Via Deborah Teramis Christian.

A long piece with a simple message: human connection makes a difference.

Originally shared by ****

“I think people die when they feel completely alone.”

The most pivotal response was sent by a study participant who lived in an apartment in San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury district. The man, who 18 months earlier had written a “kiss-off” letter, now described himself as a broken vase held together by his own hands. His letter spanned five single-spaced typed pages and read as if it had taken days to write. Forty years later, Motto could remember the first sentence: “You are the most persistent son-of-a-bitch I’ve ever encountered, so you must really be sincere in your interest in me.” There it was, a perfect encapsulation of the study’s aims. Motto called it “the bingo letter.”

After about four years, Motto and his team had enough data to determine that their work was unprecedented in the history of suicide research. In the first two years following hospitalization, the suicide rate of the control group was nearly twice as high as that of the contact group. And it wasn’t only that no other experiment had ever been able to show a reduction in suicide deaths. Motto had also demonstrated something more profound: People who attempted suicide and wanted nothing to do with the mental health system could still be reached.