The following archived articles relating to my SPAN and SOS involvement have appeared in Nevada newspapers. They are listed by date, with the latest article appearing first. I have included the web site address of the article where it appeared, so that you may easily read the full context. After clicking on the article to review, simply click the "back" command or button, of your browser ( you may also left click the mouse and choose back ), to return to this page.
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2003 Monday June 23, 2003 - Las Vegas Review Journal
Suicide prevention
Linda Flatt says she can finally breathe a little more freely. After six years of lobbying the Nevada Legislature, the Henderson mom was finally successful earlier this month when Gov. Kenny Guinn signed a bill establishing a statewide suicide prevention program. "It's been six years of hard work," Flatt said.
2002 Suicide survivor helps her peers
Wednesday June 5, 2002 - Las Vegas View
In 2000, 282 people killed themselves in Clark County. Year after year, Nevada has the worst suicide rates in the nation, more than twice the national average. One woman out to make a difference is Linda Flatt, a dental hygienist whose son Paul took his life when he was 25. Paul was a lab technologist who worked with the Environmental Protection Agency. He took home chemicals, mixed them to make cyanide gas and inhaled the fumes. He found a release from earthly life. Flatt found a quagmire of guilt. Read more.....
EDUCATION PLAN: Lawmakers see suicide crisis among teens
Saturday March 23, 2002 - Las Vegas Review Journal
Teachers should be trained to detect signs that students are considering suicide, several legislators said Friday. Assemblywoman Sheila Leslie, D-Reno, said she was horrified that the Department of Education does not require teachers to take special courses or receive training in combating suicide.
Suicide of son gives mom's life a new meaning
Sunday, December 01, 2002 - Las Vegas Review Journal
The suburban mom from Henderson did not set out to become an activist, the kind of person who is sought out for quotes or who travels to Washington, D.C., and Carson City to lobby legislators and testify in committee hearings. Indeed, after more than five years of undeniable activism, Linda Flatt is still uncomfortable with the label. "I certainly don't feel like an activist," she said. "But if it can happen to me, it can happen to you."
This article also appeared in the Suicide Reference Library
2001
Religious groups often unsure just how to deal with suicide
Sunday, November 25, 2001 - Las Vegas Sun
By Stacy J. Willis: Linda Flatt's son, Paul, had a gambling problem. Sports betting. Lots of debt. He got behind on a bank loan. He sold his belongings, however meager they were. He had some trouble with his girlfriend. He threatened, once, to commit suicide if she left. His girlfriend called his mother and told her about the threat. Flatt sat him down and asked him, "Are you suicidal?" "No, I was just kidding," he said. Read more.....
Stopping suicide: Nevada lags behind nation in prevention programs
Sunday, November 25, 2001 - Las Vegas Sun
By Stacy J. Willis: Terri Greenfield's husband, John, heard voices. They were "like country-western songs" stuck in his head, repetitive. He was detoxing. It had been three days since he had come off a drinking binge. At 25, she said he was trying to quit for good. Terri sought mental-health care for her husband at the Veterans Administration hospital. He was put on a waiting list. On the third day of his sobriety, she and their 2-year-old child found him in the garage, dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Read More....
Photo
Sunday, November 25, 2001 - Las Vegas Sun
Photo by: Lori Cain / Las Vegas Sun: LINDA Flatt, a community organizer for the Suicide Prevention Advocacy Network, holds a quilt at her home that she made in 1998 to honor the survivors of people who committed suicide. Her son Paul Tillander's photo is one of several photos on the quilt.
REMEMBRANCE: Left Alone
Sunday, May 06, 2001 - Las Vegas Review Journal
By Sonya Padgett: Families who lose loved ones to suicide struggle with memories, try to help others. For those who think suicide affects a single individual, think again. It is estimated that one suicide can have lasting effects on an average of six people. Experts say survivors are anywhere from 3 to 9 times more likely to commit suicide than those not touched by it.
2000
Calling for help
Thursday, March 9, 2000 - Las Vegas Review Journal
By Joan Whitely : Suicide-prevention experts say more needs to be done to reach vulnerable people.
Las Vegas generates the lion's share of suicides in Nevada, which has ranked for 11 years as the state with the highest suicide rate in the nation. But Las Vegas, by several measures, lags behind Reno in suicide-prevention efforts. The local suicide-prevention hot line has only one incoming phone line; the Reno-based hot line has six. Sometimes the Las Vegas center, which advertises itself as a 24-hour service, has no one to answer the hot line.
Suicide drop fails to hearten experts
Friday, February 4, 2000 - Las Vegas Review Journal
By Glenn Puit : A decline in 1999 in Clark County means little given the state's overall high number of those killing themselves, activists and officials say. For the first time in three years, the annual number of suicides in Clark County has dropped, according to statistics compiled this week by the Clark County coroner's office.
SUICIDE: New study may lead to better understanding and prevention
Tuesday, Febuary 1, 2000 - Health Surfing.com
Produced by Mark Kadin, reported by Lucky Severson, and story by Julianne Remington, this aired on national TV. The site has a complete reprint of the article, with photos, and includes a link to down load the full video that was shown. "The grieving process for family and friends is different than with other deaths," says John Fildes, M.D., trauma surgeon in Las Vegas and co-investigator of a new $5 million, 3-year study aimed at preventing suicide. By uncovering the detail thoughts, motives and events that precipitate the desperate act, Dr. Fildes and colleague Tom Shires, M.D., hope to develop new strategies to reduce the incidence.
1999
Event to examine suicide prevention
Monday, October 25, 1999 - Las Vegas Review Journal (last article)
A conference aimed at developing ways to help family members of suicide victims cope is set for November in Las Vegas . The first Suicide Prevention Conference will seek to put family members of suicide victims into the prevention process. U.S. Sen. Harry Reid, D-Nev., whose father took his own life, is expected to speak. The conference, which is being organized by the Las Vegas chapter of the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, is scheduled for Nov. 20 at the Las Vegas Veterans Affairs Center, 1700 Vegas Drive at Martin Luther King Boulevard. "It is high time we deal with suicide as a major health problem and provide services for high-risk individuals and their families," said Dr. Rena Nora, chief of psychiatry at the veterans center. The conference will take place with others in New York, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Atlanta, Miami, Chicago, Houston, Los Angeles and Portland.
Calls To Suicide Hotline Up
( Tuesday, May 04, 1999 : front page of the Sunbin section of the Las Vegas Sun - 2nd article ).
When two teenagers killed 13 people and themselves at a Colorado high school two weeks ago ( in April 1999 ), Dorothy Bryant saw an increase in the number of calls to the Las Vegas suicide hotline.
The suicide rate in Clark County has not improved in the six years since Linda Flatt's 25-year-old son took his own life. "It happens in Nevada at twice the national rate," said Flatt, who has become an activist in suicide prevention since her son killed himself over gambling debts. "The reasons for this are complex. "This is a very transient town. People have access to addictive processes. People come here with high expectations and not much of a support network. When their expectations are not met they don't have family or support."
Two years ago in 1997, Flatt became a community organizer for a national group called the Suicide Prevention Advocacy Network, established in 1996 by a Georgia couple whose daughter committed suicide.
Clark County suicides rise to record 286 in '98
( Saturday, April 24, 1999 : Las Vegas Rewiew Journal ).
Another year, another rise in suicides. Statistics released Thursday (April 22, 1999 ) by the Clark County coroner's office show 286 people killed themselves in the county in 1998, a record high and 14 more suicides than the previous year. When shown the statistics, suicide prevention advocates said the blame lies mainly with the lack of a comprehensive strategic plan in the county to offer immediate, low-cost outreach services to those considering suicide. Without such a program, the numbers will only get worse, they said. "We need to stop crunching numbers and start making this a people problem," said Henderson resident Linda Flatt, who has been intensely lobbying state and federal officials to try and get more money devoted to fighting the public health epidemic.
Pair Fight Suicide Problem
( Monday, March 01, 1999, in the Las Vegas Review Journal ).
In November, ( see article below ) Las Vegan Terri Greenfield and Henderson resident Linda Flatt told of how they have transformed their grief into a grass-roots commitment to try and reduce the rampant suicide problem in Nevada. Greenfield's husband killed himself in 1994, and Flatt's son took his life a year earlier. Next week, they will travel to Carson City to urge the Senate Human Resources and Facilities Committee to pass Senate Concurrent Resolution 11, which would acknowledge the magnitude of the suicide problem and commit the state to developing a plan to address the public health epidemic.
1998
Support Group Aids Those Left Behind After Suicide
( Wednesday, November 25, 1998, in the Las Vegas Review Journal ).
When Linda Flatt's son Paul Tillander committed suicide five years ago, part of her died with him. The eternal question "Why?" buried with the 25-year-old laboratory technician, Flatt began torturing herself with questions: "What did I do wrong? Could I have been a better parent? Why did he do this?" Unable to get answers or emotional support from local suicide support groups, she created her own.
Las Vegans Raise Suicide Awareness
( Monday, November 16, 1998 : front page of the Nevada section of the Las Vegas Review Journal ).
Three valley residents who have lost loved ones to suicide work to save others from the same fate.
Flatt, Greenfield and Tarantino are three of a countless number of people in Clark County who have lost someone to suicide. The three hope that by telling their stories they might be able to increase awareness about the 272 people who killed themselves last year in Clark County, and the fact Nevada has the worst suicide rate in the nation year after year. "It happened to my family and I'd prefer to see it not happen to anyone else," Flatt says.
1997
Holiday Stress Push Many To The Edge
( Friday, December 26, 1997 : front page of the Sunbin section of the Las Vegas Sun ).
Bright red poinsettias, shiny baubles dangling from pine boughs, packages wrapped in colored paper -- it's all a part of that cheery holiday image so commercialized this time of year. But not every home is happy. For countless souls, the holidays bring nothing but the blues.
"Holidays are trigger times for survivors' bereavement. It is a reminder of the loss," Flatt said. "Suicide survivors, along with survivors of murder victims, have a bigger grieving process to go through because not only are they dealing with loss and death, but also the choice of the person who died, and the social stigma, the embarrassment, it brings out, and not wanting to talk about it."
Return to current articles
| The Glass Door | An Unplanned Trip | Unanswered Questions |
| The Forgiveness Road | Basic Plan For Survival | Picking Up The Pieces |
| It's A God Thing | Anniversaries | Anguish to Activism |
| Striving To Beat The Odds: A Widow's Perspective |
Left Behind: A Daughter's View |
Healing Poetry: A Daughter Writes To Her Father |
