Susan Tellone began her career as an oncology nurse – caring for and comforting many patients in the last stages of their life. Part of her role was to help them face the inevitable.
She had seen survival instinct in its rawest form.
“It took me time to get them to relax and let go of life,” she said.
A supervisor, seeing her empathy and excellence, staying at the bedside of patients long after her regular nursing duties were done, encouraged her to go into psychiatry.
An untold number of New Jerseyans — thousands upon thousands — are grateful she did.
Tellone now serves as the clinical director for the Society of the Prevention of Teen Suicide — an organization in Freehold that not only works with teens but teaches others how to do so.
She told a packed room Wednesday night at the 24th annual Evening of Excellence event by the Mental Health Association of New Jersey that she teaches the two universal truths around teen suicide:
- It is not a desire to die; it is a desire to end the pain that they are experiencing;
- It is preventable.
“When I got to psychiatry and started hearing about children wanting to die, after I had seen that survival instinct in its rawest form, I could not let people go,” she told the crowd.
“I knew that when I heard about children wanting to die, that goes against our human instincts. And I knew right then and there that it was preventable. And I have dedicated my work to that, knowing that suicide is not a desire to die, it is a desire to end the pain that they are experiencing.
“I don’t think it takes high degrees in psychiatry to become part of the solution. What it takes is your humanness. It is your kindness. It is your heart. It is recognizing that they need to be asked a question, just a simple question: Have things gotten so bad that it’s hard to live anymore? Are you thinking about dying?
“And if we all do that for all the people in our world and recognize their pain, we can all save a life.”
On a night that honored numerous honorees and offered numerous stories about the heroic work those in behavioral health have dedicated their lives to doing, Tellone’s words stood out.
The concept of communities working to prevent what is second-leading cause of death of teens — especially during a time of the untold trauma of the pandemic — epitomized the efforts of everyone in the room, champions all in the behavioral health community. People such as Connie Greene, an SVP for the RWJBarnabas Health Institute for Prevention and Recovery, who was recognized for her leadership and pioneering work in behavioral health.
Under her leadership, the RWJBarnabas Health Institute for Prevention and Recovery has emerged as a national leader in prevention, intervention, recovery, tobacco treatment and workforce development, recognized for its exceptional training and educational programming.
Groups such as Uwill Mental Health & Wellness, which was honored for its outstanding leadership in revolutionizing the mental health support landscape, particularly in addressing the mental health needs of college students.
The group, which has a first-in-the-nation partnership with the state to support all students enrolled at 45 participating New Jersey colleges, has more than 13,000 students registered on the platform and has scheduled more than 49,000 sessions with its diverse network of licensed mental health providers.
Amazingly, 61% of students who registered on Uwill’s platform had not previously sought counseling at their institutions, and 79% of institution staff acknowledged that the partnership has enhanced their ability to provide after-hours mental health support.
All of this goes back to Tellone’s premise: It takes all of us to help save one of us.
Tellone offered a call to action.
“What I’m saying to you all is, we need to partner together,” she said. “I started my career in medicine, I will end my career knowing that I’m going to educate nurses, doctors, dentists on the front lines.
“We have now begun the work in hospitals, because we have that natural, organic relationship with everyone that walks into that hospital, but we haven’t always been trained how to ask the questions and, more importantly, how to hold the space to listen to the answer to the question.
“Tonight, I’m saying to you, we can count how many we have lost, but we will never know how many we’ve saved. But I know that every single person in this room has saved someone, and from the bottom of my heart, I thank you.”
