Donald Trump might have been the candidate you were rooting for, but if he wasn’t, and especially if you are part of a minority or marginalized group, this has likely been a tough week. According to the Washington Post, the call volume to a number of suicide hotlines and crisis lines was way above average Tuesday and Wednesday. We wanted to share an excerpt from the Washington Post’s article, along with a link to the full text, as it includes links to all of the crisis resources it mentions. If you’re in the greater Cleveland area and find yourself struggling with depression, anxiety or suicidal thoughts, we hope you’ll reach out for support. We are here.
The outcome wasn’t certain, but in the 60 minutes that seemed to stretch for much longer between 1 and 2 a.m. Wednesday, while the swing states deciding our next president flipped between red and blue, the phone at the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline rang 660 times.
People were scared — for their rights, for their safety, for their children.
They were thinking about taking their lives.
It was an unprecedented volume for that hour on a Wednesday — 2½ times the average — which is perhaps unsurprising when you consider the extreme levels of anxiety Americans feel during election cycles. They watch, overwhelmed, as the nation’s game plan changes overnight. They seek reassurance.
But this cycle, and this candidate, stoked fearful calls unmatched in the hotline’s history.
“We didn’t see numbers like this in 2008 or 2012,” Lifeline director John Draper told The Washington Post. “This was an extraordinary year by any stretch of the imagination.”
And the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline was not the only crisis center to experience an influx.