Estimated read time: 9-10 minutes
This archived news story is available only for your personal, non-commercial use. Information in the story may be outdated or superseded by additional information. Reading or replaying the story in its archived form does not constitute a republication of the story.
IDAHO FALLS, Idaho (AP) — Ally Harrup's mother pushed her to make silly faces at other people's babies in public. To be the kind of girl who laughs loud enough for the whole bookstore to hear.
Patricia Harrup was the "mom taxi" to Ally's friends, someone who gave them rides everywhere.
She told Ally to speak the truth even when her voice faltered. Patricia's voice, soft-spoken and often shy, remains a comfort in Ally's memory.
Patricia Harrup, 46, died two years ago after prolonged illness when Ally was a sophomore at Idaho Falls High School, the Post Register reported (http://bit.ly/1Wj5kNQ).
"I thought that when a parent died it was like the movies, all beautiful, like my mom was in a better place. And then I realized it's not even close," Ally, 18, said.
Patricia's death triggered Ally's generalized anxiety and panic disorder. She thought she had stomach problems for a while because she always felt like throwing up.
"At first it didn't hit me. 'OK. This is weird. My mom is dead now.' Then six months later I was hit with my very first panic attack," Ally said.
She still gets them. At times Ally can't breathe, can't speak, can't think. Extremities ache and buzz; her heart races. Sometimes Ally has to call in to her job at Papa Tom's Pizza and tell them she's going to be an hour late to work because she can't safely drive.
"The first panic attack I saw," said Dana Wolford, Ally's closest friend, "Ally was hyperventilating on my bathroom floor, dry heaving. I sat and cried with her. I had no clue how to help."
The anxiety brought depression. It became hard for Ally to get out of bed in the morning, to go to school and socialize.
She cut herself, and had suicidal thoughts.
"I had no idea I'd be susceptible to mental disorders. To me it was the way most people think about cancer. Maybe you know someone who had it, but that could never happen to me," Ally said.
Apart from her own experiences, Ally has seen the effects of mental illness around her community. It's claimed friends.
For her senior project, Ally created an informational presentation about mental illness and suicide in an effort to educate people and shed some of the stigma associated with them.
"People say 'it's all in your head.' Well, that asthma is all in your lungs; the drowning is all in your chest," Ally said. "People would care more about suicide if they stopped thinking it was a choice."
Idaho's suicide problem
While other major causes of death decline in the U.S., suicide rates continue to climb, this year hitting a 30-year high according to a report released in April by the National Center for Health Statistics.
From 1999 to 2014, suicides increased by 24 percent. It isn't known why numbers have grown since tapering down in the '80s and '90s.
Idaho resides within the "suicide belt." Coined by Temple University Sociologist Matt Wrey, the belt refers to a string of western states — Idaho, Wyoming, Colorado, Nevada and Utah — with suicide rates far exceeding the national average.
In 2013, Idaho had the nation's seventh highest suicide rate. Among Idahoans ages 15-34, it's the second leading cause of death, according to the Suicide Prevention Action Network of Idaho.
There's no clear explanation why so many Idahoans commit suicide, though the stigma of weakness associated with mental disorders likely plays a part.
"I think it's just our culture. We're told from a very young age: don't cry, suck it up, rub dirt on it. So if we have these feelings and emotions that aren't accepted, then people aren't as likely to ask for help," said Jeni Griffin, the Suicide Prevention Network's executive director. "Also, we lack horribly for good, affordable mental health care in the state."
Griffin believes there's a breakdown in care for people who seek treatment for their disorders. Part of that, she said, comes from inadequate professional training.
"A lot of our counselors and professionals are not currently well-educated in suicide prevention assessment," Griffin said.
Many individuals who receive treatment for mental health disorders don't receive follow-ups from counselors or doctors. That can mean therapy, medication or a support network beyond the initial treatment.
"After someone goes home, what are their resources?" Griffin said. "After a crisis, triggers can set that person off again."
There's also the problem of getting people to see counselors or doctors in the first place.
"Most people go in and have physical health checkups twice a year, and they're more worried about having their teeth cleaned than having their mental health assessed," Griffin said.
Subsequently, a lot of people don't seek help.
Presenting her emotions
One of Ally's friends committed suicide last June. Another friend did the same a few months later. Another followed about six months later.
"I've noticed that suicides can come in strings. One person kills themselves, and others see how much someone is missed, and it almost gives them the courage to do it," Ally said. "I'm just waiting to hear about the next one."
Ally didn't realize she had anxiety and depression until some friends noticed symptoms.
"When her mom passed it was like a light switched in her brain," Wolford said. "Days after her passing Ally looked dead. She was lifeless. She'd sit in her room and think about all the things she never got to say to her mom."
After her fifth or sixth panic attack, a friend gave Ally a Xanax. (The prescription drug is used to treat anxiety and panic disorders.) She freaked out; the panic worsened.
"After that, I realized this isn't how I should deal with this," Ally said. "I'm trying pills from my friend. This is not a good idea."
Ally also has seasonal affective disorder. The first winter after Patricia died was difficult — dark at 5 p.m., cold, gray, cloudy.
A doctor prescribed Lexapro, an antidepressant, but it didn't help. It evened out Ally's emotions, she said, but she also couldn't feel happy. She spent her days in a fog.
"Once she was on it for a while she thought she was going crazy. She started experiencing derealization," Wolford said.
Ally quit taking the drug in March. Since then, she's developed breathing exercises for panic attacks and worked through different cognitive therapy for her depression.
Though she has more tools for dealing with abrupt emotional swings, some things still are triggers. In May, she went dress shopping for prom, and broke into anger in the dressing room.
"My friend told me to calm down and asked if I was OK. And I finally realized that my mom should be here; this is crap," Ally said.
She plans to study psychology at Boise State University in the fall. She wants to become a grief counselor.
Ally created her presentation to show peers that many struggle with anxiety and depression.
"A lot of people who deal with the stigma of mental health and depression, you isolate yourself and you don't think anyone else really deals with it," Ally said. "It's like a weird little secret club almost when you realize somebody's not OK."
She gave the presentation several times in February to Holly Frazier's Taylorview Middle School eighth-grade health class and Pat Lloyd's Idaho Falls High School sophomore health class.
Ally specifically wanted to target an audience that could relate to her through similar academic and social pressures.
"Just look at the suicides happening just this year with our youth," said Mitzi Ellingson, Ally's project mentor and past science teacher. "Nobody wants to talk about it. I've been doing this job for 21 years and it's just gotten more and more evident. Kids have to be someone they don't know how to be, and it stresses them out."
Some students who listened to the presentation in Lloyd's class looked disinterested, eyes glazed over. But many were attentive.
Others in Frazier's class showed more involvement.
After hearing the presentation, several crying students approached Ally and hugged her. Others passed quiet thank you notes and scuttled away. Ally told some of the students to text her if they needed anything. Others messaged her on Facebook.
"My students were very moved by Ally's presentation. She's so passionate about the topic and it comes through," Frazier said. "It was very emotional for some as Ally shared some personal stories of friends she lost to suicide this year. Many of my students also knew them."
Moving forward
Learning to cope with her loss over the past two years, Ally found no solace in pity.
"When my mom died, people would approach me almost the way you would approach a wounded squirrel," Ally said. "My mom wasn't a tragedy. Her death might have been, but that's not all she was, and that's not all I am."
And although medication and therapy work for many, they didn't for Ally; the latter was too invasive.
For Ally and Griffin, an important step to mitigate mental illness is simple, mundane compassion.
For those struggling with depression, it can mean reaching out to someone. For a friend or loved one, it means recognizing warning signs. Basically just caring.
"Something as simple as a phone call or going to coffee with somebody. Checking in gives them some kind of purpose — they feel like they belong," Griffin said.
Through months of panic attacks and bouts of depression, Ally takes comfort in warm weather and blooming flowers. Also the friends and family who will go skateboard with her, or take off on a drive east into the hills.
"If it weren't for those people reaching out and taking care of me, I'd probably be long gone. That's the only thing that kept me around," Ally said.
Her goal isn't to get rid of the anxiety and depression; Ally's goal is to cope with them. Good things will continue to happen, just as the bad will.
"And admitting that was very scary, because no matter how hard I work to make everything in my life perfect, the anxiety will never go away because it's a part of me," Ally said. "I just want to grow. And know I'm handling my anxiety better than last winter."
___
Information from: Post Register, http://www.postregister.com
Copyright © The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
