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The State of the Need

Despair, and the way back

This page is written plainly and carefully, with the numbers behind a hard subject and, more importantly, the evidence for what actually helps. If you are struggling right now, please read the line below before anything else.

If you are in crisis, you do not have to wait for the rest of this page. Call or text 988 (Suicide & Crisis Lifeline) right now — it is free, confidential, and available around the clock.

The scale

Suicide is rising among women. It is also, very often, preceded by thoughts nobody around her ever heard.

5.9 per 100,000

The age-adjusted female suicide rate in 2023, up from 4.2 in 2003 — it peaked at 6.1 in 2017 and has since leveled off, per CDC/NCHS Data Brief 541 (2025).

5.5%

Of women reported serious thoughts of suicide in the past year (2024 data), highest among women ages 18–25, per SAMHSA's National Survey on Drug Use and Health, via NIMH.

3.9x

The male suicide rate (22.8) is about 3.9 times the female rate (5.9) — women attempt more often but die less, a long-standing pattern, per CDC/NIMH data (2025).

That last figure deserves a caveat rather than a headline. Recent self-report data shows women and men now attempt suicide at close to the same rate — but the mortality gap between them remains wide. Whatever the reason for that gap, it does not make a woman's risk smaller. It means her crisis is more likely to be survived, and survived crises are exactly where a program built around a year of stability can do its work.

In Texas

The need is not smaller here.

Texas's overall age-adjusted suicide rate was 14.2 per 100,000 in 2023 — 4,382 deaths — essentially matching the national rate, per the same CDC/NCHS data brief. Women accounted for 20% of Texas suicide deaths between 2019 and 2022, per the Texas Violent Death Reporting System (Texas DSHS, 2025) — though that period reflects partial-county coverage, so the true share may differ.

What drives it

Suicide risk rarely stands alone. It compounds with the things this ministry already exists to address.

Depression is a recognized risk factor, and women experience major depression at markedly higher rates than men — about 10% versus roughly 6% — per NIMH's 2021 data (the most recent year with a sex breakdown available). The CDC also names adverse childhood experiences, which are highest among girls, as a risk factor, and estimates that preventing ACEs could reduce suicide attempts among high-schoolers by as much as 89% — a modeled population estimate, not a measured outcome, but a striking one, per the CDC's ACEs overview (2026).

None of this happens in isolation. The women this ministry serves most often carry more than one of these risks at once: depression and childhood trauma, a substance use disorder used to numb what depression and trauma leave behind, and an abusive relationship that deepens all of it. A program that only treated one of these threads at a time would be treating the wrong problem. That compounding is exactly why Mercy Manor is built as one year, in one home, addressing all of it together.

The way back

Suicide is preventable. Connection and stable care are the reasons why.

The CDC states plainly that suicide is preventable, and names feeling connected, having supportive relationships, coping skills, and access to consistent care as established protective factors, per its risk and protective factors guidance and its prevention overview (both 2024–2026). Treatment helps, too: among adults with major depression, 61% received treatment in the past year, rising to about 75% among those with the most severe impairment, per NIMH data.

A stable year of connection, structure, and care is exactly what the evidence points to as protective. That is not a metaphor for what Mercy Manor does — it is a description of it. A year, a home, a community that does not disappear when the crisis passes: that combination is what lowers risk, according to the research above, and it is what a $500-a-month, $6,000-a-year place in the program provides for one woman for a full twelve months.

Depression, trauma, addiction, and abuse rarely arrive one at a time, and neither does recovery. See the fuller pictures of women's mental health and trauma, domestic violence against women, and women and addiction — and why a full year, specifically, is the model that gives these protective factors time to take hold. For the broader picture of the need Mercy Manor exists to meet, see the state of the need.

Help a woman find her way back
Sources & methodology

Every figure on this page, and where it came from

Last reviewed: July 2026. Every figure is dated and linked to its source; we refresh as new data publishes.

Common questions

Frequently asked questions

How common is suicide among American women?

The age-adjusted female suicide rate was 5.9 per 100,000 in 2023, up from 4.2 in 2003, after peaking at 6.1 in 2017 and leveling off since, per CDC/NCHS data. Beyond deaths, 5.5% of women reported serious thoughts of suicide in the past year (2024 data), highest among women ages 18 to 25, per SAMHSA's National Survey on Drug Use and Health.

Do more women or more men die by suicide?

Men die by suicide far more often. The male rate (22.8 per 100,000) is about 3.9 times the female rate (5.9), a long-standing pattern, per CDC and NIMH data. Women attempt suicide more often but die less frequently in each attempt. Recent self-reported attempt rates are close to equal by sex, but the mortality gap between men and women remains wide.

What raises a woman's risk of suicide?

Depression is a recognized risk factor, and women experience major depression at roughly 10% versus about 6% for men, per NIMH's 2021 data (the most recent sex breakdown available). Adverse childhood experiences, which are highest among girls, are another named risk factor; the CDC estimates that preventing ACEs could reduce suicide attempts among high-schoolers by up to 89%, though that figure is a modeled population estimate rather than a measured outcome. Trauma, substance use, and intimate-partner violence frequently compound these risks together.

What actually helps prevent suicide?

The CDC identifies feeling connected, having supportive relationships, coping skills, and access to consistent care as established protective factors, and states plainly that suicide is preventable. Treatment works: among adults with major depression, 61% received treatment in the past year, rising to about 75% among those with severe impairment, per NIMH data. A stable year of connection, structure, and care is exactly the kind of protective factor this evidence points to.

If you are in crisis, call or text 988 (Suicide & Crisis Lifeline) — free, confidential, and available around the clock. Mercy Manor is not a crisis service; it is the longer work of rebuilding a life after the crisis has passed, one stable year at a time.