you know, the guilt that came all of that can be very contributing to that. Obviously, as a Jewish person, you don't experience that per se, at least as far as I understand. Well, no, there's Jewish guilt, don't worry, well is there So it's it's really tough. So what what would you what would you tell parents? I mean here, you are a normal family, no expectation of it. Was there anything different down the road that as you as you reflect back on that, is there anything that could have been done that you feel like might have been a good intervention.

16:32 If we'd seen some sign anything, if there was any any disturbance emotionally that we would have perceived, we certainly would have jumped in. We were a close family at least, you know, we spoke, we talked about things, and um, we didn't have the opportunity to intervene because whatever he held inside, he yelled pretty tightly, and um obviously couldn't deal with it whatever it was and couldn't and he wasn't willing to communicate that with any went now now you know unfortunately. So let's talk about people outside of the immediate event that are looking in on a family that just experienced suicide in their family.

17:15 I know that, you know, I watched my brothers. I'm not familiar with what one experienced so much, but I know that with the other one, the external judgment and attitude and comments that he experienced. We're really devastating to him. Yeah, that's a terrible thing. I mean, for when when you hear of someone who's lost a family member or a close friend to suicide, the worst thing you can do is task judgment. You don't have the right to do that. You have no idea what's going on in someone's head, someone's family's, someone's situation, and you don't have any right to do it anyhow. To judge somebody else, but especially in a situation like that, that is just not just unkind, it's unconscionable. And by the way, I'm sorry for your losses. I just yeah, it's been like for you, It's been years for me too. So yeah, and that's a whole other story. But you know what, you know, people talk about closure, there's no such thing as closure. You only learn to live with it as best you can, and that's all you can do.

18:25 It becomes emblematic of who you are and you carry that with you the rest of your life. Now, I've taken these darkest days and I'm trying to do something to benefit other people with them by doing interviews like this where someone hopefully is listening and gets it and says, Hey, you know what, I'm not alone, there is help, I'm loved, and I can't do this to my family and my friends. Um So it's it's it's what I try to do to make somebody's life better. And I may never know, and I don't need to know, but we and we really have three audiences here. We've got the audience of people who are making comments or judgment about what's going on. And for those faults, what do you tell them?

19:07 Don't judge anybody. I mean, this is this is a mental health issue, and it's an illness like any other illness in the body, except it's in the brain and whatever's causing it, whether it's chemical or it's peer pressure or it's you know, bullying or feeling inadequate or pts, any of those things. And no one's got the right to criticize or judge somebody else about that. You have not walked their paths or you have no clue what their life was like. So just be kind, be loving, be supportive, and quit the attitude and the comments. All right. And then we have the families. We have the family that is experiencing this, and as you said, you never get over it. But as we talk about what can what are some of the things that here? You are a normal family.

19:59 I was brought up in quote a normal family. I don't think there's any normal there. But but you know, we all are reasonably normal families, and and yet it's still happening. And any thoughts, you know, prevention preventative measures are usually taken when you observe that a child is experiencing difficulty and so forth. But are there some preventative measures just normal, common everyday things that we can do within our family, which we would assume is normal. That might be just that one safeguard against what happened to you and to your family. Yes, And I think that communication is key. I think talking, having an open dialogue and referring to suicide as well, that is never the answer. That no matter what your kids do, they can come to you and you'll support them. And I'm short of happening to come at you with guns and knives. I mean, you know, but I mean realistically, you know, you don't know what's going on in a kid's head.

21:10 And when when our kids were old enough and we didn't know my wife and they didn't know exactly when to broach the subject to let them know about my brother when they were maybe twelve eleven, twelve, thirteen years old, and we knew that it was a time that they could comprehend without freaking out. We told them about my brother, and we also told them that no matter what happens in your life, no matter how bad you think it is, you can always come to us and please, do you know there's always an answer. There's always I mean, I'll be the answer you want to hear, but there's always an answer, and it's always better than terminating your life. And they, you know, we did this, told them this as insurance in a way that they knew they could come talk to us no matter what it was, and even no matter how bad it was or whatever they would do, that we'd be there for them. And that this, you know, that's important because some kids take in a way, the easy way out and just end it if they're not much pain. Well, and I think you've hit on a good point, and you know, this is something that I don't see happening as deeply as I would like to. But this communication, this transparency, the confidence and the trust to be able to communicate with your parents or with a family member or whatever. But that's something literally that the parents really are the ones that need to Number one, realize that you know what communication is key, and how do I how do I develop

22:42 an open transparent communication with my children to the point or with my spouse, or with my friends whoever, that they literally are able to be transparent in their comments and their thoughts and their failings. It takes a lot of trust to go to your dad or your mom and tell you tell them how you're feeling. If you're not feeling good, yeah, emotional. I remember getting thrown out of Temple University. This was after my brother and all that stuff, and I just died. My mind was not on scholarly works. I didn't care, you know, when I was spiraling out of control. So I got the letter in the mail, and I was petrified my father was gonna be very angry, judgmental or whatever, and it was quite the opposite.

23:26 He was there. He supported me. He said, don't worry about it. We'll get your reinstated, which he did. He said, then we're going to take you out and you're going to go to a different school or smre school where you can really get a grip and function and be happy. So parents, kids are afraid their parents are going to judge them because they're they're the parents, that they're the authoritarians in the family. But you know, they have to know also that they're loved and their guidelines, so kids can't go and do whatever they want to do without repercussions. Well, and as you say, they're the parents. But you know what's interesting is they are their parents if they were to open up that communication line number one, and you know for them, how often I mean, I go back and I look at the habits that I've developed. I go back and look at different things, medical issues and so forth. And guess what, I can trace it to some degree back historically to my family through DNA. Right.

24:22 So you know that that's part of the challenge that we have. We have people who have grown up in dysfunctional families, or we have people who have never really learned the art of communication. I had to go to I had to go to school and take courses in communication to learn how to communicate. And and so you know, I think that what happens is we have these families where the lack of awareness the parents may not even be aware that that communication is going on is not really great. Um, you know, child, I want you to do this, you need to do this, you need to do that. Well, guess what that may be creating the expectation that's going to cause the issues. It's possible. I mean, there have to be boundaries and guidelines. I think that the kids have. You have to train them and teach them to do for their long term benefit of growing up as a as a whole person in a society, not to step on them and and criticize them and you know, correct them all the time and tell them no that you're this isn't a way to do it. You're wrong, You're you know, you're you're you know, stupid or whatever.

25:29 Yeah, you don't do that. And I think today parents are so busy in the business world that they're sometimes so involved in what they're doing that they don't always see or communicate with their kids the way they should. I know, my wife always tells everybody when I came home from work, I leave my briefcase at the door. We'd sit down and have dinner and everybody would talk about their day. And that was really important to both of us. You know that we were able to tell the kids what we did, and we wanted to hear how their school day was and what they were doing, and you know, to find out good beta are different, whatever it was going on in their in their daily life. So we always had an open communication, and you know, I think that's really important. Well, and I think the other thing I kind of laugh about this is my dad was a university professor, right and boys classical voice, but he sat down with each of us and said, you will be professionals. I mean, that was it. That was I mean, when I was going to college, is like, all right, I'm going to be a doctor. Am I going to be a lawyer? Am I going to be a you know, whatever that happens to me. Those are the only choices that I had in my mind, right, and with each of my brothers and my little sister, but my brother's same thing, and they each did. And you know, I look at that and I think, you know, were those unreasonable expectations? Probably not? Probably not, because he really helped us to achieve what we're, you know, what we wanted to be able to achieve.

27:00 But there are expectations that create that are so high sometimes that they can create guilt. They can create shame that I'm not good enough, I'm not meeting up to the needs or the standards or whatever that happens to be. How often do you think parents sit down, and you're one of them that has but how often do parents sit down and really discover what are the what are the purposes of that child, what are their values, what is it that they're thinking about? And then do you support them? I mean, here here in Utah, it's horrendous. I know my daughter who's twenty six and is you know, got a master's arene and social stuff and research and so forth. I'm not a social worker, but she tells me that in a particular area of Utah, most of the homeless, or at least many of the homeless or teenagers and then booted out of their house because they're not abiding by the rules and the expectations of the house. Oh yeah, yeah, can you imagine? And yet I think that goes on a lot where here all of these expectations that you have of how someone should be and how they should act, You have your own personal values, But how often is a person able to forego those personal values and listen to a child or a teenager, find out what their values are and then actually as a parent be supportive

28:33 of them rather than creating a sense of guilt and shame because you're not living up to the standards or the values that I have. That makes it really tough. Sure puts a lot of pressure on a kid. I know Ruth was. He went to Temple of University of Night School for a round. It wasn't for him, and my dad said fine, because he knew how good he was with his hands mechanically. He said, build your frame shop on the fourth floor of the gallery and you can make the frames and we finish them, because that was an integral part of our business, the framing and craftsman. You know, he wasn't a professional in a sense of a doctor or you know, a scholar or anything like that, but his forte was mechanical and he would have been amazing. I mean I used to see the things that he would do when he would build, and it was like, Wow, I wish I could do that. I couldn't, you know, But so I think you have to. You have to be aware of your kids strengths and weaknesses and endorse them for the things that make them happy and the things that they're good at, you know, and encourage it.

29:36 It doesn't matter what it is. Suppose your kid wants to go into military or be a cop, you know, dangerous as that might be, you have to support them because that's what's going to make them happy. You know, they have the right to live their life just like we do. And that's I think is really tough sometimes your parents to realize that, you know what, you've got to support your children and their values and what's important to them, and and that can be tough in a certain family. I mean, I'm sure within the Jewish community that's that's got to be a tough one because you do as you say. You have expectations too, don't Yeah, we're people like everybody else. That doesn't matter what the what the cloth is um. You know, everybody has the same issues or it grows up with you know, in families where there are things that go on. It doesn't matter. You know, you could be black, white, Queen, yellow, blue, you know, Catholic, Jewish, Muslim, Protestant, PRESBYTERI.

30:27 It doesn't matter. We're all humans, you know, and we're all connected and we all go through similar paths with variations. But I know that may sound like crazy, but it's not. I mean, you know, there's there's a continuum if you will that. You know, that's a life cycle. And it's tough when you have expectations that you know a kid can't live up to, you know, help them live up to whatever they want to do well exactly. And that sounds so you've written the book. Tell us a little bit about the book you wrote, about your experience and what has been the outcome of writing that book for you. Well, it took a long time to write the book. I knew that I had to write this book because some day we were gonna have kids and they would not know my brother or my father. And initially I wrote the book to memorialize my dad was my hero. But as I wrote the book, and it took decades to write it, because i'd write it for a while, i'd put it down. Was too painful. And my wife had said to me and said, I it's too painful, don't do it. And I said, no, I have to. I have to do this, and I would write it and she said, well, you're intellectualizing. Your readers aren't going to feel any I'm not feeling it, you know again if it's too painful now, So I started over again. I let the emotions come through, you know. I laughed, I cried, I felt all the stuff that I had when I relived all these experiences. And then it became, ah, I can see what's going on here. Now, now I'm starting to feel it. I'm starting to it's going to be a good book. So it took years, and the focus then became greater because it was on suicide

31:59 prevention and survival, because our story with my brother taking his life was a focal point of the book. So I lost two of my heroes, two of my best friends, and I wanted to memorialize them. And then I realized after a while that I needed to do something by sharing this story that might save somebody else's life, because people reading it, hearing about it, might understand the impact of ones taking their life and the trail of pain and that destructive after effects that leaves on people who are close to them. So I went to look for a publisher and everybody said, oh, it's too personal, you know it's I kept thinking, yeah, you ate it. Of course, it's too personal. That's what it's all about. You missed the whole point. So I finally found a woman in Wisconsin who was a publisher. She was referred to me by an entertainment agent in Las Vegas who I knew, and she got it. She said, yeah, let me read it and i'll call you. In ten days. I called her and she said, yes, we want to publish it. I only want you to do one thing, and I said, okay, great. What do we need to do? She said, I want you to rewrite it movie style. Well I heard movie and I got excited because ultimately, for this book, I want to film. I wanted to be in a visual venue so that people can see it. And like, I can't remember the name of the movie ordinary people, you know, And I wanted it to be because some of my friends had told me this sounds like ordinary people. So I said, we'll wait a minute. What's movie style? She said, I want you to write it. I want you to show it, not

33:29 tell it. So she's I'll give you an editor who will show you how to do what she won't tell you to show you. And in six weeks I rewrote it. And what she really wanted was dialogue so that the characters would come to life, and they did. And people would read it and say, oh my god, I feel like I know too much about your family, or I wish I were a part of your family. You know, they got it. They really felt the impact of it. So it came out, and I started to do radio television, in journal interviews, solicited and some not solicit. Someone would come to me and I just felt like this was a path that, you know, I had to take something I really wanted to do. UM that even if I reached one person, And as I said before, I may never know, and I don't need to know. I'm just doing what I know. Is I know what's the right thing to do, because it'll say it right. Yeah. And the book, what is the name of the book. It's called Baderfield, How My Family Survived Suicide. It's on Amazon. It's all over the place.

34:23 If we do a search for Baderfield by Carl David, it'll show up on My website was just re launched. It's Carl dash David dot com and c A. R. L. Dash David dot com. And there's all kinds of stuff on there about the book and why I wrote it, and interviews and podcasts and um that's it's from aside from making a limit as an art dealer, this is what I'm doing well. And you know, you you made a comment you were as you were going through you saying you know and I never know and so and so forth. Have you actually had any experiences so far where you are aware of something that you did that has helped someone to avoid or move away from that emotional level of suicide. I've had a couple of emails where people have emailed me after an interview saying, you know, thank you so much. You have given me a different perspective and now I'm seriously thinking about living. Um. And you know, when I hear that once or twice, that's that's the vindication. I mean, that's validation for everything that I'm doing. It is just that's that's it for me, just knowing that I helped somebody. And there are people that I'm connected with um on LinkedIn who write to me, and you know, one guy was suicidal and um he was very depressed and whatever, and I've been going back and forth with him now for better part of a year, and he thanked me for pulling him out of a dark space. So yes, and and

35:54 but your comment, and you know, that is such a blessing for you to have experienced, because so often we never know. And I think that's something for the audience to really understand that that smile, that hug, that a little small act of kindness or acknowledgement, you never know how that's going to ultimately affect someone, and they may never tell you. But the reality is is that all of those things that we can do that are kind, that are loving, can potentially change someone's life without us ever knowing, moving them away from suicide into deciding to really live a full life. It's true.

36:40 I always tell people when you walk down the street and you make eye contact with somebody, smile, you know, because that one smile, as you just said, may make the difference in whether someone wants to live or not because someone someone cared and they cared enough to anouledge them, and that that, you know, it gives them a sense of being, a sense of warmth and belonging. And I love well, I am this is such a challenge. And again we're talking about situations in your situation where completely normal family, totally caught off guard, never ever anticipated that this is going to happen. Then there are troubled families, where that becomes an entirely different issue.

37:29 Have you found most of your focused is in normal families or are you finding your focuses and troubled families both both. I don't think there's much of a distinction and how you can help someone, because you don't know if the family is normal, you perceived to be normal. Who knows what's behind the curtain, and then vale can be very thin or very thick. And I don't make that distinction. I put it out there for everybody because I can't judge what some family is like, if they're if they're dysfunctional, they're having problems, there's depression, there's you know, gang related stuff. Because there's no family, it kind of doesn't matter. The principles are the same.

38:12 What are you doing specifically, Carl, What are you doing specifically to help these people as you come across them. Well, when I find someone who needs help, I let them know that they're not alone, that there is help for them. And you know there's tomorrow and every day you get, you wake up, you get another chance to do a redo, and that you need to reach out to people. I always tell people if you're feeling that way, you know, call somebody, if it's a family member, if it's someone in the clergy, if it's a bartender, if it's anybody a friend, Because if your family won't listen to your reach out, call nine eight eight. That's a souricide hotline. And it's so important. And there used to be all these other hotlines that had long names and numbers.

38:53 Who remembers them all? But nine eight eight A is a God said, I mean, it's something that's out there now, and you know, it's just it's wonderful because it's easy. There's no judgment you call on. Nobody's going to judge you, will come after you or you know, come knock you up or take you to a mental facility. They don't do that. And that there, if you can talk someone down for ten minutes off that ledge, sometimes you can actually change their mind. You know. I've dealt with some psychologists who have said that there was an organization called Contact up in the Philadelphia area. We're in Florida now, but when we're up there, I did an interview. I did a television show with Lynd Doyle called It's Your Call, and there were three segments, and there was a psychologist who's from contact who said, if you can talk to someone, get them to talk to you for ten minutes, you can usually change their mind unless they're so determined that they're just they're going to do it anyhow. At that point, you know it's nine one one or whatever. If you know someone well and yeah, you've gotten the whole point there is just to open up that communication line with them or get them to get some help. I think that's that's the key. As I've looked at what I'm seeking to do, Okay, just with the behavioral aspect of it, what I recognize is, you know what, there are issues. As I say, that's just a thin slives. My sense is it's really important to help them to understand it's okay to talk to a therapist, you know. And even today's society, although

40:24 that's opening up a little bit more, it's still kind of that connotation of oh, you're going to see a therapist, what's wrong the type of thing, and we've got to be supportive of that and recognized that sometimes the only help that they're really going to get is to be able to work through with a therapist all of the issues that they've experienced from childhood, whether it's abuse or whatever it happens to be. Yeah, and sometimes you can't talk to your family because you're so imbued with all this whatever, negativity, whatever it is in your head. You can't talk to your family because maybe they've flemented some of this. Maybe not, but maybe there's just not listeners and they're the wrong people. And you need outside a third vision, with someone who actually is independent of your family, who can actually work with you directly and find out what's going on, you know, without a familial influence. So you're watching a family that's just a mess, you're saying, a child that potentially is suicidal. How do you talk to that family and convince the parents that they need to get their kids to see a therapist. That's a battle.

41:34 I mean, sometimes they'll listen, and sometimes they'll say, no, you're wrong, you know this is nuts, leave us alone whatever. And that's tough to deal with because when the parents are rigid enough that they don't want to recognize that for whatever reason, they feel they've failed or it's cast aspersion on them because their kids messed up. Who knows. But it's a difficult thing. To do. And then you have to see if you can, depending on the age of the child, see if you can send help for the kid, or you know, reach out and let the child know that you're available for them. It's kind of circumventing the parents and it's a little dicey, but you know, it just depends on the circumstance well, and it is a challenge. It is a challenge to be able to talk to sit down and talk to parents and say hey, let's get some help to your friend. And they're going, well, it's not your business, we're just fine, and type of thing. But for parents, parents, parents, parents that are listening to this, I think the key is open up that discussion, open up that communication line. Get to know your kids and get to support them rather than with your values. Get to support them and their values. Now that's kind of scary sometimes it is, but at least you can if you open that dialogue, you can find out what's in their head. They'll talk if you let them, and you have to listen.

42:52 Listening is key. My father always told me, if you want to make a friend, just listen, you know, let them talk, and frequently when they talk, everything comes out good. Bad and indifferent, and then you can kind of analyze the situation and see if it's something that you can do to direct them. Look, I'm not a doctor, I'm not a clinician, but I live this and I bring to the table something different because I've actually got it in my gut and in my brain. I lived it, and I'm trying to do something to help somebody else so that they don't have to live it. And for parents who have gone through this or families who have gone through it's the same thing. They have to know, you know, how they can deal with it. And we do deal with it. We don't get over it. We all learn to live with it, but we can get through this together. It's just you can't do it on your own. It's too difficult. You know, you'll shut the world out and it's a mess. No, you can and to learn those communication skills. I mean even even you know. I've experienced this with friends that don't spink real good English, and it's really fascinating because they'll say something and normally you know, okay, got it, got it when I really didn't.

44:01 But being able to go back and say, okay, we're going to have a communication, but there's things that I'm not going to understand that you're saying. And when I don't understand, I'm going to ask you to explain that a little bit further. Clarify that a little bit further is that okay, well, yeah, absolutely, because they want to be understood. And what I have found is when you do that, all of a sudden, that opens up back communication lines, so being able to you know, you talk about communication, and one of the fun funniest things and yet is that is they talk about the fact that when someone is talking to you, you're so busy trying to say figure out what you're going to say next, that you're not really listening. And I think you've hit it on the head.

44:45 Is that we've got to learn to be good listeners, non judgmental listeners, and be able to then go back to whomever it happens to be and really number one, acknowledge what they said. Number two repeat back what they said to make sure that your understanding is what they really meant. And going through that type of process I think would really open up a lot. But I mean, how much communication did you learn in school? Not much, me neither until I went back to business school, and all of a sudden there was this huge course on communication, and it's like holy cow, and it was fascinating to see how poorly up to that point I had understood about communication, you know, So I think that becomes key. So, Carl, as we're closing out, what would be the message that you would like to share with the audience today? Excuse me? Be kind to people. If you have kids, listen to them, talk to them, don't judge them, Let them know that you're there for them, you know, physically, emotionally, and spiritually, and that if you see somebody who's having an issue, try and reach out and help. The worst you can do is embarrass somebody by being a little bit overzealous. But if you hear someone talking about killing themselves, giving their possessions away, dropping out of society, not caring,

46:15 becoming completely disinterested, step in and do something. If it's not with them, it's with their family, it's with somebody, because you might save their life. And I think the biggest thing that I can impart is just to be kind, to be nice. This is a tough world we're living in. It's not getting any easier, and we all need to be there for each other, pure and simple. Well, and I think you've hit it on the gate, Carl. Again, this has been a great discussion, and what you're doing from the standpoint of suicidal advocacy to try to prevent that, I think is amazing. And you know, it's just little things like that that some people do that makes all the difference in the world.

46:57 So kudos to you for doing what you're doing. Thank you. I appreciate it. It's not always easy. It's an emotional journey for me back to nineteen sixty five, but I feel like it's something I just have to do or wasted an opportunity to maybe save a life, or save lives or just help somebody. You know, it's just that simple. Thank you, and I really appreciate the time being on your show. You're and you're right. It's not a much easily to do it because as we absorb their emotions, it becomes difficult for us. So it's it's a courageous thing to do. And that's what you've done. How do they find your book, Carl? If you do a search for bader Field be a D E R if I E L D by Carl David It'll show up in a myriad of places digital formats. It's in the Apple I Bookstore, it's in Amazon, Barnes and Noble. And if anybody has a problem getting it, just reach out to me. My email is Carl E. David at gmail dot com and I'm available on my website shows a lot of what I'm doing Carl dash David dot com. All right, Carl, thanks so much, and I look forward to getting you and again in the future and seeing what you're doing and see if you've come into some more insights. Thank you anytime. Appreciate it.

48:06 Doctor. Hey, take care you'd bye.