The most important conversation you will have with your kids | Jason Reid | TEDxLakeForestCollege

In March of 2018, Jason's 14-year-old son committed suicide in the attic of his home while he and his wife were away on vacation. "My seemingly perfect life was shattered to pieces. I was raising beautiful, smart and happy kids in my eyes. But what was really happening behind the scenes, deep in the soul of my son was hidden. We are never given a parent manual, but we are given the tools to help one another. I am on a mission to help parents change the conversation they have with kids."

Jason Reid is a the Co-Founder of National Services Group, a nationwide company that employs over 2,000 people at the peak of it’s season each year. He is also a partner at CEO Coaching International. Jason has written seven books including two kids book and a book about family conversations. He is also and Ironman and black belt.

This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community. Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx

It was March 21, 2018.

I was in Mexico with my wife
celebrating her birthday.

We had just finished
a wonderful dinner.

We were talking about
our great live with our kids

and the next phase of our lives
as our kids are getting older.

It was 11:03 p.m.

when the text message came in.

My wife screamed.

I tumbled on my phone
and read the text, it ended with

"Sorry. Love you.

Bye."

I freaked out, and I called the house.

I woke up my mother-in-law,
and I yelled, "Find Ryan!"

She ran into the house,

and she finally found him.

He was in the attic.

She screamed - it will be
in my head forever.

She said, "Jay, he hung himself!"

The next couple of hours was a blur.

There was text messages and phone calls
and ambulances and police and doctors.

They revived him
and they brought him down

to Rady Children's Hospital in San Diego.

That started

what was supposed
to be a three-hour journey,

that became a 15-hour-nightmare

as we tried to make
our way back to San Diego.

Ryan was in a medically induced coma

for the next three days.

The doctors and nurses
did the wonderful job

of trying to balance hope with reality,

but at the end the CAT scan
showed that he was brain dead.

We were able to spend
the next 36 hours with him,

saying our goodbyes.

I actually got to watch

our favorite TV show,
the last three episodes of it,

where I had one earbud
in mine and one in his.

My oldest son snuck in
with a bottle of wine the last night,

and we toasted with Ryan

while we hid the bottle
from the nurses and doctors.

The next day, they came to get us,

and they brought us
to a special place in the hospital

where we all surrounded him,

and they took him off life support.

We watched as whatever life was left
in his body drifted away,

and the color of his skin turned to ash.

And they pronounced him dead.

I want you to imagine

a world

where disease exist
that is attacking our children,

where half a million get so sick
they come close to death,

and where 5,000 die every year.

What would you do as a parent
to protect your children?

What would be on CNN 24/7?

What would they be talking about?

And what would be blowing up
all over social media?

I want you to imagine that world
because that world exists.

Depression is that disease.

It's the number two killer
of our children.

It, too often, ends in suicide.

And depression is a disease
that we do not talk about

like it's a disease.

We don't treat it the same way
as we treat cancer.

We treat it as something you're supposed
to shake off and then you'll be fine,

or maybe it doesn't exist.

It's almost like we're in the dark ages,

where you don't want to tell people

what's going on
in your family or your friends

because you're afraid
that they might judge you.

Well, on March 26, 2018,
that disease took my son.

How was that for a cold opener?

You know, even in the darkness,
there is this light,

there are funny things that happen.

I'm going to share a couple with you,
and you can laugh if you want, it's okay.

I was in such a rush!

I got home that afternoon;

I wanted to start a foundation,
to change things,

because that's the kind of guy I am.

So I said, "Choose life."

That's what everybody should do,
they should choose life,

and Chooselife.org was available.

So I bought it; I didn't know
why it was $10,000,

I just paid it.

Then I got some rubber wristbands
that said "Choose Life" on them,

and I'm ready to go.

The next week,
a buddy of mine says,

"Hey Jay, you know that's the old
anti-abortion website from the eighties?"

I'm like, "Oh!"

(Laughter)

And that was
the first $12,000 I spent.

(Laughter)

Ryan texted all of us ...

at 11:03.

He had them all pre-done,
including my daughter's boyfriend.

He said some really nice things; he said,

"If you are not nice to my sister,
I will come back and haunt you, Mister."

Now, even I feel bad for that kid.

(Laughter)

My daughter, on the other hand,
she thinks it's awesome.

Ryan researched everything.
That's the kind of kid he was.

In his suicide note,

he talked about the different ways
he planned on doing this.

One of the ways, he said, was to throw
himself out of my attic office window,

but then he said,
"You know, I'm only 76 pounds,

I was afraid my clothes
would act as a parachute."

And that was Ryan.

So if I'm sitting in the audience
right now, I'd be going,

"Jay, this is a tragic story."
And yeah, it is a tragic story.

But I'd be thinking:

"That would not happen to me.
I know my kids."

Well, I thought I knew my kids too.

Let me introduce you to my family:

my wife Kim, 25 years of marriage,

stay-at-home mom
doted on our kids every day;

my 21-year-old son Derek;

my daughter Ashlynn;
my 17-year-old son Kyle;

and Ryan, my youngest.

I wrote the Protector Bug
books for Ryan,

stories I would make up
and tell him as a kid.

As a family, dinners were our thing.

We would sit around the dinner table
for hours and talk,

and funny things would happen.

There'd be no computers,
no phones, none of that, right?

Funny things would happen that I turned
into a book called "Dinner Conversations"

to try to encourage other families
to spend more time together.

I took all my kids on individual
"only-with-dad" trips.

Ryan and I were working
on his trip to Boston

that was supposed to take place in June,
and his next year's trip to Dubai,

a week before he killed himself.

This is Ryan.

This is how I remember Ryan:

a happy kid who could light up a room.

That's what he wore
until he was almost 13.

At some point, he changed.

Thirteen, I feel he is a little
bit more withdrawn.

As I look back on it I see it,
I didn't see it then.

He is a little more quiet,
more grumpy.

I thought he was just another
grumpy teenager, I have four!

I thought that's all it was.

After Ryan passed, I was going through
his room and up in his drawers,

and the top right hand drawer
was empty except for two notes,

two sticky notes.

One note said, "Here is
my username and passwords."

The other said, "Tell my story."

That's what I'm doing.

So if I'm you I'm going, "Okay, Jay,
now what do you want me to do?"

Well, I'm going to give you a few things
that I think we should do.

We have to first realize
that we're living in a world

and parenting in the way
our parents used to parent us,

but the world has changed.

Suicide amongst teenagers
is up 70% since 2006,

and Facebook started in 2004.

I'm not blaming social media.

I don't want to get
into a battle with every PhDs

about causation versus correlation,
I'm not going to do it.

I'm just saying the world has changed,

and we haven't changed.

Our kids are bombarded
with social media,

and so much more stimulus
than they ever were when we were kids.

I was bullied as a kid.

I was sickly.
I was an easy target.

But you know what happened?

At 3 p.m. everyday
when that bell went off,

I went home to a very safe place
where the bullies could not reach me.

For kids these days, the bell never rings.

And I'm sorry, but the bullies
are in the room with them for 24/7.

And the cool kids
who sit at the lunch table?

Well now, they're not at the lunch table,
they're in your room,

and they still won't let you join.

So we need to understand
our kids' social media.

We need to understand
who their so called "friends" are,

who are they following.

We need to understand
that for some kids -

not all kids, but for some -
it's too much.

Your need to make sure
your kids understand

that everyone else's life
is not better than theirs,

and that the real fake news is that
Instagram post they just looked at.

Second thing you want to do
is to watch for change.

What was your child like

three years ago, two years ago,
one year ago, whatever the time frame is?

Are they different?

Are they more withdrawn?
Are they more quiet?

Are they more combative?
Are they arguing with you more?

Are they not hanging out
with their friends?

If you see change you need to address it,

and you need to get them talking.

And when you say,
"Hey, how are you feeling?"

and they go, "I'm fine... Yeah, I'm okay,"

and your gut says, "No you're not,"

you can't take
"Yes, I'm okay" for an answer.

I took "Yes, I'm okay" for an answer.

We need to get them talking,
and part of getting them talking

is to be approachable as a parent.

Ryan likely saw me ...

as a CEO,

as an entrepreneur,

as an author,

as an iron man who's a black belt,

a guy who'd get anything done -
you give me any problem, I'll solve it -

a guy who never, ever complained,
and above all never cried.

He saw that of me because
that's the image I showed him.

That's the image I thought as a dad
I was supposed to show

(Choking)

my son.

What did Ryan show me?

The same thing,

a kid who had his act together,

good grades, always smiling, always happy.

I wish I was more vulnerable with my son.

I wish I shared with him my fears
and my concerns,

and what I was afraid of,

and maybe, just maybe,
he would have shared that with me.

I spent so much time
trying to be my son's hero,

that I missed out on being his dad.

You know, as parents
we want the best for our kids.

And sometimes, we want
them to toughen up,

and we'll say things like,

"When getting going is tough,
the tough gets going,"

or, "You think you had it bad?

Shake it off,
you're going to be fine."

And you know what?

Some of you are going,
"Jay, they need that."

I'm like, "Yes, some of them do.
Some of them do."

But in those kids
who are truly depressed,

in those kids who are truly sick,
that doesn't help.

And yes, I probably said
some of those things.

I have parents who tell me,

"Jay, you want me to go talk to my kids.

You want me to say, 'Have you ever
thought of hurting yourself?

Have you ever thought about suicide?'

I can't do that, Jay, because I don't want
to put that idea in their head."

Well, the reality is
that idea is already in their head.

Not talking about it is the problem.

Not talking about suicide with your kids,
not talking about hurting themselves,

is most likely not talking
about the elephant in the room.

The only way to help this
is to get them to talk.

Next thing I want you to understand,
and this is hard for me,

is that people who are depressed,
kids who are depressed

do not see the world
through the same lens that we do.

On the sunniest of days,

when the sun is shining
and there's not a cloud in the sky,

they will still see gray skies.

And we don't get that.

Those of us who have never been depressed
will never understand that.

My journey started

on March 21, in Mexico.

It brought me to this stage.

And the next phase
of what I'm going to do

is a documentary film
called "Tell my story,"

about teen suicide,

In hopes that I can get all of you
to see it a little differently.

So what can you do?

Well, I want you to take action now.

You need to understand
that suicide is at an epidemic level,

amongst teenagers today.

You need to pay attention
to their social media.

You need to look for change,
and if they change,

you have to address them, talk to them.

Be their parent, not their hero.

Talk to them, make sure they know
it's okay to feel sad.

Realize

that they see the world
through a different lens.

And if you're worried, get them to talk
to a mental health professional.

Half a million kids a year
try to commit suicide,

and 5000 succeed.

We need to change that.

I need you to go home
and hug your kids.

And ask them how they feel,
not in the tummy,

but in their hearts
and their minds.

I need you to get them talking,

and don't just take "yes"
for an answer.

Don't take "Yes, I'm okay"
for an answer, but dig deeper.

One more thing.

It's kind of like a superhero movie,
and you think I was done,

but I'm not quite done.

People ask me,
as I've been doing this,

"Jay, this must be really healing for you

to go through and prepare this talk?"

The answer is no.

Over the last 60 days,

I've had to relive my son's death
at least a thousand times.

There is nothing healing about this.

So why am I doing it?

I'm doing it because Ryan ...

(Crying)

Ryan asked me to.

And I'm doing it in hopes

that at least one of you,
maybe a whole bunch more of you,

will go and have
that conversation with your kids

that will change their lives
and save someone.

And I need your help

because I can't change
this world by myself,

and this world needs to change.

I need you to start the conversation,

and I need you to share this talk

with anybody
and everybody you know.

Thank you.

(Applause)