Suicide awareness topic of Oct. 11 program

by Dennis Dalman

editorial@thenewsleaders.com

The public is invited to a free program called “Suicide-Prevention Awareness” at 7 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 11 at the St. Francis Xavier Church and Gathering Place in Sartell.

The guest speaker will be Roxann Storms, a clinical social worker; and Tim and Mary Boerger of Elk River, parents of a daughter who took her own life at age 16.

Trained professionals will also be available for consultation and/or referrals.

The program will share how to recognize signs of suicide and how to prevent it. Information will be shared through videos, personal stories and factual presentations.

There will also be time for a question-answer period, fellowship, prayers, refreshments, professional assistance and referrals.

Among the professionals will be Tina Kunkel from the National Alliance on Mental Health; Molly Wiemann, the Text for Life coordinator at the Central Minnesota Health Center; Adam Vande Vrede, Sartell school-resource police officer; Richard Schultzetenberg, a member of the Surviving Schizophrenic Mental Health and Wellness group; and Charles Kalkman, a registered nurse.

Storms

Guest speaker Roxann Storms is a licensed independent clinical social worker and a Fellow in Thanatology. She holds a master’s of clinical social work from St. Catherine University/University of St. Thomas and her thanatology certification from the Association for Death Education and Counseling. Storms is very involved in grief-and-loss services in central Minnesota.

Storms is a member of Granite City Counseling LLC, of Waite Park.

As a social worker, she consults with places such as Granite City Counseling; and Northern Pines Mental Health Center Inc., Little Falls.

The Boergers

On a very cold day, Dec. 14, 2006, Mikayla Boerger, who was only 16, took her own life in Otsego.

Her family (parents Tim and Mary and little brother Kellen) was, of course, devastated by the terrible unexpected loss.

There had been no reason to suspect Mikayla was feeling anything but happy. She loved ice-skating and volleyball, she enjoyed her friends and was a typical seemingly care-free teenager.

“While we thought we had the perfect family, something else was happening,” said her father, Tim, in a story in the St. Cloud Visitor newspaper earlier this year. “We do not know what it was. She never shared that she was feeling sad, hurting or frustrated in any way. It must’ve been a terrible hurt . . . We were blindsided that at 16 her life was over. [Her suicide] has changed our lives forever.”

The Boergers, who now live in Elk River, sought support from local grief groups and joined the Suicide Awareness Voices of Education program. They have since shared their tragic story with many others and want to help others prevent suicides.

“Now we have to live life like Mikayla would want us to,” Tim Boerger told the Visitor. “It’s therapeutic to talk about it, to say her name. We are never going to make her death ‘worth it’ but we are going to try to make something good come out of it.”