Dear President,

My name is Allie and I am a freshman in high school. Teen depression is an important thing to pay attention to. Many teens struggle with depression, but as a team we can work together to prevent more lives from taken from us.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                               Many teens base the emotion of the situation on how comfortable the person they’re telling their emotions to feel. In this situation, make sure to listen, look serious, but never judge. Let them know they have someone that they can trust. Lecturing someone who is in a dark place has never helped anyone. If someone thinks that depressed teens can’t tell when they are being silently judged, they are wrong. A job as a friend, parent, counselor, etc. is to guide their depression into the light, and show them that they are an important part of this world. My point is, if someone decides to open up and tell someone that they are depressed, no one has the right to judge them. They told someone because they trust that person. It’s not worth it to judge them, only for them to take their lives. If someone they are telling feel emotionally comfortable they will feel comfortable.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     Use the little light they have left to encourage them to fight against darkness. If someone walks into the shoes of depressed teens, they may feel like they are locked behind bars, they are looking for the keys to be freed to the light. Basically, that right there is what depressed teens feel every single day. Life, life is only broken, it is full of emotion, this goes to everyone but for depressed teens, this gets worse and worse to the point where they may want help, but they may not know how to ask for help. A lot of teens feel so sad, mad and angry, to the point where they just give up their control to their minds and bodies. What they might not know is that somewhere deep inside is confidence, so they can use that to fight for the right to have control. In the article, “What are the risk factors” written by Nadine Kaslow, a psychologist , “One of the myths of suicidal talks, and actual suicide attempts, in young people is that they are just a bid for attention”. Basically, Nadine Kaslow is saying, that people who suffer from depression, most likely don’t get enough attention from their families, or don’t have a really good friend to talk to about their situation. Kaslow also says, “It’s important to respond to threats and other warning signs in a serious and thoughtful manner. They don’t automatically mean that a child is going to attempt suicide.” In other words, Kaslow is trying to say that when a teen threatens to kill themselves even when they have threatened to kill themselves before, then every time they say it, you have to take them seriously. Anything can happen at any moment, so it’s important to pay attention. 

Respectfully,