Suicide Hotline Operators, When Did Help Come Too Late? (AskReddit)

suicide hotline operators have you ever had calls where you thought help wouldn't reach your client in time how did you come to terms with it i worked at rsp hotline for about a year and one call that comes to mind was when a caller said they didn't want to die alone but had already taken a lethal amount of bills they said they were parked in a lot somewhere they wouldn't disclose and the only information i had to pass off to emergency services was their phone number i felt so worried that information wouldn't be enough to get them helped in time but once they hung up the call and wouldn't answer my calls back i realized there was only so much that this person allowed me to do for them and i did absolutely everything i could with it being able to understand that brought me some peace knowing that i will be there as much as someone will let me and i'll do the best that i can with whatever is in my power and that's all we can do for others and that's all we can ask of ourselves while not a suicide holy line operator a friend called me in tears saying he had drank bleach obviously i didn't really know what to do so i stayed on the phone talking to him and used someone else's phone to call an ambulance he was alive when they got there but he died a few hours later honestly it's horrible knowing someone is dying and the help they need might not reach them in time with an ambulance call taker for a little while the amount of psychos on a daily basis was in itself depressing if you think they are going to hurt themselves or are in danger you must stay on the line i've spoken to people who were actively cutting themselves while on the phone and i had to tell her to stop another was having a manic ptsd episode and i was on the phone with her for 40 minutes before the ambus arrived that was an exhausting call had another who wanted to end it they had recently gone through gender reassignment and were having mixed feelings had others try to odd and they were choking on their vomit a few others i can't remember but there's always the fear you're going to say something that triggers them into going over the edge fortunately for me most just call because they want someone to listen and to get help but there have been others who have called just before jumping in front of trains just so they can hear one last voice mental health is so damn important and is being overlooked way too much i fear not only for the victims and their families but also the emergency services who have to physically be there to manage them not a hotline operator when i was about 13 my best friend at the time called me to tell me she took an overdose and wanted to say goodbye she's had a really troubled childhood and was always running away and self-harmed a lot i talked to her for a bit to get more information and then told her i'd have to call her back because my mum wanted to use the phone once she'd hung up i told my mum everything and we called him ambulance for her i called her back and kept her talking i knew the ambulance had arrived when she started screaming at me down the phone that i'd lied to her and broken her trust she survived we never spoke again i found out years later she'd actually wrote me a letter while in hospital but my mum never gave it to me she'd read it and decided to throw it away i never knew what was in it my friend continued having a troubled life but then found god and started sorting her life out unfortunately she died from heart failure a few years back i always thought she hated me for what i did it upsets me we never got to talk again and i've always resented my mum for keeping that letter a secret i work in ambulance communications i was on the phone with a lady out in a semi-rural area on a very busy night for us she had found her boyfriend hanging from a tree in his favorite park she told me that it was his favorite place to come and sit to watch the dogs he'd sent her a suicide text and she had just thought to look there i spoke to her for about 30 minutes before we got police assistance we requested fire and police since our rita lights and sirens was 35 minutes she had nothing to cut him down and no way to climb high enough to try and undo the rope for 30 minutes she held him up as best she could with his feet on her shoulders he'd been hanging for 30 minutes to one hour and couldn't be revived i hope she got the help she needs to keep going from that she did everything she could that's the worst call i've ever taken former emt i remember talking to one of our 911 dispatchers who was on the phone with someone who called 911 because they were afraid they were going to hurt themselves during the entire call they were crunching and chewing something eventually the dispatcher had to ask them what they were chomping on they said it was their psych meds i don't know how it ended but ms was enroute as soon as they said they were afraid last time i tried to commit suicide i called a suicide hotline and they literally just forwarded my call onto emergency services once i told them i'd taken a bunch of pills unless you just want support and someone to talk to don't call a suicide hotline also bonus trivia spoke to the emergency operator and she said it would be at least four hours for an ambulance and i'd be better getting a taxi not a hotline person but an army medic this always helped me and i found it to be fairly accurate there are three types of patients those that will live no matter what you do those that will die no matter what you do and those that if you do the right thing right now they may have a chance we are really just there for the third type the first two you monitor and reassure and make them as comfortable as you can if you as a caretaker need help please please get it it's easy to carry it all with you not a hotline operator but i'm currently in recovery from addiction i used everything but in this case it was heroin my friend and i were sitting on my couch and had just each toast about a minute or two after i said something to him about something funny on tv but get no response his color was leaving him his breathing was shallow and he started struggling to breathe he was completely unresponsive i shook him nothing slapped his face and when nothing happened began to realize the situation was dire this was the real deal over 15 years of using mass quantities of many drug combinations myself and only faced one other situation where another person helped me get someone who ought to ride to the hospital but this time it was all on me i knew i had to do something or my friend would die right beside me i was lucky slash smart enough to have a narcan kit on hand but had never shot anyone up with an intramuscular injection before i snapped off the glass vial top and injected him in the thigh i have allergies and the epipen injection area seemed like it would be appropriate slash best to use it there in the heat of the situation upon pressing the plunger down he seemed to react to the dose he still made some [ __ ] up odd breathing noises as he sort of began breathing again there are two vials in the kit they say wait a few minimum before you use the second one but my friend is dying in front of me [ __ ] it i plunge the second one into his leg he starts to come to his breathing quickened and just like that he snapped back to reality he was confused what happened [ __ ] man you just almost died after driving him the hospital and having them take him inside once again yelling at me for not calling ambulance [ __ ] that he would have died if i just called ambulance and he was fine when i drove him they realized him in like 10 minutes and to show how [ __ ] addiction is immediately upon returning home i told him he owed me a hit because he wasted my high by almost dying not a suicide line operator but when i was 17 i tried to jump of a bridge at the time i was in a psychiatric hospital and had leave where i hadn't returned when i started to have suicidal thoughts i rang the ward where i was staying i spoke to one of the nurses tony who tried to calm me down he was a big burly man almost seven foot tall and billed like a bouncer while i was stood on the bridge some guys pulled over to see if i was okay i freaked out and hung up the phone on tony the last thing he heard me say was [ __ ] off the guys ended up restraining me and calling the police the police took me back to the ward and tony was waiting outside to take me back in he was crying and told me that for the first time in his 15 years working there he genuinely thought he had lost someone i ain't an operator there but i experienced my best friend die it's kind of sad to remember what happened so i was in a discord call with him playing some games then he left for like 10 minutes after he came back he was crying i asked him what's wrong and why was he crying he explained me that he had drank bleach only because his girlfriend left him not saying anything i called the medics unfortunately they didn't arrive in time all i heard was someone fall down on the ground in silence the after a few minutes the medic rushed in at that point i knew what happened i was crying and the feeling was horrible to experience someone that was important to you die not hotline operator but i once saw a person who had rabies from a supposed bad bite while he was sleeping he didn't notice that he was bit and never got any vaccination against it before rabies travels up your nerve fibers to reach your brain once it does you are dead there is nothing all the medicine in the world can do so this dude starts getting all the symptoms of rabies in front of my eyes refusing to drink water because his body won't let him scared of the light terrified when a cold breeze hits his face foaming at the mouth i left when i couldn't handle it i've worked on a suicide line before i think it takes a certain type of person plus very good training debriefing and a particular frame of mind to be able to do it and feel okay i had a wonderful and experienced shift supervisor who used to ask me at the end of calls if you could go back in time keeping everything you know about the call what would you do differently it was a great question because it did two things help me continuously reflect and use my experience to get better and better at my job notice subtle signs figure out what worked keep an open mind etc help me recognize call after call that i had done the best i could with the information experience training and resources i had available to me at the time both of those things helped me feel okay about what i was doing even if the outcome was not what i had hoped i always felt deeply for the people i spoke to but i never felt responsible for what they chose particularly in the case of a certain type of caller who always made my stomach drop these were the people i used to call box checkers they were people who had essentially made up their mind about what they were going to do and were now going through the motions of checking the boxes of place they could turn to for help proving to themselves that it was useless and no one could really help them it was a justification for going through with their plan in my experience these people never really engaged with the call and were dismissive of everything without really considering it especially if it involved them changing a point of view or trying something new they want the call to fail and actively make that happen even if it means becoming combative with you i felt the worst about those calls because i felt used by those callers they were always going to do what they were going to do and used me and my service organization as part of their justification for doing it we didn't hear the outcomes from our callers that was how the system worked but i always knew after those calls that the outcome wouldn't have been good but at the end of the day i always took the attitude that i can't control the choices of another person i can offer my hand but they have to choose to take it i felt good about being one safe person standing watch at the figurative edge i wasn't there to save everyone all i could do was be there for people who needed someone right at that moment and offer a lifeline that's all it could at times be very stressful and sad but it was mostly very joyful and uplifting i'd recommend people thinking of trying being a hotline worker to try it i learned a phenomenal amount about what it means to really listen and be with another person in what they are going through i'll use those skills for the rest of my life i had a friend a while back who actually had to deal with the reality of this we didn't talk too much about it she told me the full story because i had the same kind of question but it bummed me out but she did mention that once that phone hung up she felt this indescribable dread she was holding out and hoping that help would arrive in time but something inside her just told her it just wasn't going to come in time at that point talking about suicide was romanticized and we had facebook posts floating around like suicidal people are fallen angels who want to go home actual mental health and information on how to upkeep one's own mental well-being was there but the conversation never really moved past suicidal people should seek help so she told me because of that she held on to that experience for a really long time a really long time i think it's important to note that usually it's never someone's fault the majority of people who end up ending their own lives don't have a vendetta against one individual lots of shows like 13 reasons why love to make the concept of suicide a cardboard cutout revenge something to make people feel bad but it's not and she knew it wasn't but it sue who got him easy to believe that at the end of the day and our conversation i guess both of us walked away knowing a little more she told me she coped with her time as a volunteer by accepting that what happened after those calls happened once the conversation finally moved past that early sentiment of yore she started letting go she couldn't change the past but she could go forward and try and make things a little better that meant learning how to better utilize tools for people at risk of suicide to distract themselves with until help arrived advocating for better mental health education encouraging others to be thoughtful and treat the topic with respect she was a really good friend i was an intervention operator for three years and a trainer for two in my experience it was extremely rare because people who call are looking for help it's the people who don't ever call that make up most of the suicides we hear about or don't there was a call where it was clear the caller was getting more and more confused slash disoriented they had admitted having consumed pills but couldn't say what or how many we alerted the authorities near the beginning of the call when it became clear the person was in distress slurred speech vomiting etc and it was a difficult wait we eventually heard them break in the door and confirm the room was littered with empty pill bottles for the mental health of all staff we never had any feedback on the outcomes of our interventions for exactly the reason you are i think alluding to in your question knowing you lost a caller would be devastating in the end having a good support system debriefing process in place can reduce the possibility of post-traumatic effects or vicarious trauma hope this helps

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Id: EgI50Veyt74

Length: 15min 55sec (955 seconds)

Published: Sat Jul 18 2020