Walking for a Cause: College’s First Out of the Darkness Walk
Al Stone-Gebhardt & Eli Styles | October 25, 2023
The American Foundation for Suicide Prevention (AFSP) hosted a community walk at Warren Wilson College (WWC) for the first time on Oct. 20, bringing together friends, family and supporters under its banner.
Roughly two hundred community members gathered at Morris Pavilion on Warren Wilson College’s (WWC) picturesque campus. Many donned beads around their neck in solidarity with suicide prevention.
In an informal tour of WWC’s campus, the walk took participants from the pavilion, past Gladfelter, down the road, by the Pew Learning Center & Ellison Library and Morse Science Building. Finding themselves parallel to the gardens, walkers eventually entered the farm trail and looped around the plots of land back to the pavilion.
Participants walked for many different reasons; some for the loss of a parent, child, spouse, first responder, sibling or relative. Others walked to support those who struggle or attempted, to honor the LGBTQ+ community or because of personal struggle and/or attempt. All walked in support of suicide prevention.
Suicide and mental health conditions affect thousands. The AFSP seeks to educate communities and facilitate dialogue to destigmatize mental health.
Co-chair of the walk, Rob Hlavaty, lost his father to suicide in 2017 and spoke about how conversations around suicide avoided the topic entirely.
This inspired him to pursue advocacy and encourage open dialogue surrounding suicide.
“When I share my experience with people [and] say, ‘Yeah, my dad died by suicide,’ the conversation goes something like: ‘I'm so sorry to hear that.’ And that's kind of the end – we don't know how to talk about it,” Hlavaty said. “AFSP has a program called Seize the Awkward. And it's all about not being afraid to ask awkward questions — that's what I try to be a proponent of when someone tells me their son died by suicide. ‘What was his name? When did you lose him? What did he like to do? What do you miss the most about him? Has that been hard for you since it happened, have you had your own struggle since then?’”
Hlavaty connected with Becky Stanford, the head women’s lacrosse coach at WWC, to coordinate the event on campus.
Additionally, Hlavaty emphasizes the role community plays in what he calls healthy grieving and how crucial it is to destigmatize mental health struggles.
“To be connected to a student community is really important,” Hlavaty said. “The earlier that we can start having conversations like this, the more we can spread awareness and [ensure] people understand how to talk to those who have been through [mental health struggles].”
Rob Hlavaty also runs a podcast called Writing on the Walls to promote prevention advocacy. He combines community — mental health clinicians, researchers, folks who have attempted and those who have lost a loved one — with dialogue around suicide education.
For freshman Abigail Harris, it was her second Out of the Darkness community walk. She heard about the walk from her mother and has a personal connection to the event.
“When it's individual, you only know your point of view,” Harris said. “But if it's community[-oriented], you can see lots of different points of view. It gives a broader view of the different forms that [suicide] can take in everyone's life.”
Harris walks for her father, whom she lost to suicide in 2017.
“I went on one of these before,” Harris said. “It was really nice because one of my teachers [walked] with me. So it's nice to see how many other people have been impacted by similar things; it’s kind of uplifting [that] everyone [joins] together, even though we're all tired and sweaty afterward.”
Though a multitude of community members showed up, few WWC students did. Freshman and aspiring social worker Elena Wheeler helped set up the event and took part in the walk.
“For me, the walk was a way for me to be intentional and focus on suicide awareness,” Wheeler said. “Mental health and community is something that's really important to me. I appreciated how Out of the Darkness was a group effort and that I could help, feel supported and also support.”
Wheeler is active around WWC as a member of the Bonner Leaders Crew and the swim team. She emphasized that it allowed her to address mental health struggles, even though those feelings often go unexpressed.
“I find that my life can feel really busy,” Wheeler said. “And I just go, go, go and I don't always think about mental health. Whenever there is an opportunity [to] be like, ‘Hey, I'm going to be intentional and think about mental health and support and show up and be present,’ I like to do that — that's something that we overcome, and so I'm working on feeling comfortable, continuing to talk about it, continuing to foster hope and [having] confidence in my journey as well as learning from it.”
Another student participant in the walk was senior Rae Milstead, a photographer for The Echo Newspaper. Much like Harris, this was Milstead’s second Out of the Darkness walk.
Last year Milstead walked in Asheville. For this year’s WWC walk, they were walking specifically for their sister, though they have lost many loved ones to suicide.
“My brother’s death made me feel angry and sad, but my sister’s death made me vengeful,” Milstead said. “She was this incredibly sweet, creative person and she was torn away from this world.”
Milstead is passionate about suicide prevention. They heard about the walk last year from their soccer team and were glad that it took place on campus this year. They hope that the walk stays on WWC’s campus in the following years and that WWC continues to work toward educating the community about suicide awareness and prevention.
“I went to Texas A&M, and the suicide rates there were high,” Milstead said. “It was the same at my high school. There was one instance where a guy jumped off the third floor in front of everyone and the school never addressed it. Warren Wilson is better because of how close-knit we are, but the college is better at prevention talk than having the difficult conversations.”
In the future, Milstead hopes that WWC will do a better job of fostering conversations surrounding suicide. They hope for better support for students struggling in classes due to mental health issues and for increased Narcan accessibility and education on overdose-based suicides.
Walks and other events promoted by the AFSP seek to address mental health education and further interventions and resiliency surrounding suicide. You can find an event at Out of the Darkness Upcoming Events.
If you are struggling with suicidal ideation or need to talk to someone, please consider reaching out to hotlines such as 988, the Trevor Project at 1-866-488-7386, the LGBT National Hotline at 1-888-843-4564, or the Crisis Text Line by texting “Hello” to 741741.
