UW-Milwaukee Students Discuss Mental Health and Gun Violence

Jenna Wahl has always struggled with mental health. In her younger years, she turned to alcohol and sex. With feelings of isolation, she soon had suicidal thoughts that clogged her mind. Wahl is a graduate student at UW-Milwaukee and a member of NAMI, a student-led club that tackles mental health issues on campus.

Wahl was one of the speakers, on campus last Wednesday at the Fireside Lounge to discuss and de-stigmatize the association between mental health and gun violence.

She painted a picture of the struggles of dealing with mental health by telling her personal story. She also stressed that you can still be successful and live a fulfilling life with therapy and a strong support system

“It is possible to change and recover from those struggles,” said Wahl.

According to The Gun Violence Archive, gun violence is defined as the result of all incidents of death or injury or threat with firearms without pejorative judgment within the definition.

According to Politifact, there have been roughly 12 million firearms manufactured in the United States. In the state of Wisconsin, there have been approximately 500 men, women and children who have been killed by guns each year. This includes the 75 percent who die as a result of suicide.

“What we hear about is mass shootings but as you just saw it is not the vast majority of shootings in our communities,” said Heidi Rose, a member of the Wisconsin Anti-Violence Act (WAVE).

Trevor Neukirchen was the second speaker to share his personal story and experience with mental illness. Neukirchen grew up in a small town in Wisconsin, he recalled getting abused by his father from a young age. This led to Neukirchen feeling worthless, unlovable and led to few suicide attempts. Since Neukirchen grew up in a small town, news spread like wildfire, and he soon began to get bullied.

“I would hear comments like wow you can’t even kill yourself properly,” said Neukirchen

Neukirchen is currently in the master’s program for educational psychology at UW-Milwaukee. He spoke at the event to give reassurance that mental illness doesn’t have to enabling.

“You can have depression, anxiety or other mental illnesses, but that doesn’t define who you are as a person,” said Neukirchen.

According to the National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI), only 4 percent of violence in the United States is attributed to mental health. Yet, 46 percent of American believes that people that have been diagnosed with a mental illness are more dangerous than the rest of the population.

“We are trying to humanize mental health,” said Neukirchen.

The scheduled event took a chunk of time to help the audience members find ways to be informed. The event promoted three resources, a public policy website – what works for health, any publically available database and to get in contact with experts such as, Wisconsin department of services, NAMI and WAVE.

“Good practice starts with good information,” said Rose.

Some of the ways UWM students can advocate properly for mental health are volunteering for an organization, voting and sitting in a committee. If you are looking to advocate in a big way, the event suggested meeting with a legislator or even testifying at a public hearing.

There are multiple resources UWM offers to students who might struggle with mental health. A few are the Norris Health Center, UWM police and even the Aurora Health Care – Dewey Center.

Next to the podium, there was an ASL interpreter. At the back of the room, there were mental health professionals to assist any audience member and also a space to register to vote for the upcoming midterm election.