There is a question I have carried quietly into many suicide prevention spaces. I do not always say it out loud, but it sits with me in meetings, conferences, roundtables, and strategy discussions: Is there space for us here?
Before I go further, I want to pause on what I mean by suicide prevention. Because for many of us with lived and living experience, that phrase is not simple. It can hold tension; it can feel distant, clinical, or even harmful when it is rooted in systems that have not always understood or held us well. For me, suicide prevention is not just about stopping deaths. It is about creating the conditions where people feel able to live. Where there is safety, dignity, connection, and space to exist fully: belonging before crisis, not just intervention after it. I also recognise that some people may not connect with the language of suicide prevention at all, particularly within survivor movements and spaces that challenge traditional approaches. So when I ask if there is space for us, I am asking something deeper. I am not simply asking about attendance or representation, I am asking whether there is real space. Space to exist fully, to speak honestly, and to shape the conversation rather than carefully fit inside it.
As a racialised person working within this space, I have often found myself as the only brown face in the room. You notice it straight away, even when nobody names it. You become aware of how much of yourself you bring forward and how much you hold back; you measure your words, you soften your truths. You try not to sound too angry, too political, too different. Sometimes you shrink yourself so the room stays comfortable. And yet this work is meant to be about connection and safety, about making sure people feel seen before crisis takes hold. There is a painful irony when spaces designed to hold people can still reproduce the feeling of being unseen.
When presence does not equal belonging
Being invited into a space is not the same as belonging within it.
Many racialised contributors know this feeling well: we are welcomed warmly, often with genuine intention, yet still positioned as guests rather than co-creators; one or two voices are asked to speak for entire communities; lived experience is requested but not always embedded into decision-making. But our experiences are not marginal to this work, they are central to it.In those moments, participation can feel fragile, almost conditional. As though the invitation holds as long as we do not challenge the foundations too much. But this work cannot afford partial conversations. Distress does not exist outside of race, culture, migration, identity, or systemic inequality. These realities shape how pain is experienced, how help is sought, and whether support feels safe enough to reach for. When these perspectives are missing, prevention becomes incomplete.
The work of amplifying voices
These reflections are not mine alone. They sit at the heart of the Amplifying Our Voices: Racialised Perspectives in Suicide Prevention report, developed through the Learning and Collaboration Space convened by the National Suicide Prevention Alliance.
The report brings together expertise, experiences, and perspectives from people with lived experience, professional insight, and community leadership, including:
- Isaac Samuels, lived experience facilitator and changemaker
- Natalia-Nana Lester-Bush, equity, diversity, inclusion and liberation consultant
- Nikhwat Khan Marawat, Founder and Director of The Delicate Mind CIC
- Sandeep Saib, suicide attempt survivor and mental health advocate
- Shilla Patel, Advisor and NSPA member
- Steve Gilbert OBE, suicide attempt survivor
- additional contributors who chose anonymity
The report does something simple yet powerful: it listens. It places voices that are often pushed to the edges into the centre of the conversation. It asks what changes when racialised people are not consulted occasionally, but included consistently. When lived experience is treated as expertise, not just testimony.
Claiming space is not taking space away
There is sometimes discomfort when racialised voices speak about needing space. A misunderstanding can creep in, as though visibility for some must mean less space for others. But, claiming space is not about exclusion, it is about expansion. This work is not a limited table where one chair must be removed for another to appear. Rather, compassion grows when perspectives grow and understanding deepens when complexity is allowed into the room. We are not asking to replace existing voices, we are asking for the conversation to reflect the reality of the communities it serves. And when space widens, everyone benefits: practitioners gain richer insight, communities feel safer engaging and the work becomes more human and more effective.
Community knowledge is prevention
In many racialised communities, prevention already exists. It lives in faith spaces, friendships, storytelling, mutual care, humour, and resilience passed across generations. These forms of care are rarely labelled as suicide prevention, yet they hold people through moments of deep vulnerability. The challenge for systems is not to teach communities how to care. It is to recognise that care already exists and to work alongside it with humility.
The report highlights that meaningful prevention requires relationship building, trust, and long-term commitment, not one-off engagement exercises. Communities cannot be consulted only when strategies are written; they must be partners in shaping them.
The cost of shrinking yourself
There is a quiet emotional labour that comes with being the only racialised voice in a room; you carry representation whether you want to or not. You translate experiences others may never have lived, and you decide which parts of truth feel safe to share. Over time, that shrinking takes a toll. And yet many of us continue to show up. Not because it is easy, but because we believe this work can be better. More honest, more inclusive and more reflective of real lives.This is not about criticism, it is about hope. Hope that future spaces will not require people to leave parts of themselves at the door, andhope that the next person entering these conversations will not have to question whether they belong.
Building spaces where no one feels alone
At its core, this work is about belonging. Creating space for racialised voices is not an optional equity exercise, it is essential. If people cannot see themselves reflected in prevention efforts, engagement becomes harder; trust weakens and opportunities to support people earlier are lost. The Amplifying Our Voices report is a beginning- an invitation. A chance to rethink how knowledge is valued, how leadership is shared, and how communities and systems work together. Because this work becomes stronger when everyone can recognise themselves within it, and because no one should feel alone, especially in spaces that are meant to hold them.