In 2018, my middle son was in eighth grade when he lost a classmate to suicide. I remember the sadness, fear and helplessness. But what stays with me most was the silence.
We didn’t know how to talk about what had happened. I didn’t know how to talk to my own three boys about it. There were hushed conversations and private questions. Our community was grieving, scared and uncomfortable—and I could feel how much we simply didn’t know.
I remember thinking: Why aren’t we talking about this? Why aren’t we talking openly about mental health?
And then it happened again. And again.
Over the next few years, two more young people from the same school, the same grade and the same community died by suicide.
As a mother—and as someone working at Community Partners, our local community mental health center—I felt compelled to do something. I approached our new school superintendent, and that conversation became the beginning of something neither of us could have imagined.
From Tragedy to Action
In 2019, our small group of community leaders and volunteers came together to launch the Dover Mental Health Alliance (DMHA), a grassroots, community-driven effort to make mental health something we could talk about openly, learn about together and take responsibility for collectively.
What began in response to tragedy grew into something much bigger.
Community members became trained in NAMI NH Connect suicide prevention, Mental Health First Aid and ACEs. Hundreds—and ultimately thousands—of people participated in trainings, meetings and community events.
But the numbers aren’t what I remember most.
I remember the conversations.
People began talking about mental health in ways they hadn’t before. We asked questions. We shared experiences. We learned how to recognize when someone might be struggling and, perhaps most importantly, we learned that we didn’t have to be an expert to help.
Stigma isn’t eliminated simply by giving people information. It begins to disappear when people have opportunities to connect, talk openly, listen without judgment and realize they are not alone.
That, I believe, is where the real change happens.
One Community’s Experience Becomes Another Community’s Starting Point
As the DMHA grew, something happened that we never anticipated: other communities began asking, “How did you do this?” When Rochester, Somersworth and Portsmouth began developing their own mental health alliances, DMHA leaders were able to share what we had learned along the way – what worked, what didn’t, the challenges we encountered and the lessons we wished we had known from the beginning.
We helped guide these communities, but we also learned from them.
Each community is developing its own alliance based on its unique people, priorities, resources and strengths. The goal is not to replicate the DMHA, but to share what we have learned and provide a flexible framework that each community can make its own.
And that may be one of the most important lessons we have learned: there is no single formula for building a resilient community. But there are proven practices, lessons and tools that can help communities get started.
Why We Created the Toolkit
As Rochester, Somersworth and Portsmouth launched their own alliances, we realized something important. We had accumulated years of experience – much of it learned through trial and error – and we didn’t want that knowledge to stay in Dover.
That experience led us to create Stronger Together: A Toolkit for Building Community Mental Health Coalitions, made possible by a grant from the Greater Rochester Community Health Foundation.
It isn’t an academic journal or a one-size-fits-all blueprint. It is a practical guide for communities that want to build or strengthen their own mental health coalition. It brings together established evidence-based and best practices with the real-world lessons we learned while building the DMHA and supporting other communities through their own journeys.
In many ways, the toolkit was being written while the work was happening.
We weren’t looking back years later and trying to remember what we had done. We were learning, adapting and documenting the process in real time as new communities took what we had learned and made it their own.
We Can’t Prevent Every Tragedy. But We Can Be Better Prepared.
No community can prevent every tragedy. Mental health challenges and suicide are complex, and there are no guarantees. But we can increase the number of people who are prepared to help.
The more community members who understand mental health, recognize when someone may be struggling, feel comfortable starting a difficult conversation, know how to respond and know where to turn for help, the greater our collective capacity to reach someone who may otherwise fall through the cracks.
We can’t guarantee that tragedy won’t happen. But we can build communities that are better prepared when someone needs help. And we don’t have to wait for tragedy to teach us that.
That may be the most meaningful evolution of the DMHA story.
The DMHA began as a reaction to the loss of three young lives. But Rochester, Somersworth and Portsmouth have demonstrated something different: communities can recognize the need and choose to act before tragedy strikes.
They don’t have to wait until their community is grieving to begin having these conversations. They can start now. They can educate themselves. They can build relationships. They can learn the warning signs. They can become comfortable talking about mental health. They can understand their local resources. And they can create a culture where asking for help is met with connection rather than stigma.
We cannot change what happened to those three young people. But we can change what happens next. We can build communities where more people are prepared, more people are connected, more people know how to help—and where no one has to face a mental health challenge alone.
That is the power of a community coming together.
One person. One conversation. One community at a time.
For more information about the Dover Mental Health Alliance or the Stronger Together: A Toolkit for Building Community Mental Health Coalitions, contact Suzanne Weete at suzanneweete@communitypartnersnh.org.