'Don't let a bad day become a bad week'
The Cavan office of SOSAD has provided almost double the number of support sessions in 2024 as it did four years ago, and the local service is already on course to achieve its busiest year to date helping clients in need.
This was just one of a series of startling statistics shared with members of Cavan County Council who listened to Independent Brendan Fay say that charities such as SOSAD are struggling to survive without a steady Government income stream.
The worry is that, without the necessary funds, the volunteer-led suicide prevention and awareness charity and others across the country might not see Christmas.
Cllr Fay’s motuion asked the council to write to Minister of State for Mental Health, Mary Butler, and the HSE so that they might consider financially supporting groups like SOSAD who he said do “vital” work in the community.
“A lot of small charities who do a lot of good work don't get government funding,” outlined Cllr Fay, who volunteers with SOSAD, and says the biggest drain on resources are costs such as light and heat.
He said across their six offices - in Cavan Town, Drogheda, Dundalk, Laois, Monaghan, Navan and two sub offices in Carrickmacross and Mullagh - SOSAD had seen 1,652 individual clients up to last Friday, October 10.
To put into perspective, the Belturbet rep said, SOSAD saw 1,646 clients for all of 2023.
In Cavan alone, SOSAD has seen 228 clients in 2024 and offered a total of 2,496 client sessions.
The local office meanwhile saw 253 people in 2023, and that number looks set to be surpassed this year, Cllr Fay told last Monday's October monthly meeting.
Across the network of SOSAD offices, he revealed the number of client sessions offered in 2024 is up by more than 22% on 2023, and close to 50% compared to 2022.
He outlined too that the demographics has also “changed”.
The vast majority of people making contact with SOSAD in 2024, nearly two thirds, were now women (64.52%). Non-binary, transgender, other and those who preferred not to say accounted for less than one per cent. The rest identified as male.
Nearly one in three presented to the SOSAD service meanwhile reporting depression or low mood (29.98%), with the other top five issues suffered from being anxiety (19.2%), relationship difficulties (10.55%), bereavement (8.96%) and some form of personal trauma (5.21%).
Just over three per cent of people presented with either suicidality or 'dual diagnosis'.
More than half of the people who contacted SOSAD were considered 'Low Risk' in 2024, but close to one in 10 fell into 'High Risk' category.
Messaging was another way clients made contact with SOSAD, which provided 300 hours of service so far in 2024 to 94 clients covering 591 chats, with the top difficulties discussed being depression and low mood, anxiety, relationship difficulties and sexual identity. Of those who messaged SOSAD, 81% were women.
Helpline
Since January, the SOSAD helpline had provided 152.5 support hours, compared to 106 hours in total in 2023.
Cllr Fay said that funding is a constant worry for SOSAD, and he hit out at the thousands of euros spent on “quangos”, which could otherwise be diverted to supporting local charities doing work in their communities. “What ever money is raised, it stays within the community,” stressed Cllr Fay.
He further stated the HSE and other organisations often referred people to SOSAD for support.
Sinn Féin's Damien Brady said this was a matter that was “close to home”.
He opened up to the meeting about the death of his brother Aidan to suicide in September 2017. “I know the devastation that suicide leaves behind. The unanswered questions. I did the training here at the council, and still we never see it coming.”
The Ballyconnell man stated that, if funding “saves just one life, then it will be worth it.”
Independent Ireland's Shane P. O'Reilly commented that, in his line of work, as an undertaker, he too witnesses all too often the unbearable sense of loss that descends on a community after a death by suicide.
He commended the work being done already in Mullagh, which operates a one-day per week service at the St Kilian Heritage Centre. It now operates with three counsellors, and Cllr O'Reilly stated that a “massive issue” that needs addressing is rural “isolation”, especially within the elderly community.
He blamed the “after effects” of Covid, that has led to a “departure of people from one another”.
“SOSAD means so much to so many, but it only needs to mean something to one person to make a difference,” he surmised, adding that Cavan continues to have one of the highest death by suicide rates per capita in the country.
“If SOSAD closes it's a shame on us all,” stated Cllr O'Reilly, who asked that the Fianna Fáil councillors might help facilitate for a delegation to meet the Minister Butler.
“It needs to be hammered home just how much SOSAD does for us.”
Fianna Fáil's Patricia Walsh sadly remembered when her own Cavan Town community was bereft by two suicides weeks apart. “That money should always be in place.”
The motion was unanimously supported, with Cathaoirleach TP O'Reilly concluding: “There is not a community in the country that has not been affected by suicide.”
CONTACT US
SOSAD Cavan is based on 26 Bridge Street, Cavan Town.
The drop-in centre in Cavan is an informal place where anyone can pop in from 10am to 3pm, Monday to Friday. It can be contacted on 049-4326339.
A 24-hour helpline is available by calling 1800-901-909.