Luke Todd

Interviewer : I’m going to start out and just have you very briefly tell me about your video piece, about what the audience is going to see and basically just that.

Luke : Mine, real briefly is about suicide, and it tells a little bit about my story and how I survived though it and that’s pretty much it yeah.

And why did you decide to tell the story this way? Give me a little background about you were thinking about doing the piece about what you would do and knowing now that you’re putting in some of the cemetery stuff and all that, tell me why you decided to do the piece the way that you’re doing it.

I chose to make my piece a little different from everyone else, um I have a different perspective, I’m chose to film a lot of it at the cemetery because that’s where the story all began.

Tell me just briefly about your history just so the audience can know, and I don’t know how much of this I’m going to use, I may not ya know use it, I know you’ve problems, give me a little bit of that brief history that you would want the audience to know before they see your piece.

I suffer from depression, and a lot of that was because my dad took his own life so I kinda just wanted to follow his footsteps so I became depressed myself.

Luke, what is the core message of your piece that you would hope the viewers walk away with after they look at it?

I would think my core thing is that you have a choice, I mean of if you live or die, if you chose to be suicidal or you choose to heal yourself. I mean it’s up to you , and that’s my core thing, is just making that choice and following through with it.

What did you do to cope, and I’m asking you this just from the perspective of, what did you do to cope and what would you tell other people?

My way with coping, first was way negative, cuz I was still in it. I would like isolate and do that all that kind of stuff, but as I progressed I started realizing my patterns, and that my thing was wasn’t getting what I want so I started changing my thinking process to not as negative, but even though it was still negative I was progressing slowly, like step by step um, just facing my problem was coping with it and actually getting through it and dealing with it helped me get through it.

Now I know that friends and family played a big part, and I don’t know if that’s negative or positive, but um as a message to our viewers tell me a little bit about family things and how they help or hinder with mental illness.

My friends, a lot of them stood behind me. But the problem was with my family, my family couldn’t accept my choices. So they would just like push me aside and let me go and let me do it on my own, so I just chose to not, I mean they stopped me from like growing, they were like a barrier for me so I had to let them go just to get through my depression.

What about um, homelessness, I know, I don’t know if you’ll end up even talking about it in the piece and that, but I think it’s and important element in the fact that statistically I know that ya know people with mental illness can have a high risk of becoming homeless, do you want to say something about that?

Sure, um, with a mental illness, and the way I was raised, I really didn’t feel like I was I never really like had a home so I chose to become homeless just to because I’ve been rejected by so many people and I just wanted to see if they would be the same kind of people who would reject me, just like everyone else did. That’s kind of why I became homeless. I mean it was totally my choice, I could have stopped but I didn’t wanna, because of the lessons I learned from it.

What lessons did you learn?

I learned from being homeless to be grateful for the things you have and I got out of my depression at that time period because I was volunteering, serving people, loving people, which was a big wake up call to me, that’s when I realized I had all this love to give people and I didn’t give it to people before, family members, anybody, so I just kinda like held it in, and it helped me to give my life by serving people and not keeping it in and just being a taker and stuff like that.

So what would you tell other teens that are suffering from mental illness that have been contemplating suicide, what would your message be to them?

My main message to teens is, it’s gonna be hard and if you have a mental illness, your gonna feel like restrictions are placed over your head and you can’t do everything that you wanna do, but you can, you just start to get to that point, you gotta choose to move forward, and if your just gonna sit in your crap your not gonna gain anyway, I mean if that’s the way your gonna live your life you can but I wouldn’t because you won’t be happy and your happiness is based on that mental illness and saying that your not going to be a barrier anymore over my head, I will just, I’ll still have like you’ll still have those stops, but you won’t, you can get through it if you I mean, just facing that, saying that mental illness will not have a part of you, that’s one of the biggest battles, that mental illness doesn’t have power over you anymore, because it won’t restrict you anymore, and that’s a good thing. That’s when you can start just moving forward and you don’t even care, you just as fast as you can just so you can move on with your life and have a good life.

Going back to your piece, and the fact that you went back to the cemetery I know you told me that you felt like you were nervous, but I’m wondering was that a difficult thing to do, was it difficult to put this piece together?

The piece at the cemetery was very difficult because 5 years ago that same day we buried my dad. So, like through the whole piece I had memories coming back of that funeral, me walking like behind my dad’s casket. Being an honorary paul bearer, and me not crying because I was mad because stuff happened in the funeral I wasn’t a part of messed up mom didn’t want me to be a part of and that hurt me, and just it scared me and it to be back there on that same day, just thinking wow 5 years ago, that’s when it all started. That’s when my life changed forever. Just realizing ya know, look at me now, mumble, and I know my dad’s proud of me, you’re doing it, even though it was a hard road, I mean, but, I’m glad because I wouldn’t choose any other life if I had a choice, because it’s fun, it’s hard but it’s fun, it enjoying cuz it’s not one of those boring lives, it’s one of those, you gotta be on your toes lives, just going back through and seeing that piece and rerealizing how much I’ve progressed in those 5 years I was like woah, and it just like brought up all these emotions, like wow I am, I forgave him, I’m done with it, I’m like before I would think about my dad’s suicide like every single day, but now it’s like every once in a while, cuz I like let it go, it’s not a problem I have to deal with anymore because I dealt with it.

Where are you at now in your life, what do you see in your future?

For my future, I’m planning on leaving job core in like 6 months and going to college and getting a job and getting on with my life, I kinda want to leave now, but I’m unprepared cuz I don’t have the right tools, so I’m just gonna lay down and be patient till the times right, then I’m gonna go on my LDS mission, mumble, and just go forward, and have I mean cuz I know, my life, my hardest part of my life is over, I already know that. This was the big battle in my life, I know it’s gonna be hard, but it will be a lot easier because I know how to deal with it, so I’m, it’ll be awesome, I’m lookin forward to the I’m looking forward to my life, 5 years ago I would have never said that.

I wanted you just to mention the fact that you have been speaking out about mental illness, can you tell me why you decided to do that?

I’ve been speaking out in mental, for mental illness for like the last year pretty much. I’ve been speaking out because it’s helped me. I’ve seen what mental programs can do, I mean been run a lot better in some programs I’ve been in, and me speaking out just gives my perspective, my point of view as a person with the mental illness. I learned that, got through it at a young age, some people it takes their whole life to get through it. It just took me 5 years. I had I mean it was hard, but I choose to speak out because I realize I have a voice, before I was told I never had a voice, just to keep quiet, and I love it. I love speaking out because, just me speaking out just once every time it helps somebody else. I don’t even realize it, and that’s what gives me joy, just a little peace, something I said helped them make their life better, and that’s why I did it. And I’ll keep doing it for the rest of my life.