Larry Bernstein, a licensed clinical social worker and facilitator of the Triangle Survivors of Suicide (SOS) in Raleigh, offers this advice for suicide survivors:

• Seek support. Find empathetic listeners among your family, friends, neighbors, church or local professionals. Not everyone is up to the challenges of helping you through this sudden and difficult loss. Support groups like SOS can be a lifeline. Grieving can progress quicker with others' help.
• Educate yourself about grieving. Learn how others have made their way through the journey. Understand that each person's experience is unique, but there are common threads.
• Take care of yourself. It's not unusual for people dealing with the death of a significant person in their lives to grieve for one or two years. For suicide survivors, it may take three or four years because of the trauma and additional suicide-related issues such as stigma, guilt and shame. Do things to increase your energy level and help you sleep, such as exercise or meditation.

to learn more

The Wake Forest Survivors of Suicide support group meets on the second Thursday of every month at Wake Forest United Methodist Church, 905 S. Main St., from 6:30 to 8 p.m. For more information, call Carolyn Zahnow at 368-6286.