Tag Archives: Suicide

On May 4th, 2022- Beautiful Black Student, Arlana Miller, Committed Suicide, Leaving Open Suicide Note on Instagram

On May 4th, 2022, a beautiful young Black woman by the name of Arlana Miller wrote her final suicide note on instagram and then took her life. Her family panicked when they saw it, searched for her but to no avail. From what I understand, she was later found in a Mississippi River. In her note, which I will post in full below, she mentions water and peace… I write this with shaking hands, because this should have been known about and spread all over the place on May 4th, 2022.

While her instagram post has been removed, I feel it is important to share it. She shared it; she wanted these words to be heard. And she clearly wanted people to learn from what she went through and learn from what she felt was a hopeless position. Black suicide is rising, especially among children but not solely among children. And 19 years old is not what I consider to be an adult, either. She was under too much pressure, all of which it seems she felt she had to keep to herself.

And that is another reason posting the suicide note she wrote publicly is so vital, in my opinion. More attention needs to go into learning the signs of depression and other mental illnesses, more attention needs to be given to reenforcing the knowledge that it is okay to be depressed, and it is okay to reach out for help when you are anywhere close to the line of feeling suicidal.

There is no shame in mental illness except the stigma associated with it and the community maintaining a taboo outlook on speaking of anything related to mental health. It’s not only a white issue, clearly. She notes that she wishes her granddad was still alive to tell her it’s not worth it, that she is being “stupid”- but he had already passed on, and I suppose she felt she could go to no one else.

I have been surrounded by people who may have honestly thought that I was okay, but I havn’t been okay for a while,”  

She also makes a request of others:

“To the people in my life I pray you learn to vocalize your feelings and get help always!!! I failed at that and I’m afraid it’s too late,”

Who is Arlana Mille?

She was a beautiful Black female attending Southern University and A&M College in Baton Rouge with a major in . a cheerleader and struggled with depression for along time…in her own words,

“May this day bring me peace. I have fought the urge since my early teenage years. I gave this life all the fight I had. To everyone who has entered my life, I’m so grateful and I can only imagine how this may find you. I have been surrounded by people who may have honestly thought that I was okay, but I haven’t been okay for a while.”

She adds further along something every single person needs to hear:

“I hope this teaches everyone to check on your “strong” friends, be present always! I’m contradicting myself but NEVER give up!!! I know that I’m letting a lot of people down by what I’m about to do, but truth is I have already let down so many people throughout my life and it just feels unbearable.

I have no words to express the sadness I feel over yet another loss, a loss which could have been prevented. This is a common problem; silence and judgment from stigma related to feeling their emotions are not worth discussing, or, having no one to discuss them with.

What is more is that this happened on May 4th of this year. I found out about it by chance, why was this not all over twitter? Why is her death silent? Especially after posting a public suicide note. We all know why it is silent; and that is even more reason why I ask you to please share this…

Too many people are suffering in silence just as she was…especially in the Black community. Action needs to be taken, steps need to be made to help destigmatize mental illness and help prevent the increasing number of suicides…

And here is her heartbreaking farewell note, which she posted to instagram before taking her life.

To this beautiful young woman… I hope you have found peace, and I hope your new journey is beautiful and blesses you abundantly. I did not know you personally, but your words and story have left an impression on my heart so that I will never forget you. I am so sorry you found yourself feeling this was the only way, you are forever cherished and loved and missed. No one can take your place in this world; a part of the world is forever gone now and the world will be a little less bright without you in it.

Time To Talk About Mental Health in The Black Community; 12 Books By Black Authors Follow

Black mental health is not taken seriously enough; it is very discouraging and very frustrating but I am hoping the more the community discusses it, the more people will realize that;


1) no, mental health doesn’t make you crazy
2) no, mental illnesss(es) are not for white people only
3) sadly, the denial to talk about emotions & the lack of discussing mental health in the community among Black adults and especially children, is continuing to let suicide run rampant -especially among those whom are not adults.

All Black lives matter, regardless of age, but when we have children as young as 5 and older attempting -succeeding- in taking their lives due to the trauma of racism in America, and bullying at school more often than not. Here is but one story, that of a beautiful 9 year old Black little girl.

Or what about all the missing Black women and girls? Why is there no outrage over that?

It is hard to talk about, but we have legal killings by capital punishment killing the Black community, or stealing fathers from families, much of the time due to self defense, drugs (which the white community is not absent of, so no one has any right to look down on anyone) -drug offenders do not need prison but that is another article- and a multitude of other ‘crimes’ later -far too often too much later- found to be innocent of said crime by DNA testing, but it’s took late because they’ve already been executed by the government. Or released after 60 years of serving a sentence they were innocent for.

And it is as though it’s become so common place everyone just looks the other way. FUCK THAT!

Or the police, who are here to not serve and protect, who are feared by most and how can anyone question why? They do not just murder, I would like to add. The beatings and other cases I have worked on in the past, that I want to update regarding both the victim and the killer(s) or abuser(s), are far more sick than I think anyone understands. Working nationally over 10 years as legal aid and as a counselor to victims I have a lot of confidential incidents I cannot share but there are also no shortage of ones I can share, sadly.

We have gang crime, which, I believe in just another form of suicide, and will go into those details at another time. But it’s taken kids lives, along with the drugs implemented by the government, as they admit or you can dig deep enough yourself to find these truths, if you are willing…

Suicide and self destructive of any sort, be it drugs, alcohol, knives, guns, wreckless behaviors that would get most white teens therapy are ending the lives of those in the Black community.

I focus on the children a lot; but we need the adults to step up initially, I believe, and show these children it is okay to speak about their emotions; show them it is okay to be upset and hurt. We need to educate them more and prepare them… We also need to ensure Black women and men know that they can call on a friend or a family member and reach out when feeling depressed, suicidal or just “off” and know they won’t be judged.

Below are from BlackMentalHealth.com which I hope you will check out as well. For now, here are a few, 12 to be exact… I’ve read many of them, especially Black Pain, number 12 on the list, and highly suggest it…

It’s gonna take Black men and women to first accept mental illness, especially understand how NORMAL it is for the trauma that the American government, school systems and society has caused for hundreds of years! Racism is trauma; and children are being more and more traumatized with Black children under the age of 11 and suicide still steadily rising since the early 1990s.

Black children aren’t going to talk about their problems if they see the adults can’t talk about theirs or if no one tells them it’s okay. Suicide is preventable; mental health is vital and it also impacts the physical but that’s for another article.

Please, consider reading and learning for yourself, for your loved ones and for the kids… For the COMMUNITY. There are far too many methods of legal murder in this country; taking a life by ones own hand should be the easiest one to put an end to as much as possible, if only we are open about it…

Link to books HERE.

New Video Up – Systematic Racism, Trauma, Children and APA Makes A Promise

The past few years I’ve been doing noting but studying, however, to convey and share that with anyone via blog or video was somehow too much. I am in a position in life that has left me lost, but I won’t go on about that. I have decided it’s time I do what I know I am here to do, and so…

There will be some changes to my YouTube page, and in the following video I cover that, I also talk about the American Psychiatric Association and their admission to systematic racism that cost us research which could have potentially helped saved Black children under the age of 10 who are attempting and also succeeding suicide.

They have made a pledge; the link is in the description in the video.

Thank you guys for staying, I hopefully am going to do better this time. YOUR FEED BACK HELPS; good or bad… Please feel free to message me, email me or comment. My email is noctem_aeternamx@yahoo.com

Here is to a new beginning…

Purpose Of This Page

I have to begin this by saying this will be a page for people to reference anytime they desire, simply by clicking “purpose of this page” which is located at the top right and also in the left side panel. I am posting it as a blog because I began this page in 2018 and after too many traumatic events happened, I had to withdraw from almost all aspects of the internet, in consistency anyway.

Now I am back and confident I am ready to begin what I’ve spent so many years working on. Below is the ‘mission’ of this page… Thank all of you who have stayed and been patient as I got lost and found myself once again.

between the world and me

There are so many issues to address I’ve decided to make separate websites for each main topic… The purpose of  this page is to, hopefully, alert people to the urgency of mental illness and mental health in the Black community, speak on different types of trauma, including why racism is trauma and what  poor mental health does to the body physically.

It is not anyone’s fault if they are struggling with mental illness. Racism in the Black community is a cause of a lot of other severe mental health and physical health related issues, too many of them fatal.

There is a great importance in not only accepting mental health but understanding it, and the genuine risk in increasing numbers of suicides, for example… And I want to make this clear, suicide at any age is horrific, but the number of Black children between the ages of 4-12 that are taking their own lives and/or attempting to take their own lives is unprecedented.

It’s no surprise medical research doesn’t have much on this growing problem. This is something I really want to focus on and expose. This number has been increasing over the past two decades silently. Children in this age group are usually not ones to consider suicide let alone act out on it. But they are.

We need to make it a priority to learn about mental illnesses, what causes it, what is sparking these children and what sparks adults, what role does racism play when you have additional stressors such as poverty or abuse or other in ones life and most importantly; what can we do about it.

The point of these posts is to share facts and stories of what is going on right now among adults and children as young as 5 years old. It is to take the worst situations going on with mental health, that which is scarcely spoken on. I hope it will open dialogue among people, help parents, teachers and other caregivers notice signs and symptoms in children and adolescents, but also in grown men and women, too.

Mental health is just as real as any physical ailment, and in too many situations it is proving to be just as fatal. In fact, mental illnesses have physical symptoms more often than not; sadly, most of them lead to dying to early.

The risk is real and the reality of lose of loved ones by their own hand is real. This is another reason  I believe the community needs to get that village mentality as well as we need to see more Black men and women rising up as professional psychologists and psychiatrists. Even if it is just someone in the community who is willing to be open about their struggle; someone for others to go to, someone people know they won’t be judged by…

I have was verbally ‘attacked’ by a white man when I previously said we need more Black therapists. He accused me of separatism. I am not a separatist at all, but as a survivor of many forms of abuse, I do not want a male therapist. It only makes sense to hear people within the community speak of not feeling comfortable with a white therapist.

If you cannot understand this that is your problem; and so let me state it again. The reasons many in the Black community don’t feel comfortable going to a more than likely white psychologist is understandable. One of these reasons;  white people do not typically understand, especially on a personal level, what it is to be Black in America. We need more Black psychologists and psychiatrists. I will be compiling a list for people to access of Black professionals to look into and/or contact. 

Finally, because this topic is very heavy with sadness, obviously, I want to make sure to balance it out with fact and real history. This will be posted originally on another blog which I will post a link to *here* when it is up and running, and I will reblog from it from time to time.

Learning and remembering true history outside of the negative is vital, especially for children. As a warning I will share the horrors of the past and the hidden glory of the past on my other page, for both need to be known. However, I will only be posting positive stories in history here, as I said, this is a very heavy topic.

MENTAL ILLNESS IS NOT SOMETHING TO BE ASHAMED OF; IT DOES NOT MAKE A PERSON CRAZY OR STUPID. Mental health has nothing to do with intelligence, just for the record.

I truly hope this website will serve to help even one person. Coming up soon I will have many resources and information I hope to aid in this current, silent crisis.

And because it is silent, let’s work at changing that and make it off the charts until self love and self acceptance has been achieved, along with the reality of Mental Health.

Racism in Medicine- A Doctor & His Story

white people are hypocritesFirst, I need to apologize for my delay in posting. I am still conducting research and gather works for my larger release on the impact of modern day racism (and in history) and how it is impacting innocent Black children. I have decided, however, because this is a topic that is vital, a topic that rages onward sadly outside of childhood and is a huge health problem in the Black community for men and women of all ages.

Last year this tragic, silent killer was reported by the Center of Disease Control (CDC) showing the biggest increase for suicide risk is between the ages of 5 – 11 years of age in Black children… That takes my breath away. It also fuels me for my other posts that will soon come.

The CDC also released information late last year showing an increase in suicide among the above noted ages in this localized area, rising from 1.78 to 3.47 per every 1 million; at the same time, studies revealed suicide among white kids declined from 1.96 to 1.31 per every 1 million The 4 year study conducted by the CDC there was tragic loss of life; leaving 41 Black males and 73 white males (both groups children) dead to suicide.

There are two books I am currently reading and will soon be posting reviews about. One of them you can read for free if you have Kindle Unlimited. After reading, I will post my review and link to the book so others may learn and share.

Facts on Black suicide

    1. The Centers for Disease Control reported that between 1999 and 2004, young African-American males had the highest rate of suicide.  This latter finding is consistent with research that males are more likely to complete suicides whereas females are more likely to attempt suicide.
    2. The American Association of Suicidology reports of the 1,992 completed suicides among African-Americans that 371 of those deaths were by females.
    3. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) reported the following statistics for 2010:
    4. Suicide was the 16th leading cause of death for Blacks of all ages and the 3rd leading cause of death for young Black males ages 15–24.
    5. Althoughl Black suicide rates are lower than the overall U.S. rates, suicide affects Black youth at a much higher rate than Black adults. Suicide is the third leading cause of death among Blacks ages 15-24.
    6. Since the Black community in the United States is disproportionately young, the number of deaths among youth may have a particularly strong impact on the Black community.5. Black Americans die by suicide a full decade earlier than White Americans. The average age of Black suicide decedents is 32, and that of White decedents is 44.
    7. Caribbean Blacks had a higher rate of suicide attempts than African American Blacks.  On the other hand, another study found that among adolescent males, African American Blacks were approximately five times more likely than Caribbean Blacks to attempt suicide.
    8. Religion: Orthodox religious beliefs and personal devotion have been identified as protective against suicide among Blacks. Participation in organized religious practices, such as church attendance, is linked to lower suicide risk in African Americans. Among Blacks with psychiatric disorders, religiosity has been found to delay age of onset of ideation as well as decrease the number of psychiatric disorders.
    9. Social and emotional support: Family support, peer support, and community connectedness have been shown to help protect Black adolescents from suicidal behavior. Similarly, positive interactions and social and family support have been shown to significantly reduce risk for suicide attempts among Black adults. Although emotional support from family decreased the risk of suicide attempts for both Caribbean Blacks and African Americans, the impact was stronger for Caribbean Blacks than for African Americans.

Those are but a few facts on suicide within the Black community, but the information is not only available, I believe it is a necessary need for all. I must end this here, but I urge you all to check out the following book by Doctor Damon Tweedy, listen to the short interviews and then go buy the book yourself!  🙂 It looks like a tragedy when people are just trying to escape the unspeakable pain. While stigma towards mental illness(es) may be bad enough regardless of race or what-have-you, it seems they want to break us all down sometimes. And we cannot let that happen. Mental health care is just as save63

With all the stigma surrounding mental health, especially in the communities that struggle to, or refuse to, acknowledge the severity and risk so many men carry daily … it is time for, yet again, action…

There is a ton of information I had to post but I must leave now. I urge you to watch these videos, check out the book and I shall post the free one to as soon as I am able 🙂

Until Next. zoom in and check out the other book I am about to go start reading right now.

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255.

Rant: White People, You Are Not Victims

heartbreaking
Absolutely heartbreaking truth

My mind is blown; and it angers that I am not surprised but still I remain absolutely stunned that people truly go about their lives not caring for the plight of others, regardless of age, because it does not impact them. What appalls me even more is the claim that they are not racist, that is one of the first things most of these sort are ready to shout. The second and equally detestable remark these sort of people (who sadly seem to be a majority as of right now) deny they have any sort of privilege due to being white. Or better yet, those who claim that “white genocide” is happening and white people are the victims of this racist society.

I don’t know if it is brainwashing -I believe this to be an excuse; think for yourself! Or perhaps it is some form of denial because it is a disgrace, it is very hurtful to know how unjust and cruel people can be; especially when you are not the one being treated bad. The guilt and shame is almost overwhelming; I loathe the treatment of my light skin and am not afraid to call people out on it when I see my friend or family being treated differently; there is no excuse for it! 

I don’t know what in this universe could justify these forms of treatment to other people simply because of skin color; but here we are. Facing it, accepting it and all of its ugly facilities is the first step; speaking out is the next, I believe.

That all being said, in accordance with the research I am doing on how racism impacts Black children in both the short and long run I came across an article a moment ago that has me in a fury. The post began and repeated itself in saying that “researchers are not sure why suicide has risen in Black youth recently” – really? Either they are absolutely disconnected with reality or the media is, as the mainstream media is trying to brainwash white people. I am sad to say it seems like it’s working. Which is why it is so vital we make sure we get the TRUE STORIES, THE TRUE HISTORY AND FACTS out and spread it to as many people as possible. Truth will win in the end, and it’s time we ALL start doing whatever we can to end this extremist government and society.

As for the article I speak of, yes, they did manage to speak reputable research and give true facts, they did what most mainstream media does; find a way, any way to make sure it is not the white person to blame.

It doesn’t take an intelligent person to realize how disgusting this system is. Just a person with a heart/soul and even just an inkling of awareness to the current tragedies.

I will post some of the stories of these tragic young deaths in the upcoming future, I would do so now but I want to be able to write with full attention on the child or adult for that is the least I can do.

Coming up shortly is part 2 in the series about racism and it’s psychological -as well as physical- impact on children and later on, adults. 

*Also I will be posting photos and links to children who have died over racist bullying but were never mentioned -to my knowledge- by anyone other than local media…when lucky.*

Why Is No One Speaking About Racism & Suicide?

” Scientific evidence is now overwhelming that the early years of life are foundational to health and wellbeing, as well as to social, educational and economic success, throughout life. “

This is going to be a series of posts as doing it all in one may be overwhelming… I have been studying neuroscience and the developmental stages of the brain for 10+ years. Currently I am working on a book regarding the development of the brain and the different stages under different circumstances… Racism is one of the worst and most obvious problems facing non-whites, and Black children are suffering for it more than anyone in the media or even activism speak about. Be it out of ignorance or lack of a soul, the problem remains. So I hope to shine a bit of light on it and maybe, hopefully, do some good…

I share this because the developmental stages are crucial,  and the fact very few people in general, let alone in public policy, ever stop and think about what racism is doing to Black children… The first topic I am working on is sadly morbid but also sadly highly ignored by most of America.

From having to worry for their own safety to that of their caregivers and loved ones, the constant stress  -among other things- obviously impacts mental health…but what exactly is it doing? And what can be done to stop it?

Besides having little ones in my life who are “Black”, I also have worked with numerous at risk children, most of whom were also Black. Recently, since some of the police killings have finally made the mainstream news, I was working with one 10 year old little boy whom, after Tamir Rice’s death, refused to leave his home for any reason. He was certain he would be next…

Ten years old and that is what he is thinking about.

I know the topic of mental health in general is a taboo topic… But it is just as real as any physical ailment -if not worse- and if we could manage to get over egos and look at these problems perhaps we wouldn’t have so many people self loathing and at the saddest extreme, dying.

black children racism

Strictly speaking from a mental health point of view, an alarming number of Black children between the ages of 5 to 12. *It is important to note here that while suicide is the fourth leading cause of death among all children between the ages of 10 and 44 it is not the time people are most at risk. According to research and statistics adults in the age group of 45-65+ have the highest numbers when it comes to suicide.

Among others, JAMA Pediatrics released a study further discussing the rise in suicide among Black children, in part stating:

Continue reading Why Is No One Speaking About Racism & Suicide?