It Takes a Teenager to Help a Teenager in Crisis

I'm mid 70's and "I" don't like talking to adults. They tend to patronise...ask ridiculous questions and not comprehend the issues...or the value of simple humanity. So please let these kids talk to the kida....definitely as first contact - - they will do a whole lot better with those who truly understand and share their world.

Gee, really? Who would have guessed. There is your answer to preventing mass murders. It works. I know it does, from personal experience.

In order to save the planet, all eco-warriors and millennials are turning off their computers and are throwing away their cellphones. This is highly commendable! I'm so proud of them. They're taking action. Bless them all.

One issue with adult-run hotlines that isn't mentioned here: those tend to be "suicide hotlines" - something a teen might not call when they are just depressed or confronting a seemingly insurmountable problem. There are so few doctors and resources for kids not already harming themselves - this peer-led, adult supervised hotline is pure genius for those who don't want to get that far down.

I look forward to watching young people around the world update their Twitter bio to: "A very happy young girl (boy) looking forward to a bright and wonderful future."

This article describes some inspiring initiatives- kudos to those who make themselves available to listen, and who are willing to help. Vicarious trauma is very real, but training and support to the staff and volunteers can make it work. Yes, we will still lose lives to suicide, but the least we can do is to counter nihilism and offer a reason for survival.

I have no trouble believing that help from a teen is more effective. But what worries me is the potential impact on the helper. It is a lot for anyone and are teens able to shoulder this without damage to themselves?

For most of my career in education I taught teenagers and I still do so at a camp for teens in Maine. I teach art so I am privy to a lot of chatting while they are working. If there is one thing I learned about teenagers is that they are perceptive and honest, much more so than adults I know. I trust a teenager to work with another teenager in distress in a very supportive way. One of the issues important to them is someone being there for them. This is where another teen is can be of great help and comfort. To me these seem to be necessary programs that will help our teenagers in need.

I worked as an AIDS hotline counselor for NYC in the early '90's. Some of the calls were from people who were suicidal. We were highly trained and constantly monitored to ensure that we were making the right decisions as to how to communicate with all kinds of people in all kinds of situations. Some calls lasted for hours. The concept of "active listening" was constantly reinforced for us in trainings. We were really good at what we did. My son just turned 21 and is in college. He suffered some severe depression in high school, but he is now much more confident and optimistic, and is enjoying his time at school. He knows VERY well that his parents are there for him any time, and I have reminded him many times that if he gets into troubled waters, he should seek us or a counselor at school for immediate help. Yet I know full well (having once been a young person myself) that peer support from caring friends--people who "get" what's going on then and there, and don't judge--can be more helpful and easy to engage with than adults, even if the adults love you more than anything. A hotline full of well-trained and highly supervised PEERS, who have support and access to good resources for further help, seems to me to be the best of both worlds. And of course this one is in Portland, where I went to college and where, if I recall correctly, pretty much everything is wonderful. Thanks so much to the volunteers who put in the hard, sometimes draining work, and to their supervisors.

Isolation kills. Isolation or temporary estrangement from parents can be a normal stage in growing up. But isolation from one's own peer group is devastating. Ask formerly-bullied adults if the pain of it was serious. This is a brilliant idea that comes from how kids work. How their hearts for each other are so powerful. Of course adults should stand protectively near. But this is brilliant.

Okay folks! Where is the mention of LGBTQ young people and organizations such as The Trevor Project??? Young LGBTQ are at highest risk of suicide and I don't see one mention in this article.

These kids are really great. The cautioning, judgmental and critical adults in this comments section, less so.

I work on a peer-to-peer forum for a mental health issue that effects young people. This forum is run by peers, and who knows where their money comes from. Ad revenue I think. I also do some work on a forum run by the well-known professional organization that labels itself as the main advocacy group for this condition. This group is run by doctors and Phd's and has a yearly budget in the millions of dollars. Their forum is heavily supervised and strictly regulated in what can and can not be said. In order to protect other members from "triggering" material, they claim. It get's maybe a dozen posts a day. Whereas the peer-run forum, which is often demonized for lack of adult supervision, can get up to 10,000 posts a day. Folks tend to reach out to those they believe will understand them, and who they know are primarily concerned about them as individuals, rather than trusting in professional organizations which can often appear to be concerned primarily about preserving their own professional positions.

Kids need parents, not peers. It is precisely this muddled thinking--abetted by parents who fail to be parents--which is why kids are in the straits they're in.

I worked on the Columbus, OH Suicide Hotline for a year during my counseling grad school days. I was in my early 40's. I remember a fellow worker, a 21-year-old OSU psychology student, taking a call from a suicidal teenager. The call went very well, though my coworker spoke in almost a whisper. I was very impressed when she asked the caller, a female, if she wanted to sing a song together. That's what they did. Would a teen hotline worker think of that?

Speaking from experience: I second that this can be one tool in the kit for suicide prevention, but it must be accompanied by supervision by expert adults. There are consequences for the teen who becomes involved in helping a seriously ill peer and, particularly, if the intervention does not work. My daughter survived the suicide of her friend, but the friend was so ill she could not be saved. I feared for my daughter for a long time afterward. Eventually, she became a doctor, but this was due to her inherent health and strength. The friend needed far more help than someone to talk to, and my daughter told her friend's mother that there was grave danger. The family thought they were addressing the issue, but it was a teaspoon of help, not the serious intervention required. Suicide is a complex phenomenon. Severe mental illness sometimes underlies it. When it does, severe medical intervention is required. Families go into denial. Peers need to direct the ill person to those who can medically intervene. What kills the sufferer is the disease.

A wonderful idea - on paper. What is essential is that the volunteers are monitored and provided constant guidance. I have seen this go awry, where even the most stable child can be thrown off when serving as the counselor/guided for troubled teens. As teens, they are simply not equipped to handle this pressure - they are not adults with fully developed brains (that doesn't happen until 25). Again, this has merit, but ONLY if the teens who participate must be constantly monitored for their own mental health.

How many teens do you know who talk on the phone anymore. If I wanted to get a young person to open up I’d start by texting them or direct message etc. I believe the volunteers are doing great work but figuring out a safe way for them to text live support to those in crisis be the ideal.

Thank you to these courageous young volunteers. The cynic in me sadly thought that the headline referred to the brave Greta and our POTUS.

The teenage mind is absolutely fascinating. Adolescents do have a different thinking style. And, if some neuroscientists, anthropologists, and historians are to be believed they enter a phase in which their identity develops partly through intense social interaction with other adolescents. They become peculiarly susceptible to psychological manipulation as well but often immune to adult guidance. Sometimes that's a recipe for disaster but this seems like the perfect solution. As a parent of a teen I notice how well my teen responds to situations where he is responsible for someone in need (though not well to my my need for him to fold the laundry). A lot of his social interaction with peers does involve supporting his friends through all their many trials. Often my adult guidance is not welcome, even though I distinctly remember going through similar things myself. If you structure it like this where teens are trained to help each other, amazing things could happen. Sadly, a lot of teens don't have good social interactions and are very isolated. I hope this project will expand. It is possibly the most promising way to support teens in distress.

Great story! What wonderful young people. Please let one of these volunteers become POTUS some day. Our current crop of 25 from all political parties seem to have lost empathy for our most vulnerable citizens.