In a five-day period in early June eight girls were brought to New Milford Hospital after what hospital officials call suicidal gestures. The girls, all between 12 and 17, tried a variety of measures, including heavy doses of alcohol, over-the-counter medicines and cuts or scratches to their wrists. None was successful, and most didn’t require hospitalization; but at least two, according to the hospital, could have been fatal. Their reasons seemed as mundane as the other happenstances of suburban life. “I was just sick of it all,” one told a reporter, “Everything. Life.” Most ‘alarming, emergency-room doctor Frederick Lohse told a local reporter that several girls said they were part of a suicide pact. The hospital later backed away from this remark. But coming in the wake of at least six teen-suicide attempts over the previous few months, this sudden cluster – along with the influx of media – has set this well-groomed suburb of 23,000 on edge. At a town meeting last Wednesday night, Dr. Simon Sobo, chief of psychiatry at the hospital, told more than 200 parents and kids, “We’re talking about a crisis that has really gotten out of hand.” Later he added, “There have been more suicide attempts this spring than I have seen in the 13 years I have been here.”
Sobo said that the girls he treated didn’t have bad problems at home or school. “Many of these were popular kids,” he said. “They got plenty of love.” But beneath the reassuring signs, a swath of teens here are not making it. Some say that drugs, both pot and “real drugs,” are commonplace. Kids have shown up with LIFE SUCKS and LONG LIVE DEATH penned on their arms. A few girls casually display scars on their arms where they cut themselves. “You’d be surprised how many kids try suicide,” said one girl, 17. “You don’t want to put pain on other people; you put it on yourself.” She said she used to cut herself “just to release the pain.” Some see therapists and reel off brand names of antidepressants as if they were types of shampoo. A slight redhead, 14, said she’s taking Zoloft for depression, Ritalin for attention deficit disorder and Trazadone to help her sleep. Her friend, 15, added, “Everyone I know has been at 6 West” – the teen psychiatric ward at Danbury Hospital. “We’re not Generation X, we’re Generation Depressed.”
Emily, 15, a friend of three of the gifts treated in June, said one was having family problems, one was “upset that day” and the third was “just upset with everything else going on.” She said they weren’t really trying to kill themselves – they just needed attention. As Sobo noted, “what’s going on in New Milford is not unique to New Milford.” The same underlying culture of despair could be found in any town. But teen suicide, he added, can be a “contagion.” Right now New Milford has the bug – and has it bad.
