I want to donate the “Just Like This Tree” Poster for use in suicide prevention (awareness and fundraising) in Oregon (where I live), Nationally, and Internationally. I am a poet, artist and child psychiatrist. I am the founder of Arts Medicine for Hope & Healing and Creative Life Lines. A few weeks ago my friend and colleague ended her life by jumping off the St. John’s Bridge. She was a wonderful woman, an amazing mental health provider, and a loving mother of two sets of twins. “The Just Like This Tree” poster is a response to her horrific loss, plus other experiences of suicide I have had in my professional and personal life. This is what I posted on Facebook (Diane Leslie Kaufman and also on Creative Life Lines): "It was birthed from sorrow, loss, grief and yearning for transformation. Last week I took a picture of a tree with green shoots coming off its thickened bark and wrote these words. I knew it would make a beautiful poster. I commissioned Amanda Sloan to create the image and design. I dedicate “Just Like This Tree” as tribute to lives lost from suicide wanting others to live.”
I have shared the poster with friends and mental health colleagues. Many people have asked my permission to share it. I keep on being told it is “beautiful, touching, necessary, important, heartbreaking and heart opening.” The poster can be posted on social media with a request for donation tab included. It can be printed and sold for a donation. It can also be used as a fundraising auction item.
If used, I would like the poem’s creation to be credited to Diane Kaufman, MD as poet, artist and child psychiatrist, and Amanda Sloan as the graphic designer. I would like to know how you are using it and how it is succeeding in raising awareness and funds for your organization.
Please let me know your thoughts about “Just Like This Tree” and how it can be used to help prevent suicide. Thank you!
Diane Kaufman, MD
artsmedicine@hotmail.com/908-400-8585
