Hometown Community Alert
Fayette County GA March 5, 2022
In the first 60 days of 2022 Fayette County has experienced ten suicide losses bringing the total to 58% of our worst year in 2019. With 300 days remaining in the year the community is currently trending to have a suicide rate that is 233% higher than any previous year. Now is the time to get the training that saves lives. AFM offers the Intervene Challenge powered by the Listen Learn Lead curriculum for all community members. Take the training or better yet organize an event for your community gtroup.
In the first 60 days of 2022 Fayette County has experienced ten suicide losses bringing the total to 58% of our worst year in 2019. With 300 days remaining in the year the community is currently trending to have a suicide rate that is 233% higher than any previous year. Now is the time to get the training that saves lives. AFM offers the Intervene Challenge powered by the Listen Learn Lead curriculum for all community members. Take the training or better yet organize an event for your community gtroup.
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AFM's LOSS Team is an Active Postvention Model that responds alongside of first responders who go to the scene of a suicide and provide support and referral for those bereaved by the suicide.
The goal of the LOSS Team is to shorten the elapsed time between the death and survivors finding the support they feel will help them cope with this devastating loss. The LOSS Team Active Postvention Model has shown to have a positive impact in helping loss survivors through the bereavement. The model has now been replicated in countries as diverse as Australia, Singapore, Northern Ireland, Canada and America. |
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Background and Call to Action
by Kenneth Lou Koon
Coweta Fayette LOSS Team Captain
In September of 2013 my friend and mentor, Frank Campbell, Ph. D invited me to attend the national LOSS Team Conference in Columbus, Ohio. LOSS is an acronym for Local Outreach to Suicide Survivors. Dr. Campbell developed the first LOSS Team in 1998 in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. He was looking for a way to encounter survivors of suicide as soon as possible so they would know (1) They are not alone and (2) Where help is available in their community that other survivors of suicide had found helpful.
His hope in my attending is that I would be inspired to bring the concept back home to Georgia. Listening to the survivor’s stories and hearing Frank’s passion and vision; I knew that LOSS Team would become an integral part of our mission at AFM. For two years we shared the vision with all who would listen. It was a challenge. AFM was still a relatively new start up nonprofit and our work within the First Responder community was still in its infancy. Then in August of 2015 I met Chief Janet Moon, the new Chief of the Peachtree Police Department. Her being a former Army MP and me an Army Chaplain, we immediately connected and implemented the LOSS Team concept in the Peachtree City Police Department.
A few months later in January of 2016 the concept was put to the test with the suicide of a veteran at the intersection in front of Longhorns Steak House where we were meeting friends for dinner. Our friend walked in the restaurant where we were waiting and immediately informed me of the loss. A few minutes later the Chief called. “I responded I am already there.” That evening an officer and I went to the home of the mom and dad. Over the course of the next two weeks, I conducted more than a dozen counseling sessions with individuals who were traumatized by events at the intersection and we provided support to the family to include conducting the memorial service.
In August of 2016, AFM hosted the first LOSS Teams Conference in the state with participants coming from across the east coast. As a result of this conference LOSS Teams were planted in Massachusetts and Florida that are now actively engaged in their communities. In March of 2018 the first LOSS WALK was conducted in Fayette County to honor the memory of community members that we have lost to suicide.
My greatest desire is that our community did not need a LOSS Team, unfortunately the need continues to grow every month. Therefore, this is an urgent call to our community. Reducing suicide takes an entire community. Get the training that saves lives. Take the Intervene Challenge and together let’s build a culture of hope and health. Become part of the network of care. Secondly, support AFM’s LOSS Team as a financial partner. AFM is a nonprofit organization that relies completely upon the support of community members that believe in the mission. Your support ensures that the LOSS Team remains mission ready when called upon to serve.
by Kenneth Lou Koon
Coweta Fayette LOSS Team Captain
In September of 2013 my friend and mentor, Frank Campbell, Ph. D invited me to attend the national LOSS Team Conference in Columbus, Ohio. LOSS is an acronym for Local Outreach to Suicide Survivors. Dr. Campbell developed the first LOSS Team in 1998 in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. He was looking for a way to encounter survivors of suicide as soon as possible so they would know (1) They are not alone and (2) Where help is available in their community that other survivors of suicide had found helpful.
His hope in my attending is that I would be inspired to bring the concept back home to Georgia. Listening to the survivor’s stories and hearing Frank’s passion and vision; I knew that LOSS Team would become an integral part of our mission at AFM. For two years we shared the vision with all who would listen. It was a challenge. AFM was still a relatively new start up nonprofit and our work within the First Responder community was still in its infancy. Then in August of 2015 I met Chief Janet Moon, the new Chief of the Peachtree Police Department. Her being a former Army MP and me an Army Chaplain, we immediately connected and implemented the LOSS Team concept in the Peachtree City Police Department.
A few months later in January of 2016 the concept was put to the test with the suicide of a veteran at the intersection in front of Longhorns Steak House where we were meeting friends for dinner. Our friend walked in the restaurant where we were waiting and immediately informed me of the loss. A few minutes later the Chief called. “I responded I am already there.” That evening an officer and I went to the home of the mom and dad. Over the course of the next two weeks, I conducted more than a dozen counseling sessions with individuals who were traumatized by events at the intersection and we provided support to the family to include conducting the memorial service.
In August of 2016, AFM hosted the first LOSS Teams Conference in the state with participants coming from across the east coast. As a result of this conference LOSS Teams were planted in Massachusetts and Florida that are now actively engaged in their communities. In March of 2018 the first LOSS WALK was conducted in Fayette County to honor the memory of community members that we have lost to suicide.
My greatest desire is that our community did not need a LOSS Team, unfortunately the need continues to grow every month. Therefore, this is an urgent call to our community. Reducing suicide takes an entire community. Get the training that saves lives. Take the Intervene Challenge and together let’s build a culture of hope and health. Become part of the network of care. Secondly, support AFM’s LOSS Team as a financial partner. AFM is a nonprofit organization that relies completely upon the support of community members that believe in the mission. Your support ensures that the LOSS Team remains mission ready when called upon to serve.
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LOSS WALK March 2018
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