Heidi, Will & Woody: “Let’s have a chat about suicide, shall we?”

Heidi, Will & Woody decided to stray from the breakfast radio narrative this morning to open a conversation about a controversial topic.
 
“My frustration levels are peaking because I don’t like getting beaten by something and I feel like right now, as a population, we are getting beaten by something because it’s not getting better, it’s getting worse – we’re talking about suicide,” Will said.
 
“We’re just going to try and raise as much awareness and create as much impact into those people’s lives as we possibly can right now.”
 
With Australia’s suicide rate the highest it’s been for at least ten years, Heidi, Will & Woody felt passionate about opening up the lines of communication about such a universal struggle.
 
“It’s the number one killer of men, if we’re talking about male depression, of men under 54,” Heidi said.
 
“This is a conversation that everyone is too afraid to have.”
 
This sentiment was echoed by co-host Woody, who expressed his own struggle to talk openly about depression and suicide.
 
“It makes me very, completely uncomfortable, I can’t explain why, that’s just how I’ve been brought up and I have been brought up to go, that’s taboo, don’t mention that,” he said.
 
But we should be talking about it.
 
Listeners of the show responded quickly to the topic, expressing encouragement and support, as well as sharing their own stories all over the show’s social media.
 
“The reason I want to talk about suicide is because we spoke on the show a couple of days ago about male suicide and the response that we had was immense,” Will said.
 
One of those listeners to reach out to Heidi, Will & Woody was caller Kylie talking about her husband’s battle with depression:
 
“It almost seems like men are too proud, I know he saw himself as weak for admitting that he had a problem.”
 
The conversation has only just begun for Heidi, Will & Woody as the team commits to engaging more with the topic of suicide and the people struggling with it.
 
If you need help now, call Lifeline on 13 11 14.

Click here to hear the story.
 

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