Young gays at greater risk of suicide

Young gay people are four times more at risk of suicide than straight youths and in the LGBT community in Galway City alone five people have taken their lives in the past three years.

The shocking figures prompted Amach, the support group for the Lesbian Gay Bisexual and Transexual (LGBT) community, to organise a meeting to discuss the range of supports and services available in the maldron Hotel last weekend.

They also hope to formulate a plan to try and prevent deaths, explains chairperson of Amach, Nuala Ward.

“Nationally suicide is a huge concern for everyone regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity but in particular for the LGBT community it has become a particularly devastating issue,” she stated.

“Our hearts have too many times been broken by the loss of friends to suicide. Over the last few years particularly, the problem seems to have escalated and caught us all off guard.

“In our own community here, we’ve lost at least five people in the last three, maybe four years and they’re not teenagers, they were people who were out.”

Amach recently organised an intergenerational creative writing project and what clearly emerged from that was the massive difference in experiences for older and younger community members.

“For older LGBT people, there can be alcohol abuse, major mental health issues, they feel very isolated in an already isolated rural setting. We have facilitated groups around the county for older people called Silver Rainbows but if we have it in a local hotel they worry about being seen.”

The workshop was given by the suicide bereavement group, Console, and the HSE suicide prevention officer Mary O’Sullivan.

“This is one of the issues that kept coming up in the interagency group, it’s one of the things we want to address and start a conversation with the community about, to figure out what steps we need to take to prevent this happening,” explained Nuala.

“We want to come up with some kind of a plan that we can roll out for the resource centre as soon as the doors open.”

Amach has received funding of €25,000 from Galway City Council and €45,000 over three years from the St Vincent De Paul’s Maureen O’Connell Fund towards establishing the resource centre. The latter prompted an outburst from the Bishop of Galway Martin Drennan, who threatened to withdraw the Church’s support for the charity in light of the donation.

The support group estimates it needs to raise a further €35,000 to open the centre on a volunteer-basis.

They have earmarked five premises where a centre could work. One of the biggest logistical concerns is accessibility so that people feel comfortable dropping in even if they are still ‘in the closet’.

“There’s an 85% chance we’ll be open by the summer. We will get it open and build on that with a view to having it open more often. A community development support worker is vital to get it organised and develop our long-term aim of becoming self-sufficient rather than running it 24/7 on a voluntary basis.”

Contact info@amachlgbt.com