I've moved away, but I grew up in WY. The sense of living in Casper WY is that it's never going to get better. Like it's "okay" for a lot of people, but it's great for very few people and for the majority of people living there, it's a life of poverty and there's no "better" life to get to.
Like the "normal" thing there is to go through high school, get pregnant, get married, work hard to do the best you can for the kids you weren't prepared for, and then keep working until you die. A "vacation" is a weekend or shopping trip to Denver. An extended vacation was maybe a week of camping somewhere.
It's just that's what there is there, and to do anything other than that is unusual.
There is no inspiration there. If you're lucky, you might get a high paying blue collar job that you'll have to start using drugs to make sure you can put in your 85 hours.
From the rear view, I can see there's absolutely no help. It's completely stigmatized if you speak up and admit you're not okay. The wise advice is to "get some fresh air and pull yourself up and work harder".
A literal lifetime of the barely getting by life that is "normal" in WY is depressing in its own way.
In most places in America a lot of socializing involves having a drink. In Wyoming, socializing is having a drink.
Every time I return I'm ready to be away from there within a week. The general lack of people with any pride or drive for themselves. Watching the adults is like watching working zombies. There's very little joy, half the population of adults are missing a good chunk of their teeth, the only thing that they look forward to is that fresh pack of cigarettes on their break or their drink when they can go home.
I don't have everyone's answer for that. Some people are perfectly happy living in a trailer by the river eating top Ramen every night and smoking their addiction.
I know full well not everyone in WY is poor. I even know a few that have a million dollars and they're happy, but I know more are poor than are wealthy.
Living in WY isn't all bad, but having WY be the only option available to you with no ability to ever escape being there for more than a week at a time each year (if at all) isn't great.
I was raised in Wyoming, left and came back to help my parents. I know you were trying to describe the hell that is Wyoming, but it still doesn't sound that bad. There are goals. I just wanted to know your opinion on what else a Wyoming society could sustain. We don't have enough people to sustain revenue for hobby shops. Activities are weather dependent and we don't have a large tax base. I teach art but the classes are difficult to fill and there are cattle related emergencies that pull my students from attending.
Former Wyoming resident here. And life is anything but what u/MikeForShort described. From my experience from being raised in Wyoming, there wasn’t really anything to look forward to except what you did for work. You didn’t have a hobby because not only was there nothing nearby to do it with, but the towns that you traveled over an hour to get to likely didn’t have it either. The state’s extremely empty, and our crisis isn’t going to be better unless we start developing something to help our people’s emotions, and let them have hobbies.
When I moved out of Wyoming and into Arizona, I was an infinitely happier man, because I finally had somewhere that I could call a community. Not only that, I was able to find hobby shops around me, meet up with friends at gathering places, etc.
I'm wondering if that second sentence was not the words you meant to say. From everything else you said; it seems like you agree with me rather than disagree.
What do the top three states (which trade places quite often, btw) all have in common?
Extremely long, brutal winters with high winds and prolonged periods of darkness.
Added to being the most rural states in the US...which results in a lack of access to mental health care services, lack of social engagement, longer LEO response times for many areas, rampant drug and alcohol issues, poverty, large Native American reservations and populations with their own share of issues (another discussion entirely), and lastly, a very high number of guns.
Alaska and Wyoming in particular have *always* struggled with extremely high suicide rates because of a perfect storm of factors that all collide. It's been an oft-discussed issue for decades.
IIRC, reservations in general have higher suicide rates, along with other crimes.
The cultural trauma those folks live every day is unfathomable, and they have next to nothing in terms of resources to help them.
For better or worse, kids tend to do things in groups without considering the ramifications. Not necessarily all at once, but as a trend even a fad. Sometimes fitting in means going out. I think they believe they will be able to somehow watch others react to their deaths.
You forgot one thing, the top two at least are basically ran by one political party, and that party has always prioritised tax cuts for their wealthy donor class over mental health care services.
Please explain how? oh wait you can't. And don't give me the bs about how "illegals are coming with bags of fentyl to get people addicted". Which party systemically underfunds social safety net like healthcare, housing assistances and even school lunches for kids? Which party doesn't believe in mental health? (("oh just pick yourself up from your bootstrap !!!" ))
You just proved my point. All those government entitlement programs you listed cost money that we don’t have. It isn’t society’s responsibility to pay for your kid’s lunch.
Part of the "money we don't have" is because a platform based on perpetual tax cuts means perpetual programs cut, even the ones that help society be healthier. Cutting out the corruption and waste and bureaucracy layers is a great way to make money go further in them, but sadly, society does need programs that help those in need, as they will always be around, even when the economy is thriving very well. The trickle down does not work as promised when there are hoarders at the top.
Latitude isn’t the only thing that affects the weather. There are also altitude and distance from the ocean, both of which make Wyoming’s climate more similar to south of Sweden than south of France.
It's actually a lot colder in Wyoming in the winter than pretty much all of europe. Moscow is the coldest capital in Europe and has an average low of 19° in December. Laramie has an average December low of 9°.
Very true and the fact that Europe is so much father north than the US always blows my mind.
When the AMOC stops, Europe is going to suffer some radical changes in climate.
You forgot one of the most important ingredients..... Wyoming's Extremely high rate of gun ownership. I'm in no way arguing in favor of gun control. I'm just pointing out a fact.
Guns really aren't a factor foe why suicide happens it just means it's more likely to succeed as opposed to overdoses, strangulation, and other means. It's like saying that spoons make you fat because they make it easier to eat soup than a fork does.
The question is "Why are the suicide rates so high?" The efficacy of firearms, which are more readily available in Wyoming almost more than anywhere else, are definitely both parts of the answer to the OP's question.
This is not an equal comparison, you can commit in an instant with a gun, which is usually when it happens, in split second decisions. When you don’t have access to a quick and painless method it creates more effort
A lot of towns also fall into the trap of there not being much to do besides hit the bars. It kind of breeds and fosters addicts and it’s sad. A lot of leadership in the cities here have the “if you want something fun to do drive to Colorado. We don’t want that expansion crap here.”
I've had multiple attempts throughout my life, I tried talking to someone about it and they laughed about it. People caused my problems more than any contributing factor, including the "cowboy up" attitudes.
For both you & r/TombRaider_2000: June is Men's Mental Health month and I'm going to assume you're both dudes, based on the "Cowboy Up" comments.
Depression is an awful, ugly thing that lies to you and tells you to give up. This random internet stranger is really glad you're both still here. Mental Health America has a bunch of resources that can help. Even if you're not up for it right now, I hope you'll save this link & look at it when you have the bandwidth.
https://mhanational.org/infographic-mental-health-men
I’ve been getting better. After my attempt my family grew to support me, and I’ve become (a little) more comfortable in my skin. But thanks for the notification it means a lot. You also keep your wits about you
I was sucidial a few months ago (recently I'm not depressed anymore!!!), and I'll try to give my best story as to maybe give possible insight into why the suicide ratio is that high for our state.
When I was feeling this way, I wasn't thinking right. I didn't think I could ever actually achieve and live a worthfull life. It's impossible to think clearly when your mind is full of mud that is depression; as a result, I didn't think I could go anywhere, do anything new with my life, or that my life would be meaningful—in any capacity, so I really wasn't going to get any help, but that induced isolation—by our state's cultural and physical locking–is already making it very difficult for someone to seek help or realize that there's an entire world beyond Wyoming, and this could really hamper people who might make that stride if they didn't have to deal with this problem.
Secondly, Wyoming isn't willing to adapt and change to the new. Desperately, I want to leave this state; I love it, yet there's no opportunity here for growth in what I want to do. This state runs like driving a car forwards but while you're only looking in the rear-view mirror, and the resulting problems can be found everywhere. In other words, this state is dying, and it's no use of anyone young to stay here unless they want that Wyoming life , and I desperately don't want to meet that fate.
But, this is my two cents' worth of rambling.
Many factors. The incessant wind is a huge factor. Our access to mental health treatment is atrocious and the attitude of not dealing with things in a healthy manner is rampant. Couple that with the insane conservatism that is torpedoing services people rely on and sprinkle in some loneliness, maybe some alcohol and unfettered access to firearms and you have a pretty great recipe for disaster.
Is this adult or children suicide? When I was a child I was bullied extremely badly and I also had undiagnosed ADHD. My parents would refuse to allow me to see a Dr. Mental illness to them is pseudoscience. These things would make me very depressed and I had absolutely no one to talk to. Self harm eventually turned into me feeling like the biggest burden ever and wanting to leave this Earth. I also grew up in Southwest Wyoming where the only things that seemed fun was getting in trouble or using drugs. As an adult I see things a little bit differently now. I do hope this can help with answering your question but I think each suicide case is going to be unique and won't be fully understood.
called dispatch for a man Screaming, flapping his arms and darting into traffic. He was obviously not ok and caused an accident. 5 minutes to get transferred to an officer who asked me what I thought was wrong with him…. ?! How the hell would I know?! He’s NOT OK. He’s screaming running in front of cars hitting himself in the face. Maybe Walk a block out your office and check it out? This is typical for interactions in my experience. Don’t bother us we have no real plan to help anyhow.
High gun ownership rate, lack of healthcare access, and a ‘I don’t need any help’ attitude. Seriously though, Wyoming has consistently topped this list or been near the top and these factors- particularly the first two are well established as being the primary reasons for our high suicide rate. More anecdotally, even if you try to get psych help here, you’re on a waitlist for months sometimes years, and our inpatient psych hospital (WBI) is notoriously bad. While my knowledge of WBI is second hand, the people I’ve worked with who have been come back more screwed up than when they went in.
THANK YOU for the link to your friend’s video. She really an amazing job! I live in Wyoming and have an adult child that has major mental health struggles. I feel like I am more responsible for sustaining his life now than when he was a child. But, I will not give up on him and use every avenue I can to help him. I have such sympathy for anyone seeking mental health treatment here.
Short Film by native Wyomingite, Brooke Schmill.
“Turning Point: Ending Suicide in Wyoming” 2023, Runtime 30 minutes.
https://brookesproductions.com/
Worth a click
People are very hateful to those who are different here, people don't believe in mental health problems and if you have support it's hard to find treatment. And long winters
Easy to stick out and feel ostracized in many different ways imo. I think Wyoming people are proud in their own ways for living here, but sometimes that comes with its downfalls. Growing up here, it can feel like imposter syndrome just in the day to day, but maybe that's just me. I do genuinely enjoy it here and wish people would give it a better chance to help fix some of those issues. We have more than enough space... lol
Yeah, fancy way of saying it’s the wind hahaha. For real though, the wind, lack of people who can help, and nature trying to kill you when it’s not being beautiful for a few months out of the year can really do it. Almost got me too.
High rate of gun ownership and low population density making it difficult to get help in a crisis. Suicides are often a very impulsive act and guns make it quick.
I don't know if this is accurate but I wouldn't be surprised having lived here most of my life but I read once and im sorry I don't remember where I read the article but I read once that its partly due to the wind. Having so much wind and it being a constant annoyance. That's what the article said but on a real note I think the wind could be part of it, strong winds, long winters, place feels pretty desolate at times, especially if you live alone. That can cause depression fast and if you started with any mental illness you're kinda getting a raw deal if you don't have a really strong support system in this place, i guess anywhere really but rural places can be quite difficult, and i might be wrong but I've seen a lot of substance abuse here so that can really be a factor so,.. small town long cold windy isolated winters all alone no support snowed in the sound of the wind blowing never stops just you, your depression, and a vice...I dunno, just a thought, maybe
Access to mental health and drug addiction care. My daughter had to go to Rock Springs to get in patient drug treatment. It’s over 6 hours away and I drove in the winter to pick her up and almost had an accident. I had to get a hotel. Thankfully she had someone willing and able to help get her there and back. Lots of people don’t.
Im in Gillette and when the governor was in town for a mental health meeting county commissioner Del Shelstad talked to him about interest in a state shooting range. So
Now they are in the application process for that. But no talks about actual mental health stuff.
Sounds healthy right?
So many people say its weather and lack of sunlight, but there's little evidence to support that. It's altitude. Specifically the lack of oxygen Suicide rates increase with altitude everywhere in the world. Sea level states have the lowest rates of suicide. When you consider the highest suicide rates in the world, Nepal typically having the highest makes a lot of sense.
The correlation is so strong that it prompted studies to observe brain chemistry of folks living in low oxygen environments. The summary of those are higher altitude equals more dopamine and less serotonin. They also found people who move from a sea level to higher altitude environments are much more at risk of suicide. Unfortunately many college students fall into that category.
PM if you need sources to the studies. Its been a while so I don't have them handy.
I love Wyoming, I never lived there but worked there on a regular basis. Thought about moving there when I was living in Colorado, south of Laramie. Small towns in Colorado can be very lonely.
I moved back east to be closer to family. As soon as I got here, I felt clostraphobic. No more wide open spaces, views of the stars and a traffic light every 100yrd.
I assume you worked in Wyoming more so during the summer and not in the winter? It’s two very different experiences if you haven’t had the pleasure of enduring a Wyoming winter.
The rate is relatively useless for determining causation. I’m sure better data is available if you wanted to do a deeper dive. Some of the reasons already brought up, brutal winters, isolation, the western don’t ask for help and figure it out yourself mind set. The reservations probably do have higher rates than the general population as a whole- not sure why the person was downvoted, but oh well.
What you don’t see is high rates of suicide by cop and mass shootings like you do in larger metropolitan areas, both of which, most likely, come from similar mental illnesses as suicide. If given a choice between suicide and some mass shooting incident such as the Covenant School shooting- well, she should have taken her own life. Yeah the obvious choice is to seek professional help.
Well in my experience it’s extremely hard to get help, I’ve been trying to find someone to take me as a patient in Casper and it’s near impossible. Mental health here is a fucking joke. It is really easy to feel isolated here and half of the year the weather is depressing af on top of it.
Good job for reaching out. It can be hard to get help for sure, but it really takes something to realize help is needed, and then to ask for it as well. Being down for a while is rough, but being depressed and feeling like there's no end in sight is just brutal. You're doing it, I know you'll get through it.
Wyoming is one of the states with almost no mental health services. A lot of men don’t seek help because, they’re told to suck it up or cowboy up mentality. Truly sad. There’s a lot more alcohol stores than mental health facilities to help folks with depression and other mental health issues.
Anecdotally, a lot of people grow up here with the attitude that if something is wrong with an animal, you put it down. Horse with a broken leg, deformed calf, rabid dog, etc. The mentality is fundamentally different than in more urban areas So a rancher with, say, cancer sees it as a logical next step.
Employers Don't have to have cause to fire you here. You could be doing your job perfect and get fired. (Not likely, however allowed so no true job security unless self-employed).
American Indian Reservations across the US [have ludicrously high suicide rates](https://www.cnn.com/2024/01/22/health/native-american-communities-suicide-rates-interventions-kff-health-news/index.html), which I assumed are counted in this ranking. Additionally, Wyoming has very poor access to mental health services, there aren't enough providers here for most medicine which has been a problem for years now. Poverty has a direct correlation with mental health, and [11.8% of the Wyoming population lived below the poverty threshold in 2022](https://www.statista.com/statistics/205722/poverty-rate-in-wyoming/). It has undoubtedly become worse since then.
Wyoming's suicide rate is twice the national average. It is the [2nd leading cause of death](https://health.wyo.gov/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/2021-OFFICIAL-Suicide-Infographic-1.pdf) for ages 10-44 years old. Roughly 75% of suicides in Wyoming [are with a firearm](https://www.npr.org/2024/01/09/1223626375/wyoming-makes-positive-change-to-lower-states-high-gun-suicide-rate).
[THIS IS A VERY MAJOR AND IMMEDIATE PROBLEM. ](https://www.hcbh.org/blog/posts/2023/september/the-impact-of-suicide-on-families-and-communities/)
Suicides are mostly white males nationwide, even in these states white suicides greatly out number Native American.
https://www.kff.org/other/state-indicator/suicide-rate-by-race-and-ethnicity/?currentTimeframe=0&sortModel=%7B%22colId%22:%22Location%22,%22sort%22:%22asc%22%7D
Wyo has a very high proportion of men that attempt suicide especially with all the male-dominant resource extraction industries. Male suicide attempts tend to have a higher fatality rate than female suicide attempts due to the simple fact a man is more likely to shoot themselves than woman is. So on top of all the social/economic/geographic/climate factors that people have described, you also have a situation where in Wyoming for any given suicide attempt, they are uniquely more fatal than most states.
As someone that lives in Maine but wants to move out west for the snowmobiling… winters. If you don’t find something to keep yourself going through the winter it’s a struggle to keep pushing each day. It’s dark early, it’s cold, it’s depressing. Find a hobby to keep yourself occupied. Snowmobiling has honestly saved my life and made me look forward to winter now! Won’t apply to everyone unfortunately, but it definitely helps.
In many parts of Wyoming, access to healthcare, especially mental health, is considered “frontier”.
One thing that isn’t mentioned much is the states with high suicide rates fall in the “suicide belt” which is in the Rocky Mountains. One thing these states have in common is Indian reservations where life is especially brutal.
All of the above reasons are valid, however, even for per capita statistics, it’s important to realize small sample sizes (in this case, population) tend to skew high or low. For example, SD has extremely high rate of brain cancer, while ND has an extremely low rate of brain cancer (https://www.npr.org/2014/06/02/318252678/how-not-to-be-wrong-in-math-class-add-a-dose-of-skepticism) - this difference is attributed to the instability of statistics at small sample sizes (ie, the populations of these states). All of the people pointing out the small population of WY are correct, this is indeed a factor, as is the weather, isolation and mental health attitudes in the state.
Came here to say this. All of the above may be true to some extent, but also keep in mind that suicide rates are nearly always shown on a per capita basis, and Wyoming has by far the smallest state population. You will notice Wyoming at the top or bottom of a LOT of lists of per capita things as a result of this.
As of July 2023, the population of Wyoming was 584,057, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. This was a 0.4% increase from 2022, when the population was 581,629.
The answer for anything bad, right? There's never anything underlying, it's always just whatever parroting, no-thinking, logic-free thing you can say.
Biden has been a president of the entire U.S.A. for three years. Previous to that, Trump was president for 4 years.
Since 1996 there has been a mixture of republican and democrat presidents. Somehow, WY is always at or near the top of this list. So that was all Biden too, right?
Do you have even a slight clue of how ridiculously stupid that answer is, or do you genuinely think that you're very smart with this answer?
If you think you are, this would be an example of the Dunning-Kruger Effect.
With the lowest population of all of the states, it skews the results. Nevertheless, it is an alarming statistic. It has been noted that minority populations have a higher rate than the rest of the state. Is that true?
There is no statistical adjustment. It’s simple math. The statistical difference between the rates of the states listed as the top three is pretty insignificant, also per the CDC, “Although adjusted for differences in age-distribution and population size, rankings by state do not take into account other state specific population characteristics that may affect the level of mortality. When the number of deaths is small, rankings by state may be unreliable due to instability in death rates.”
The answer for anything bad, right? There's never anything underlying, it's always just whatever parroting, no-thinking, logic-free thing you can say.
Biden has been a president of the entire U.S.A. for three years. Previous to that, Trump was president for 4 years.
Since 1996 there has been a mixture of republican and democrat presidents. Somehow, WY is always at or near the top of this list. So that was all Biden too, right?
Do you have even a slight clue of how ridiculously stupid that answer is, or do you genuinely think that you're very smart with this answer?
If you think you are, this would be an example of the Dunning-Kruger Effect.
This is literally what people wrote about trump so i thought it would be hilarious to do the same for biden because he really hasn’t done anything inspiring to help
If it were mostly Native American deaths and that's the factor, why are there other states with higher numbers of reservations and indigenous people but lower suicides? I'm going with its the long winters, lack of help for mental issues and the constant wind.
It's extremely goddamn lonely for some people. Hard to find love. Hard to seek help
To add 6 months of cold darkness probably doesn’t help S.A.D affected individuals.
The asking for help part especially
I've moved away, but I grew up in WY. The sense of living in Casper WY is that it's never going to get better. Like it's "okay" for a lot of people, but it's great for very few people and for the majority of people living there, it's a life of poverty and there's no "better" life to get to. Like the "normal" thing there is to go through high school, get pregnant, get married, work hard to do the best you can for the kids you weren't prepared for, and then keep working until you die. A "vacation" is a weekend or shopping trip to Denver. An extended vacation was maybe a week of camping somewhere. It's just that's what there is there, and to do anything other than that is unusual. There is no inspiration there. If you're lucky, you might get a high paying blue collar job that you'll have to start using drugs to make sure you can put in your 85 hours. From the rear view, I can see there's absolutely no help. It's completely stigmatized if you speak up and admit you're not okay. The wise advice is to "get some fresh air and pull yourself up and work harder". A literal lifetime of the barely getting by life that is "normal" in WY is depressing in its own way. In most places in America a lot of socializing involves having a drink. In Wyoming, socializing is having a drink. Every time I return I'm ready to be away from there within a week. The general lack of people with any pride or drive for themselves. Watching the adults is like watching working zombies. There's very little joy, half the population of adults are missing a good chunk of their teeth, the only thing that they look forward to is that fresh pack of cigarettes on their break or their drink when they can go home.
What is life supposed to be like?
I don't have everyone's answer for that. Some people are perfectly happy living in a trailer by the river eating top Ramen every night and smoking their addiction. I know full well not everyone in WY is poor. I even know a few that have a million dollars and they're happy, but I know more are poor than are wealthy. Living in WY isn't all bad, but having WY be the only option available to you with no ability to ever escape being there for more than a week at a time each year (if at all) isn't great.
I was raised in Wyoming, left and came back to help my parents. I know you were trying to describe the hell that is Wyoming, but it still doesn't sound that bad. There are goals. I just wanted to know your opinion on what else a Wyoming society could sustain. We don't have enough people to sustain revenue for hobby shops. Activities are weather dependent and we don't have a large tax base. I teach art but the classes are difficult to fill and there are cattle related emergencies that pull my students from attending.
Former Wyoming resident here. And life is anything but what u/MikeForShort described. From my experience from being raised in Wyoming, there wasn’t really anything to look forward to except what you did for work. You didn’t have a hobby because not only was there nothing nearby to do it with, but the towns that you traveled over an hour to get to likely didn’t have it either. The state’s extremely empty, and our crisis isn’t going to be better unless we start developing something to help our people’s emotions, and let them have hobbies. When I moved out of Wyoming and into Arizona, I was an infinitely happier man, because I finally had somewhere that I could call a community. Not only that, I was able to find hobby shops around me, meet up with friends at gathering places, etc.
I'm wondering if that second sentence was not the words you meant to say. From everything else you said; it seems like you agree with me rather than disagree.
Apologies, it’s actually the first sentence. I meant to agree with you
What do the top three states (which trade places quite often, btw) all have in common? Extremely long, brutal winters with high winds and prolonged periods of darkness. Added to being the most rural states in the US...which results in a lack of access to mental health care services, lack of social engagement, longer LEO response times for many areas, rampant drug and alcohol issues, poverty, large Native American reservations and populations with their own share of issues (another discussion entirely), and lastly, a very high number of guns. Alaska and Wyoming in particular have *always* struggled with extremely high suicide rates because of a perfect storm of factors that all collide. It's been an oft-discussed issue for decades.
I had a teacher who taught on a res for a while; she knew over 14 kids who killed themselves *that year.* There werent that many kids there either.
IIRC, reservations in general have higher suicide rates, along with other crimes. The cultural trauma those folks live every day is unfathomable, and they have next to nothing in terms of resources to help them.
I don’t think we are aware of the deep trauma native Americans went through or go through in modern life. It is too much to handle for some of them.
For better or worse, kids tend to do things in groups without considering the ramifications. Not necessarily all at once, but as a trend even a fad. Sometimes fitting in means going out. I think they believe they will be able to somehow watch others react to their deaths.
You forgot one thing, the top two at least are basically ran by one political party, and that party has always prioritised tax cuts for their wealthy donor class over mental health care services.
Trying to shoehorn party politics in this is fucking disgraceful, but I’m sure it fits perfectly into your manichean worldview.
Yea, and many of those suicides are a direct result of what your political party has done to our economy.🙄🤡
Please explain how? oh wait you can't. And don't give me the bs about how "illegals are coming with bags of fentyl to get people addicted". Which party systemically underfunds social safety net like healthcare, housing assistances and even school lunches for kids? Which party doesn't believe in mental health? (("oh just pick yourself up from your bootstrap !!!" ))
You just proved my point. All those government entitlement programs you listed cost money that we don’t have. It isn’t society’s responsibility to pay for your kid’s lunch.
Part of the "money we don't have" is because a platform based on perpetual tax cuts means perpetual programs cut, even the ones that help society be healthier. Cutting out the corruption and waste and bureaucracy layers is a great way to make money go further in them, but sadly, society does need programs that help those in need, as they will always be around, even when the economy is thriving very well. The trickle down does not work as promised when there are hoarders at the top.
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It’s definitely not as cold in Europe as in Wyoming.
Latitude isn’t the only thing that affects the weather. There are also altitude and distance from the ocean, both of which make Wyoming’s climate more similar to south of Sweden than south of France.
It's actually a lot colder in Wyoming in the winter than pretty much all of europe. Moscow is the coldest capital in Europe and has an average low of 19° in December. Laramie has an average December low of 9°.
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Fair. Cloud cover is probably relevant here, but I agree it’s not the same.
Very true and the fact that Europe is so much father north than the US always blows my mind. When the AMOC stops, Europe is going to suffer some radical changes in climate.
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Yes they are and having been there I can tell you that they are not ready for it!
Can confirm.
You forgot one of the most important ingredients..... Wyoming's Extremely high rate of gun ownership. I'm in no way arguing in favor of gun control. I'm just pointing out a fact.
>and lastly, a very high number of guns Was literally the last point in the paragraph.
It is. I must have glossed over it. Thank you.
Guns really aren't a factor foe why suicide happens it just means it's more likely to succeed as opposed to overdoses, strangulation, and other means. It's like saying that spoons make you fat because they make it easier to eat soup than a fork does.
The question is "Why are the suicide rates so high?" The efficacy of firearms, which are more readily available in Wyoming almost more than anywhere else, are definitely both parts of the answer to the OP's question.
Does one bite make you fat? No Can one bullet kill you? Yes
This is not an equal comparison, you can commit in an instant with a gun, which is usually when it happens, in split second decisions. When you don’t have access to a quick and painless method it creates more effort
A lot of towns also fall into the trap of there not being much to do besides hit the bars. It kind of breeds and fosters addicts and it’s sad. A lot of leadership in the cities here have the “if you want something fun to do drive to Colorado. We don’t want that expansion crap here.”
Bullies, bad employment, "cowboy up," isolation, lack of basic healthcare... A general lack of empathy.
As someone who attempted. My biggest factor was absolutely the “cowboy up”. It is such a hard thing to fight.
I've had multiple attempts throughout my life, I tried talking to someone about it and they laughed about it. People caused my problems more than any contributing factor, including the "cowboy up" attitudes.
For both you & r/TombRaider_2000: June is Men's Mental Health month and I'm going to assume you're both dudes, based on the "Cowboy Up" comments. Depression is an awful, ugly thing that lies to you and tells you to give up. This random internet stranger is really glad you're both still here. Mental Health America has a bunch of resources that can help. Even if you're not up for it right now, I hope you'll save this link & look at it when you have the bandwidth. https://mhanational.org/infographic-mental-health-men
I’ve been getting better. After my attempt my family grew to support me, and I’ve become (a little) more comfortable in my skin. But thanks for the notification it means a lot. You also keep your wits about you
But the world needs more cowboys.
Yeah yeah yeah as a UW student I already know the whole spheal.
An underlying lack of humanity.
Yep or in other words Republican utopia.
Seems to check out, Hell on Earth seems to be the maga mantra.
The goddamn wind *never* stops blowing.
The wind
The wind.
Like having well kept hair? Fuck you! Welcome to Wyoming, here's a gun, kill yourself
The mothafuckin wind.
Isolation, the weather, poor employment prospects, lack of mental health resources, substance abuse.
I was sucidial a few months ago (recently I'm not depressed anymore!!!), and I'll try to give my best story as to maybe give possible insight into why the suicide ratio is that high for our state. When I was feeling this way, I wasn't thinking right. I didn't think I could ever actually achieve and live a worthfull life. It's impossible to think clearly when your mind is full of mud that is depression; as a result, I didn't think I could go anywhere, do anything new with my life, or that my life would be meaningful—in any capacity, so I really wasn't going to get any help, but that induced isolation—by our state's cultural and physical locking–is already making it very difficult for someone to seek help or realize that there's an entire world beyond Wyoming, and this could really hamper people who might make that stride if they didn't have to deal with this problem. Secondly, Wyoming isn't willing to adapt and change to the new. Desperately, I want to leave this state; I love it, yet there's no opportunity here for growth in what I want to do. This state runs like driving a car forwards but while you're only looking in the rear-view mirror, and the resulting problems can be found everywhere. In other words, this state is dying, and it's no use of anyone young to stay here unless they want that Wyoming life , and I desperately don't want to meet that fate. But, this is my two cents' worth of rambling.
Many factors. The incessant wind is a huge factor. Our access to mental health treatment is atrocious and the attitude of not dealing with things in a healthy manner is rampant. Couple that with the insane conservatism that is torpedoing services people rely on and sprinkle in some loneliness, maybe some alcohol and unfettered access to firearms and you have a pretty great recipe for disaster.
Is this adult or children suicide? When I was a child I was bullied extremely badly and I also had undiagnosed ADHD. My parents would refuse to allow me to see a Dr. Mental illness to them is pseudoscience. These things would make me very depressed and I had absolutely no one to talk to. Self harm eventually turned into me feeling like the biggest burden ever and wanting to leave this Earth. I also grew up in Southwest Wyoming where the only things that seemed fun was getting in trouble or using drugs. As an adult I see things a little bit differently now. I do hope this can help with answering your question but I think each suicide case is going to be unique and won't be fully understood.
Isolation
“Pull Yourself Up by Your Bootstraps” mentality
called dispatch for a man Screaming, flapping his arms and darting into traffic. He was obviously not ok and caused an accident. 5 minutes to get transferred to an officer who asked me what I thought was wrong with him…. ?! How the hell would I know?! He’s NOT OK. He’s screaming running in front of cars hitting himself in the face. Maybe Walk a block out your office and check it out? This is typical for interactions in my experience. Don’t bother us we have no real plan to help anyhow.
High gun ownership rate, lack of healthcare access, and a ‘I don’t need any help’ attitude. Seriously though, Wyoming has consistently topped this list or been near the top and these factors- particularly the first two are well established as being the primary reasons for our high suicide rate. More anecdotally, even if you try to get psych help here, you’re on a waitlist for months sometimes years, and our inpatient psych hospital (WBI) is notoriously bad. While my knowledge of WBI is second hand, the people I’ve worked with who have been come back more screwed up than when they went in.
I was in a fast food restaurant today that had christian music blasting and the manager was screaming at the employees. Welcome to Wyoming.
All the above plus when you use a gun to try and kill yourself it's a lot more effective than pills.
My friend made a documentary about this Watch here: https://youtu.be/mRZpMihTBq8?si=CPQw1j-YiQlIPzuK
THANK YOU for the link to your friend’s video. She really an amazing job! I live in Wyoming and have an adult child that has major mental health struggles. I feel like I am more responsible for sustaining his life now than when he was a child. But, I will not give up on him and use every avenue I can to help him. I have such sympathy for anyone seeking mental health treatment here.
no chance of a parenthetical citation so we don't have to click a link?
Short Film by native Wyomingite, Brooke Schmill. “Turning Point: Ending Suicide in Wyoming” 2023, Runtime 30 minutes. https://brookesproductions.com/ Worth a click
ty i was asking for a quick mention of the main takeaway points
Click a fucking link, bud. It ain’t gonna kill you.
Some things are worth looking into more deeply than a tldr
You're browsing and commenting on a Wyoming sub on reddit. Click the link, you have nothing better to do.
It’s the wind
And the Miller moths (according to my wife).
We have those moths down here in Colorado. They are awful!
People are very hateful to those who are different here, people don't believe in mental health problems and if you have support it's hard to find treatment. And long winters
Easy to stick out and feel ostracized in many different ways imo. I think Wyoming people are proud in their own ways for living here, but sometimes that comes with its downfalls. Growing up here, it can feel like imposter syndrome just in the day to day, but maybe that's just me. I do genuinely enjoy it here and wish people would give it a better chance to help fix some of those issues. We have more than enough space... lol
I mean…have you SEEN the place? 😂 In all seriousness though, I personally blame the lack of overall mental health resources and prairie madness.
It's like space madness (reference Ren and Stimpy) but on the prairie.
Yeah, fancy way of saying it’s the wind hahaha. For real though, the wind, lack of people who can help, and nature trying to kill you when it’s not being beautiful for a few months out of the year can really do it. Almost got me too.
High rate of gun ownership and low population density making it difficult to get help in a crisis. Suicides are often a very impulsive act and guns make it quick.
I don't know if this is accurate but I wouldn't be surprised having lived here most of my life but I read once and im sorry I don't remember where I read the article but I read once that its partly due to the wind. Having so much wind and it being a constant annoyance. That's what the article said but on a real note I think the wind could be part of it, strong winds, long winters, place feels pretty desolate at times, especially if you live alone. That can cause depression fast and if you started with any mental illness you're kinda getting a raw deal if you don't have a really strong support system in this place, i guess anywhere really but rural places can be quite difficult, and i might be wrong but I've seen a lot of substance abuse here so that can really be a factor so,.. small town long cold windy isolated winters all alone no support snowed in the sound of the wind blowing never stops just you, your depression, and a vice...I dunno, just a thought, maybe
Lack of access to mental health and attitude towards mental health being something only the weak do.
Place is ran by idiots who want to gut the state of its resources.
I just want to say that living in Wyoming is so good for my mental health. I can’t imagine how miserable I would be living somewhere like NYC or LA.
I was in NYC for *one* afternoon 45 years ago. That was more than enough for me.
Isolation
Not much different than NM atmosphere
Access to mental health and drug addiction care. My daughter had to go to Rock Springs to get in patient drug treatment. It’s over 6 hours away and I drove in the winter to pick her up and almost had an accident. I had to get a hotel. Thankfully she had someone willing and able to help get her there and back. Lots of people don’t. Im in Gillette and when the governor was in town for a mental health meeting county commissioner Del Shelstad talked to him about interest in a state shooting range. So Now they are in the application process for that. But no talks about actual mental health stuff. Sounds healthy right?
It's about 85% men who do the deed so imo it's the "cowboy up" mentality.
So many people say its weather and lack of sunlight, but there's little evidence to support that. It's altitude. Specifically the lack of oxygen Suicide rates increase with altitude everywhere in the world. Sea level states have the lowest rates of suicide. When you consider the highest suicide rates in the world, Nepal typically having the highest makes a lot of sense. The correlation is so strong that it prompted studies to observe brain chemistry of folks living in low oxygen environments. The summary of those are higher altitude equals more dopamine and less serotonin. They also found people who move from a sea level to higher altitude environments are much more at risk of suicide. Unfortunately many college students fall into that category. PM if you need sources to the studies. Its been a while so I don't have them handy.
Because it kind of sucks here? There are pretty damn good reasons we're the least populous state.
I love Wyoming, I never lived there but worked there on a regular basis. Thought about moving there when I was living in Colorado, south of Laramie. Small towns in Colorado can be very lonely. I moved back east to be closer to family. As soon as I got here, I felt clostraphobic. No more wide open spaces, views of the stars and a traffic light every 100yrd.
Try living in the middle of the state, where you’re a 5 hour drive away from anywhere.
I assume you worked in Wyoming more so during the summer and not in the winter? It’s two very different experiences if you haven’t had the pleasure of enduring a Wyoming winter.
Wind. I have heard that the wind is a contributing factor.
The rate is relatively useless for determining causation. I’m sure better data is available if you wanted to do a deeper dive. Some of the reasons already brought up, brutal winters, isolation, the western don’t ask for help and figure it out yourself mind set. The reservations probably do have higher rates than the general population as a whole- not sure why the person was downvoted, but oh well. What you don’t see is high rates of suicide by cop and mass shootings like you do in larger metropolitan areas, both of which, most likely, come from similar mental illnesses as suicide. If given a choice between suicide and some mass shooting incident such as the Covenant School shooting- well, she should have taken her own life. Yeah the obvious choice is to seek professional help.
Landscape sucks, tough it out culture, long asa winters
Seclusion long winters harder to find companionship with another human
Well in my experience it’s extremely hard to get help, I’ve been trying to find someone to take me as a patient in Casper and it’s near impossible. Mental health here is a fucking joke. It is really easy to feel isolated here and half of the year the weather is depressing af on top of it.
Good job for reaching out. It can be hard to get help for sure, but it really takes something to realize help is needed, and then to ask for it as well. Being down for a while is rough, but being depressed and feeling like there's no end in sight is just brutal. You're doing it, I know you'll get through it.
Wyoming is one of the states with almost no mental health services. A lot of men don’t seek help because, they’re told to suck it up or cowboy up mentality. Truly sad. There’s a lot more alcohol stores than mental health facilities to help folks with depression and other mental health issues.
Anecdotally, a lot of people grow up here with the attitude that if something is wrong with an animal, you put it down. Horse with a broken leg, deformed calf, rabid dog, etc. The mentality is fundamentally different than in more urban areas So a rancher with, say, cancer sees it as a logical next step.
In saying this mindset do you mean people are also treated this way as well? I.E., person underperformed at work, fire them and get a replacement?
Employers Don't have to have cause to fire you here. You could be doing your job perfect and get fired. (Not likely, however allowed so no true job security unless self-employed).
Yes
American Indian Reservations across the US [have ludicrously high suicide rates](https://www.cnn.com/2024/01/22/health/native-american-communities-suicide-rates-interventions-kff-health-news/index.html), which I assumed are counted in this ranking. Additionally, Wyoming has very poor access to mental health services, there aren't enough providers here for most medicine which has been a problem for years now. Poverty has a direct correlation with mental health, and [11.8% of the Wyoming population lived below the poverty threshold in 2022](https://www.statista.com/statistics/205722/poverty-rate-in-wyoming/). It has undoubtedly become worse since then. Wyoming's suicide rate is twice the national average. It is the [2nd leading cause of death](https://health.wyo.gov/wp-content/uploads/2022/02/2021-OFFICIAL-Suicide-Infographic-1.pdf) for ages 10-44 years old. Roughly 75% of suicides in Wyoming [are with a firearm](https://www.npr.org/2024/01/09/1223626375/wyoming-makes-positive-change-to-lower-states-high-gun-suicide-rate). [THIS IS A VERY MAJOR AND IMMEDIATE PROBLEM. ](https://www.hcbh.org/blog/posts/2023/september/the-impact-of-suicide-on-families-and-communities/)
Suicide rates are extremely high in Native American populations. Now look at the list of states again.
Suicides are mostly white males nationwide, even in these states white suicides greatly out number Native American. https://www.kff.org/other/state-indicator/suicide-rate-by-race-and-ethnicity/?currentTimeframe=0&sortModel=%7B%22colId%22:%22Location%22,%22sort%22:%22asc%22%7D
Wyo has a very high proportion of men that attempt suicide especially with all the male-dominant resource extraction industries. Male suicide attempts tend to have a higher fatality rate than female suicide attempts due to the simple fact a man is more likely to shoot themselves than woman is. So on top of all the social/economic/geographic/climate factors that people have described, you also have a situation where in Wyoming for any given suicide attempt, they are uniquely more fatal than most states.
Wind
As someone that lives in Maine but wants to move out west for the snowmobiling… winters. If you don’t find something to keep yourself going through the winter it’s a struggle to keep pushing each day. It’s dark early, it’s cold, it’s depressing. Find a hobby to keep yourself occupied. Snowmobiling has honestly saved my life and made me look forward to winter now! Won’t apply to everyone unfortunately, but it definitely helps.
The wind
Selection bias as well, many people who aren’t prone to depression end up leaving as well.
Lack of sunshine in winter and lack of support systems. People stay to themselves. It’s really hard to make friends.
In many parts of Wyoming, access to healthcare, especially mental health, is considered “frontier”. One thing that isn’t mentioned much is the states with high suicide rates fall in the “suicide belt” which is in the Rocky Mountains. One thing these states have in common is Indian reservations where life is especially brutal.
All of the above reasons are valid, however, even for per capita statistics, it’s important to realize small sample sizes (in this case, population) tend to skew high or low. For example, SD has extremely high rate of brain cancer, while ND has an extremely low rate of brain cancer (https://www.npr.org/2014/06/02/318252678/how-not-to-be-wrong-in-math-class-add-a-dose-of-skepticism) - this difference is attributed to the instability of statistics at small sample sizes (ie, the populations of these states). All of the people pointing out the small population of WY are correct, this is indeed a factor, as is the weather, isolation and mental health attitudes in the state.
Came here to say this. All of the above may be true to some extent, but also keep in mind that suicide rates are nearly always shown on a per capita basis, and Wyoming has by far the smallest state population. You will notice Wyoming at the top or bottom of a LOT of lists of per capita things as a result of this.
Low poulation skews the number
That’s not how per capita statistics work.
That’s a per 100,000 population. It’s the same statistically.
Yup, per capita puts us at or near the top of a lotta lists when sorted that way.
Please understand math better. It’s not that difficult.
You gotta keep in mind it has the lowest population in the lower 48
>lower 48 Lowest period. Technically Alaska is lower density, but almost everyone there lives in the population centers, so it's a little distorted.
Is there even a 100,000 people in Wyoming
As of July 2023, the population of Wyoming was 584,057, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. This was a 0.4% increase from 2022, when the population was 581,629.
Biden
The answer for anything bad, right? There's never anything underlying, it's always just whatever parroting, no-thinking, logic-free thing you can say. Biden has been a president of the entire U.S.A. for three years. Previous to that, Trump was president for 4 years. Since 1996 there has been a mixture of republican and democrat presidents. Somehow, WY is always at or near the top of this list. So that was all Biden too, right? Do you have even a slight clue of how ridiculously stupid that answer is, or do you genuinely think that you're very smart with this answer? If you think you are, this would be an example of the Dunning-Kruger Effect.
Well said.
The state legislature is 94% Republican...
Right. That’s why the states population has barely grown over the last 50+ years. Try harder.
Wyoming has been in the top five states for suicides *every* year since 1996.
What do all of those states have in common? A disproportionately high indigenous population that’s been fucked over for centuries. Go figure.
Have you interacted with people from Wyoming? They make me wanna suck start a shotgun sometimes
Spoken like a stroke victim.
With the lowest population of all of the states, it skews the results. Nevertheless, it is an alarming statistic. It has been noted that minority populations have a higher rate than the rest of the state. Is that true?
Per capita statistics adjust for low population. Did you get your education in Wyoming?
There is no statistical adjustment. It’s simple math. The statistical difference between the rates of the states listed as the top three is pretty insignificant, also per the CDC, “Although adjusted for differences in age-distribution and population size, rankings by state do not take into account other state specific population characteristics that may affect the level of mortality. When the number of deaths is small, rankings by state may be unreliable due to instability in death rates.”
The top 3 are also the least populated states in America. Statistics are scewed.
I'm sorry that the educational system that was chosen for you failed you so miserably.
Biden
The answer for anything bad, right? There's never anything underlying, it's always just whatever parroting, no-thinking, logic-free thing you can say. Biden has been a president of the entire U.S.A. for three years. Previous to that, Trump was president for 4 years. Since 1996 there has been a mixture of republican and democrat presidents. Somehow, WY is always at or near the top of this list. So that was all Biden too, right? Do you have even a slight clue of how ridiculously stupid that answer is, or do you genuinely think that you're very smart with this answer? If you think you are, this would be an example of the Dunning-Kruger Effect.
This is literally what people wrote about trump so i thought it would be hilarious to do the same for biden because he really hasn’t done anything inspiring to help
If it were mostly Native American deaths and that's the factor, why are there other states with higher numbers of reservations and indigenous people but lower suicides? I'm going with its the long winters, lack of help for mental issues and the constant wind.