By Natasha Montgomery, M.A., LPC-S, LCDC

Content note: This article and episode discuss suicidal thoughts, suicide attempt survival, childhood sexual trauma, eating disorders, treatment, and suicide loss. Please consider your capacity before reading or watching.

I want us to stop treating someone’s ability to keep going as proof that they are okay.

The grades can be good. The career can be moving forward. The person can be smiling, raising children, answering messages, and doing everything we associate with having it together. None of that tells us the whole story of what it feels like to be that person.

In this episode of This Therapist Has Problems, I sit down with Shanai Ragsdale, a Texas REALTOR®, community advocate, mother of four, and suicide attempt survivor. Our conversation moves beyond the question of how someone survives a crisis. We also talk about what happens afterward: finding support, making sense of painful experiences, navigating faith, and wanting a life that is not organized entirely around enduring the next hard thing.

Looking Okay Is Not the Same as Feeling Okay

Shanai describes being an achiever while carrying pain that people around her did not necessarily see. Her story is a reminder that a person can be visible for what they accomplish and still feel unseen in what they are experiencing.

I do not hear that as a reason to be suspicious of every smile or achievement. I hear it as a reason to stay curious. Instead of assuming that someone is fine because they are doing well, I want us to leave room for a different answer.

That includes the child who gets good grades, the friend who organizes everything, and the colleague who always finds a way to deliver. When I say that we should not overlook the “good kids,” I am not suggesting that children who struggle more visibly are any less deserving. I am asking us to make care available without requiring anyone to demonstrate distress in a particular way.

A more meaningful check-in might begin with: “I see how much you are doing. How are you feeling while you are doing it?” Then comes the part that matters: making enough room to hear the answer without correcting, minimizing, or immediately trying to solve it.

When Achievement Becomes a Place to Hide

One of the strongest moments in this conversation is Shanai describing what it was like when a trauma response looked like success. She connects her own overachievement with trying to keep painful parts of her life out of view.

I want to be careful here. Achievement is not a diagnosis. Being ambitious does not prove that someone has experienced trauma. What matters is the person’s relationship with achievement and the experience underneath it.

There is a difference between enjoying what you do and feeling that you must perform perfectly so nobody looks too closely. There is a difference between choosing responsibility and believing you have no permission to need anything yourself.

The question I take from Shanai’s story is not “How successful are you?” It is “What does maintaining that success cost you, and do you have somewhere you can be honest about it?” I want people to have support before they run out of ways to appear okay.

Survival Does Not Make the Need for Care Disappear

Shanai speaks about a part of this subject that can get lost when we rush toward an uplifting ending: surviving an attempt does not automatically resolve the pain that came before it. Her account includes difficult feelings after survival, periods of change, and later moments when she recognized that she needed help again.

I do not want us to use someone else’s survival as permission to stop checking in. “You made it through” is not the same as “You have everything you need now.”

She also describes seeking counseling and later receiving more intensive outpatient support. I value that part of the conversation because it makes room for care to change. Needing additional support does not have to be framed as doing therapy wrong. It can be a reason to talk honestly with a qualified professional about what is happening and what level of care is appropriate.

I cannot determine that level of care for a reader through an article. What I can do is encourage honesty about symptoms, safety, and daily functioning rather than pressure to make a difficult experience sound manageable.

Faith Can Be Part of the Conversation Without Replacing Care

Faith is an important part of Shanai’s story. So are the questions she carried when she was hurting. I appreciate that she did not present a version of faith in which people never feel confused, angry, or alone.

I want there to be room for those questions. I do not want someone to hear this conversation and conclude that a mental health crisis means they did not pray enough, believe enough, or appreciate their life enough.

For some people, spiritual connection is meaningful support. Professional treatment can belong alongside it. For others, faith is not part of their life at all. Their need for care is no less valid. I am interested in support that respects the person, not support that requires them to borrow someone else’s beliefs.

Shanai also describes the meaning motherhood held for her. I honor that as her experience, not a prescription. People without children are equally worthy of care. People who love their families deeply can still struggle. I do not want guilt to become our strategy for helping someone stay safe.

The Pressure to Be Strong Can Make Honesty Harder

We talk about silence in Black and brown communities and the pressure many Black women experience to continue carrying everything. I do not want that conversation to flatten entire communities into one story. Our families, histories, relationships with care, and experiences of being heard are not all the same.

What I do want to challenge is the message that needing help means we are weak, ungrateful, or not busy enough. Those messages can make it harder to say, “Something is wrong, and I need support.”

Community can become a place where we practice a different response. We can stop praising endurance without asking about its cost. We can respect a person’s decision to seek treatment. We can ask what would help instead of insisting that we already know.

That kind of support does not require a perfect speech. It requires willingness to listen and a recognition that loving someone does not mean we can meet every need they have by ourselves.

What Support Can Look Like in Practice

I want this conversation to leave people with more than an encouraging sentence. When we are concerned about someone, a direct, caring conversation matters. The National Institute of Mental Health recommends asking about suicide, listening without judgment, helping make the environment safer, connecting the person with support, and following up. Asking directly does not increase suicidal thoughts. Read NIMH’s five action steps.

I also want to name a boundary: a friend, a podcast host, or a social media account is not a substitute for a crisis response. A caring person can help someone connect with appropriate help, but no one should have to wait for an Instagram message to be answered before seeking it.

If someone does not respond well to a disclosure, that response is not a measure of the person’s worth. I would want them to have another route to support, not another reason to go silent.

More Than Survival Is an Invitation, Not a Deadline

I keep coming back to the title of this episode because it holds two truths together. Staying alive matters. So does having support to build a life that can include connection, rest, meaning, and joy.

I do not want the phrase “more than survival” to become one more demand on a person who is already exhausted. Some days, getting through with support is a meaningful step. Healing does not need to look impressive to count.

My hope is that this conversation makes it easier to recognize when help is needed, ask an honest question, and take a next step toward care. You do not have to have your story organized before you begin that conversation.

A question I am taking with me: Where have I mistaken someone’s ability to keep functioning for evidence that they feel supported?

Meet Shanai Ragsdale

I am joined by Shanai Ragsdale, a Texas REALTOR®, community leader, former global technology sales leader, and mother of four. Licensed in real estate since 2009, Shanai has served as President of the Women’s Council of REALTORS® Collin County. She is also a suicide attempt survivor and mental health advocate. She shares her experience to challenge the assumption that outward success means someone cannot be struggling privately. Her message is grounded in faith, family, resilience, and the possibility of life after a mental health crisis. I appreciate her commitment to reducing shame and encouraging honest conversations about getting help.

Connect with Shanai on Instagram for her advocacy and connections around survivor stories, women’s leadership, and community events. Her social account is not a crisis service.

Work With Me

Through M.B.S. Whole Health, I offer counseling and individual therapy, support for women’s mental health, anxiety and depression, trauma and attachment work, life coaching, and LPC Associate supervision. I want the conversation to continue beyond the podcast for people who are ready to explore professional support.

For routine service questions or an appointment inquiry, contact M.B.S. Whole Health. We can discuss fit, eligibility, and next steps. Coaching and supervision are separate services, not substitutes for mental health treatment or crisis care.

My website | Email me | [682-292-8306 (line 6822928306)](tel:6822928306)

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Support and Further Reading

If you are in suicidal crisis or emotional distress in the United States, call 988, text 988, chat https://988lifeline.org/chat/, or visit https://988lifeline.org. In a life-threatening emergency, contact emergency services or go to the nearest emergency department. My practice inquiry form and social accounts are not crisis services.

The episode names 988 and discusses professional treatment and community support. I have also included NIMH’s suicide-prevention action steps as additional reader education, not as a resource Shanai specifically recommended.

Watch the full episode | Explore more TTHP articles | Subscribe to my personal reflections.

Educational disclaimer: This article and episode offer education and personal reflections, not therapy, diagnosis, or individualized medical advice. They do not establish a therapist-client relationship. Please seek appropriate professional assessment and treatment for your situation.