Four years ago, Chuck Siebrasse lost his 23-year-old son Mike to suicide without a warning or a suicide note.

Mike abruptly ended his life because of problems with his girlfriend, Siebrasse said. He found a permanent solution to a temporary problem.

Siebrasse, now a board member of Batavia-based Suicide Prevention Services, has teamed up with the non-profit organization One Body in Christ and the Family Services Agency in DeKalb to prevent others from experiencing the shock he did.

The group is organizing a meeting to assess the steps in place to address suicide prevention in the community and what interventions are required to reduce the impact of suicide completion.

It is hoping to recruit people interested in coordinating and improving suicide prevention, said Michael Baron-Jeffrey, a graduate student in instructional technology and a volunteer with One Body in Christ.

Baron-Jeffrey is trained in the “question, persuade, refer,” or QPR, method of suicide prevention.

This method encourages asking it people have been contemplating suicide.

“One of the things we do is to ask people the ‘S’ question,” Baron-Jeffrey said. “People are reluctant to ask because it’s scary [and] we don’t want to be intrusive.”

Individuals who come into contact with those at high risk for suicide are trained to identify signs of a person contemplating suicide, Baron-Jeffrey said. This is called the gatekeeper method and includes training pastors, teachers and officials in police and fire departments to recognize warning signs.

Some of the warning signs include significant losses accompanied by hopelessness, loss of sleep, giving possessions away, depression and previous suicide attempts, he said.

Suicide is a touchy topic but the group hopes to encourage more public discussion on the issue.

There’s a lot of stigma around the topic and often there’s a reluctance to say suicide on the death certificate, Siebrasse said.

“We’re trying to make the public more aware of depression screenings and suicide prevention services,” Siebrasse said.

The meeting will consider the goals of the Illinois Suicide Prevention Task Force, Baron-Jeffrey said.

The goals include increasing awareness about suicides, identifying the available resources and the unmet needs for intervention and training healthcare professionals for suicide assessment, said Gutierrez, who is on the task force.

The group hopes to organize suicide prevention workshops and support groups, Baron-Jeffrey said.