When Jeremy Foltz opened his front door and saw the police chief and county coroner, his mind began to race.
There were plenty of reasons the chief might be there. There was only one reason the coroner would be.
On the morning of Sept. 14, 2025, the Foltz family’s world changed forever. Their eldest son, 18-year-old high school senior Tayson, had driven to a parking lot behind Franklin Regional Senior High School and died by suicide.
“It was surreal,” Foltz, 46, said recently as he sat in his living room with a framed photo of Tayson nearby. “It’s almost like you’re in a dream. It’s just so hard to believe. You’re in shock, and the weight of what has happened doesn’t really sink in at all.”
After an investigation by Murrysville police, Tayson’s death was officially ruled a suicide.
“We were told what happened, and when it happened, but as for the school and the police, we didn’t get that much information,” Foltz said. “We went in and spoke with the high school principal and guidance counselor, and they offered their condolences but no level of detail.”
In the weeks that followed, Tayson’s father, brother and stepmother struggled to process their grief, support one another and look for answers that may never come. It is a scenario that has become more frequent nationwide in recent years, even as instances of suicide in the region have remained relatively steady.
Nationwide, data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showed suicide rates for people ages 10 to 24 rose by 62% from 2007 to 2021, from 6.8 incidents per 100,000 to 11 per 100,000.
More than 2,600 Americans under 19 died by suicide in 2023, according to the CDC. It was the second-leading cause of death for ages 10-14 and the third-leading cause for ages 15-19.
* If you or someone you know is struggling, help is available by calling or texting 988.
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A world of stress
Teenagers used to face a far less cluttered world.
They had access to the internet, but they weren’t equipped with devices that provide access to billions of hours of content, in all of its positive and negative forms.
The technology that increased access to that content also has increased access to those teenagers. If a teen was bullied at school, they usually could escape the bullying, at least temporarily, when they returned home at the end of the school day. But that is no longer the case with the proliferation of social media apps that can be used anonymously.
What’s more, people under 20 years old have grown up in an age when the national political discourse has sharply degraded and frequently intersects with political violence.
“There’s just tremendous stress in the world that we’re absorbing,” said Dr. Lauren Hartman, owner of Aspen Grove Adolescent & Young Adult Medicine in California. “My kids come home from school and say, ‘Can you believe this?’ ”
“You used to be able to go home, take the phone off the hook and essentially be disconnected from the world,” said Joe Gratzel, program consultant at the Society for the Prevention of Teen Suicide, based in New Jersey. “Now you get no break.”
Whether the cause is stress, grief, depression, drug-related or something else, it is sometimes too much to bear.
In 2023, 20.4% of students surveyed by the CDC had considered suicide and 9.5% reported attempting it.
Stress can manifest, and compound, in a variety of scenarios.
“For your high-performing kids, the stress they place on themselves can amplify things,” Gratzel said. “For neurodivergent kids with learning challenges, their frustration or lack of coping skills puts them at risk.”
Suicide has been outpaced in recent years only by gun-related deaths, vehicle crashes and — depending on the subcategory — drug overdoses for deaths among young people, according to the National Institutes of Health.
“What has changed on the negative side of things is the power and influence of social media and a world where it’s possible to torment someone anonymously,” he said. “You used to get a break from bullies when school was out. Now the bullies can make fake accounts.”
In the 2023 state-administered Pennsylvania Youth Survey, completed by more than 262,000 students across the commonwealth, 32% of students who reported being bullied also reported seriously considering suicide within the past year.
But bullying is not always a factor. More than 24% of survey respondents agreed with the statement, “Sometimes I think life is not worth it,” a figure that was down from nearly 28% in 2021.
In some cases, like that of Tayson Foltz, it can be difficult, if not impossible, to determine what leads a teen down such a dark path.
Warning signs
By all accounts, Tayson Foltz was a happy, well-adjusted teenager. He excelled on the high school track and field team, especially in pole vaulting, and he was a member of the Franklin Regional Panthers Marching Band.
When he suffered a concussion while pole vaulting, it didn’t worry his parents at the time.
“There were some physical effects, but that subsided,” his father said. “He had a good specialist who checked him out, and he got back to gym class and seemed to return to normal after a couple of weeks.”
Looking back, Foltz said, some of the things he noticed about his son “should have made my antennae go up.”
Following the concussion, Tayson seemed to lose interest in track and field and decided to leave the team. Shortly after, he also quit the marching band.
When multiple warning signs begin to emerge is when a teen’s behavior should be considered concerning, Gratzel said.
“If I have a young person who is experiencing family disruption, they have a behavioral health challenge, they’re not sleeping and they quit the baseball team — when you start to see those risk factors converging, that’s a concern,” he said.
“Parents have to remember that they know their child best,” Hartman said. “They especially know their kid’s ‘baseline.’ So if they’re seeing things suddenly shift from their child’s normal behavior, that’s something to note. If a child who’s a social butterfly is suddenly canceling plans, or if they’re really into basketball and suddenly want to quit the team, those are red flags.”
Hartman acknowledged the stigma surrounding teen suicide, not only as a topic but also the idea that talking about it with your child could aggravate things further.
“It’s one of those things a lot of us feel nervous to even talk about,” she said. “I see parents worry all the time that bringing it up will make things worse. But that ‘Spidey sense’ that parents have is almost always right. If they have concerns, they shouldn’t hold that in.”
Gratzel said his organization advises parents to act on the acronym FACTS.
“Act on feelings, actions, changes, threats and situations,” he said. “Are they sleeping more or less? Eating more or less? Are they making overt statements or threats? And it’s hard because adolescence is a time full of changes.”
Parents frequently underestimate how much their children look to them as role models, Hartman said.
“Given all the stress in the world and the emotions we’re all feeling, the better care parents can take of themselves — including getting help if they need it — sets such a great example for their children,” she said. “Seeing a parent use their own tools can be very helpful for a child and can really help destigmatize the issue of mental health.”
Coping with loss
Not long after they had lost Tayson, the Foltz family met with representatives from Ray of Hope, Westmoreland County’s suicide prevention and awareness task force.
“They connected us with two people for grief counseling, and we’ve been going to the one in Greensburg,” said Tayson’s stepmother, Nicola Campbell. “They were there for us on day one. They offered to speak with (Tayson’s younger brother) Carver. They were always checking in with us.”
Heather McLean, chair for Ray of Hope, said trained members of the organization’s team are always ready to engage with suicide loss survivors.
“The loss team can do an emergency response at the scene or a delayed response,” McLean said. “It’s really about what the family needs.”
The group consists of about 30 trained members, led by an individual who has lost a family member to suicide. Ray of Hope hosts several events throughout the year, including its annual Celebration of Life, which the Foltz family attended for the first time in December.
“To see a room of 150 loss survivors all together can be very emotional, but it helps a family recognize that they’re not alone,” McLean said.
The family is also undergoing therapy, individually and as a group.
“I can see in our house, we’re all grieving differently,” Campbell said. “And the therapists have been very supportive in walking us each through that because we’re all in different stages. If there is one thing in all of this that I am thankful for, it’s the resources that Ray of Hope was able to provide for us.”
Ray of Hope also is connected to the 988 hotline, a number anyone in the U.S. can call or text if they are in crisis or having suicidal thoughts.
In addition, Gratzel said having a strong, supportive community around one’s family can be a crucial part of keeping lines of communication open.
“The number one protective factor for a kid is a trusted adult,” he said. “Encourage your kids, at every age, to be able to identify the adults around them they can trust. And for parents — if that’s not you, don’t be sad. That’s the way it is with a lot of teenagers. But you can reach out to those trusted adults to let them know your child has identified them as such and ask if they’re OK with that. And let them know that as long as your child is not being hurt or hurting someone else, they don’t need to repeat anything your child has said.”
Talking was a crucial first step for the Foltz family. And Foltz said it was comforting, though also difficult, being with his extended family during their first Christmas without Tayson.
“People are talking to you, and you can tell they’re treading lightly,” he said. “But it’s nice to have their support.”
Ray of Hope hosts the Celebration of Life in December for that precise reason, McLean said.
“Suicide loss is one of the most traumatic things a person can experience, and it hits especially hard around the holidays,” she said.
Foltz said he and his family had to take things one step at a time.
“Nothing’s going to get resolved in a day or a month or maybe even years,” he said. “But it can help to compartmentalize things a little bit. Take things day by day, hour by hour, sometimes minute by minute. Even though talking about it is a hard first step to take, it’s important.
“You can’t keep that stuff inside. It’ll just boil you down.”
Honoring, remembering
Once a month, Tayson’s younger brother, Carver, goes to his grandmother’s house, where they write a note to Tayson, attach it to a balloon and let it float off into the sky.
“It’s a really neat thing for them to be able to do,” Foltz said. “My father is also a woodcarver, and he made a beautiful carving in Tay’s memory that we have on the wall.”
Officials at Ray of Hope also want families to know they are not alone.
“We have a card program where families receive cards the month after their loss, on the person’s birthday, after six months has passed, at Christmastime,” McLean said.
Since starting the card program in 2023, more than 160 families have signed up.
Tayson’s parents also said that, while they will never forget their son, they also had to find ways to continue moving forward.
“I think it was very important to get back to a schedule and a routine,” Campbell said. “We set out some new goals with the idea that, if you’re goal-oriented, you have something to focus on. Our younger son was not a runner, but shortly after the incident, we started training for a 5K and to run in the Greensburg Turkey Trot.”
Even with all of the resources and support, Foltz said, getting through each day still is challenging.
“There’s no instruction book,” he said. “You have to navigate it yourself, but there are a lot of people and groups who can help you steer.”
Instagram, Facebook set safeguards
On Feb. 26, Instagram and Facebook parent company Meta announced an update for settings for teen Instagram accounts that would notify parents if a teen repeatedly searches for terms related to suicide or self-harm within a short period of time. Meta also announced it was building similar features and parental notifications for teens’ conversations with AI, which will be rolled out later this year.
“The vast majority of teens do not try to search for suicide and self-harm content on Instagram, and when they do, our policy is to block these searches, instead directing them to resources and helplines that can offer support,” Meta officials said in a news release. “These alerts are designed to make sure parents are aware if their teen is repeatedly trying to search for this content and to give them the resources they need to support their teen.”