Mother creates website after son's suicide

ST. LOUIS -- Near the end, when Alex Barker Permutt did not have the mental fortitude to get out of bed, he would open his laptop, log on to what was then the fledgling social network site Facebook, and scroll through his news feed.

He would see the successes of his friends from John Burroughs School and Amherst College, where he was hit hard by depression his sophomore year.

Friends smiling broadly in photos. Friends proudly announcing their acceptance into law school. Life moving on.

Three times Alex tried to get through his sophomore year at Amherst, where he had a girlfriend, wrote for the school's political journal and seemed to excel in an academic environment that complemented his love for the classics, science and mathematics.

But the illness kept holding him down. After five years of various forms of treatment, he took his life on Feb. 3, 2007.

He was 24.

"It's a permanent wound in your heart," said his mother, Sally Barker.

But one she was not going to let destroy her.

So she set out with a group of Alex's friends to help break down the stigma that comes with suicide, and build a social network that could help connect young people struggling to find their way, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported.

The result is known today as FeelingKindaBlue.com, a Facebook-like social networking site for those struggling with thoughts of suicide or other mental health issues. From "I'm having a bad day" to "I don't want to go on," the site allows young adults to share experiences, realize they are not alone, lean on one another.

The site is monitored 24/7 by counselors who intervene when appropriate. Less than a year after launch, the site has been recognized as one of the most comprehensive online tools for helping those struggling with depression and other mood disorders.

"Medication and therapy only go so far with the problem of social isolation," Barker said.

Alex felt that isolation even as he was trying to interact with friends through Facebook. "That was difficult because all of his peers were in graduate school, being successful. Obviously, he wasn't, and that was very hard on him," Barker said.

Now, Barker's site is attempting to turn social media on its head to benefit those like her son.

"It gets people out of their shell and into a community they can relate to," said Haliday Douglas, a high school friend of Alex's. "I absolutely think the site is about coming as you are. It's very much the opposite of Facebook or Twitter."

The site, operated by Provident, a mental health counseling agency in St. Louis, went live in November and has more than 2,300 members in 50 states. The target group is young adults, ages 18 to 28.

Getting it off the ground took six years. At one point, a partnership Barker had formed with an agency crumbled, sending her back to the drawing board.

"It was not easy to implement," said Barker, a lawyer from University City, Missouri. "There was a lot of resistance to the idea."

Agencies worried about liability, including Internet "trolls" who might log on to the site to maliciously encourage destructive behavior. Other organizations doubted their ability to monitor the site responsibly and questioned whether such a site would be effective. The influence of social media's reach was still in question.

"There were no best standards for a website like this," said Heather Barnett, life crisis services director for Provident. But the agency was confident it could work.

Dr. Luis Giuffra, who treated Alex, said creating a website where young adults can find others experiencing the same feelings is an invaluable tool.

"Millennials are the Internet generation, so it's natural for them to gravitate toward social media," said Giuffra, a professor of clinical psychiatry at Washington University. "Depression sinks people into dark holes, and isolation is a big part of depression. With young adults, it's very important to have social connections."

Seeing young adults using the site to connect has been gratifying, Barker said.

"Let me underscore, it's not supposed to be a substitute for medical therapy," Barker said. But "to find others in the same situation and to be able to communicate with them can be helpful."

Provident oversees around-the-clock monitoring of the site, which includes a mix of volunteers and employees. A counselor or social worker is always on call to help with questions or intervention.

Through the end of September, 1,096 calls had been made to a hotline listed on the site.

"We ask everybody who calls if they are having thoughts of suicide," Barnett said.

Forty percent of callers, or 438, answered yes. Crisis workers ask follow up questions such as "Have you done harm to yourself?" and "Do you have something with you such as a firearm?" Usually, Barnett said, the calls are from someone who simply needs to be heard.

"A lot of times just being able to talk to someone improves their outlook tremendously," Barnett said.

Based on the assessment, a crisis worker checks back within an hour, a few hours or the next day.

In 14 cases, police were contacted to check on a person in distress.

In April, the website received an innovative programming award from the American Association of Suicidology "for effectively reaching out to young adults."

One woman, using the screen name Lifeisabowlofcherries, called the FeelingKindaBlue site "heaven sent" in a blog post on Oct. 9.

"It feels so good to have an outlet to spill my guts. I don't have anyone to talk to at home," the woman said, detailing a litany of relationship and family health issues.

Quickly, she got responses of support.

"Your strength is so inspiring," wrote another member. "I'm glad you like it here, because I like you being here."

Vicki Dolan lost her daughter Carolyn, 19, to suicide 21/2 years ago. Now, as a board member of the local chapter of the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, she spreads the word about FeelingKindaBlue, even to those who don't want to hear about it.

"I finally got to the point that I was going to do whatever little bitty thing I could do," she said. "You never know if you are succeeding. You'll never know if you kept them from doing something or pointed them in the right direction.

"But it's OK, You've got to try and hope to God that somebody's life is saved."

When her son was wrestling with depression, Barker and her then-husband exhausted every avenue to help him.

"My son was receiving the best medical treatment offered," she said. "We felt privileged to be able to afford that kind of help. There is so much in the mental health field not covered (by insurance). We spent in excess of $100,000."

The fight to help their son also took an emotional toll on Alex's parents. During his treatment for depression, Barker and Dr. Alan Permutt, a leading diabetes researcher, divorced. Their son's battle wasn't the sole reason for the split, "but it didn't help," Barker said. (Dr. Permutt died in June 2012.)

Alex's treatment included outpatient treatment at McLean Hospital in Massachusetts. One weekend, 90 minutes away from the psychiatric center, he checked into a motel room. Alex decided he could not go on.

He was among the roughly 38,000 people who die by suicide each year. It's the third-leading cause of death for those ages 15-24 and second among those 25-34.

"People don't send you a get-well card when you have a mental illness," Barker said. "People don't know what to say or do."

Alex's obituary listed his cause of death as major depressive disorder.

"Some people were uncomfortable with that," Barker said. "You don't hide it if your child has cancer or a broken leg. There's no reason to hide mental illness. Even if I tried to hide what had happened, it would only reinforce the stigma."

Douglas, the friend from John Burroughs, still gathers with friends each year to remember Alex. They meet in autumn, when Douglas celebrates the cooling temperatures and changing colors with a party. Since his friend's death, the celebration also has become a birthday party for Alex, born on Nov. 4.

From 80 to 120 people show up. There is a birthday cake, and stories of Alex's wry sense of humor and love of politics are shared.

"There are people there that don't necessarily know Alex but me, but it's hard to forget a central part of your life," Douglas said.

On this birthday, like those before, Douglas will log on to Alex's Facebook page. He will post a message on the site where Alex struggled years ago to avoid the isolation that ultimately was too much to handle.

Information from: St. Louis Post-Dispatch, http://www.stltoday.com