The Suicide Clusters That Threaten Mountain Towns<br>Outside Online logo

The Suicide Clusters That Threaten Mountain Towns<br>In 2017, the suicide rate in Durango, Colorado, was three times the national average. After 32 deaths in two years, the town's leaders banded together and instituted a range of changes with the goal of stopping the contagion. Their efforts may help other mountain towns to put an end to the grim "suicide belt" moniker for good.

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Mountain towns are looking to stop their rising suicide rates. The question is: how? (Photo: RNMitra/iStock)

Published September 4, 2018 12:00AM

If you or someone you know is having thoughts of suicide or self-harm, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline toll-free from anywhere in the U.S. at 1-800-273-8255.

Five years ago, Aleah Austin moved with her family from LaCrosse, Wisconsin, to Durango, Colorado. The then-ten-year-old was sad to leave her family’s deep roots in the Midwest, so to help ease the transition, her parents signed her up for Durango DEVO, a popular local nonprofit program that teaches kids as young as two years old how to ride mountain bikes.

Aleah showed up at practice with a clunky Giant with 24-inch wheels, and she was well behind the other fifth-graders, who had new 26-inch bikes and years of experience. She’d get frustrated and upset, but two of her coaches, Tricia Shadell, then 33, and Tina Ooley, then 40, both racers, stayed in the back with Aleah and patiently encouraged her. “It doesn’t matter what everyone else thinks,” they’d say. “It’s just about what you think.”

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Over the years, as many girls hit adolescence and dropped out of sports, Aleah stuck with it, and she and her coach Tricia became particularly close. Strong and beautiful, Tricia always seemed upbeat and had a way of making each of the girls feel special. “I came here and was, like, so afraid of mountain biking,” Aleah says. “Trish taught me how to ride downhill and keep my feet on the pedals and stand up and go off jumps and stuff.”

Standing 5'10″, with dark wavy hair, Tricia was a beacon of athleticism and fun. She had what seemed like a full life as a bike racer, coach, and massage therapist. Intensely extroverted, she was a wellspring of enthusiasm. She wore outrageously colored pants and tutus on her rides. When the girls rocked out to Taylor Swift, Tricia was the first to throw glitter all over the place. When they were at a restaurant and a live band struck up, she would make them get up and dance. The girls worshipped her.

Aleah was a 14-year-old high school freshman last November 2017 when she found out that Tricia Shadell had died by suicide the evening before. Tricia had posted a cryptic message on Facebook just before she died, and word quickly spread through the small town. Aleah’s mom, Amee, heard about Tricia’s death from another teacher and called her husband, Jason, who was driving his daughter to school.

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Aleah is small for her age and reserved, her heart-shaped face framed by an unruly halo of light-brown curls. After hearing the news, she stared out the passenger’s side window, expressionless. She didn’t cry. Jason detoured away from the high school and dropped her off at Amee’s office. Shocked and numb, Aleah sat with her mom, her wide eyes beginning to tear up. “I didn’t really understand,” Aleah says now. “It didn’t seem real.”

Later that day, Aleah met up with her mountain biking friends. They were confused, angry, sad. Their faces streamed with tears, but Aleah’s mind was consumed with questions. Why? When? How could Trish have killed herself? She always seemed so happy.

The next morning, DEVO’s founder, Sarah Tescher, sent an email to parents. She also organized a candlelight vigil that evening at a gazebo downtown. Friends gathered silently and cried in the flickering gloom. For weeks, it was as if no one in the outdoor community quite knew what to do with their feelings—guilt, devastation, anger, disbelief. But the worst was the concern for the children who knew Tricia.

“For the kids, Tricia was a sparkly unicorn,” Tina Ooley says. “She really was. That’s what the girls saw. To have this happen, they questioned everything.”

Tricia Shadell’s death was one of 19 suicides in Durango and the surrounding La Plata County in 2017, a figure almost three times the national per-capita average. The year before, 13 people took their own lives; in 2015, 12 did. (Figures are based on the coroner’s records, but suicides are sometimes miscategorized or unreported.) Locals are desperate for answers, but there are few discernible patterns to the deaths over the past few years. They were mostly Caucasian, but also included Hispanic, Native American, and Asian people; men, women, and boys; an elementary school teacher, a construction worker, a retiree, an eighth-grader. They ranged in age from 12 to 85.

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“People are, like, what the hell is going on in our community?” says...