West Los Angeles College
Teenage Suicide Rates Skyrocket
Isabella Dominguez
Abnormal Psychology
Doctor Canales
December 13th 2017
Teenage suicide is a mournful topic that plagues lives in multiple ways. Not many people
witness the impact of suicide first hand and therefore do not understand the emotional turmoil
and after effects. On the 24th of November in 2015, I woke up on my living room couch after a
long night of celebrating with peers to a text message from my best friend, Ariel. I read the
message that was sent two hours before my awakening stating: “Chayse killed herself”. Chayse
Hannah Vance, my blue-eyed, free-spirited, beautiful friend who I had spent numerous hours
creating art with had shot herself in the head with a Colt Defender .45. Days before, we hopped
in her baby-blue 2014 Mustang at lunch time and headed to Starbucks after I found her crying in
the attendance office beginning to leave campus. We discussed our depression, her poor family
dynamic, and how we would go to Winter Formal together the following month. She attempted
suicide unsuccessfully with OxyContin that night and was admitted to the hospital days before
her attempt with the handgun. She was left home alone and unattended with several loaded guns
one day following her release from the hospital, and she ultimately decided to take her seventeen
year old life. The daunting image of my friend’s organs sprayed across the pink walls and her
soulless body laying upon her queen bed will always remain in my mind no matter how much
time has passed. Fortunately, Chayse was young, healthy, and an organ donor; she assisted more
than five people who had sight and muscle complications. We made a plan to draw yin and yang
tattoos for each other, not so much as friend tattoos but more because we loved each others
drawing style and the message of balance the symbol holds. Now, I have an exact replica of a yin
and yang drawing done by Chayse on my left arm. As a reminder that she will forever keep me
balanced and safe. Our conjoined art pieces will continue to hang on my walls no matter where I
am located and her loving spirit will carry on.
For lifetimes, homicide was the second leading cause of teenage death in America. But as
of 2015, suicide became the second leading cause, surpassing homicide (Jarosz). That fact
creates the new statistic of teens dying more often from suicide than cancer, heart disease, AIDS,
birth defects, and chronic disease combined (“Facts”). There has been a significant change in the
world to cause adolescents to turn to taking their own live. Scientists are seeing more and more
people under eighteen develop depression or anxiety due to stress, which has a close correlation
to suicide (Bruno). In 2015, the rate of teenage suicide skyrocketed in The United States of
America doubling the amount of victims from 2007, which can be attributed to the stress of
tragic events happening in economics, technology, and national security.
Teenagers were given the title of being dramatic and hormonal, but with the devastating
events that occur in today’s world, it takes a tough toll on the children living through it. Stress
