Oh and lifeline is a fantastic organisation. A real unsung hero of the community. It can't be an easy job, listening to people's problems all day. I've got a lot of respect for those guys.
did the gig a few years back.. took it up after a friend killed herself, thought i'd like to be able to help those in a similar situation..
everyone on the phones is volunteering, you don't get paid for it.
eventually had to give it away for a couple of reasons - it was draining on the emotions, but also found that i was dedicating less time to helping friends when they had issues as their issues seemed trivial compared to the others i was hearing on the phone. and given the reason i took it up was after my friend killed herself, i realised that if i wasn't helping my friends, i wasn't doing a good job.
but one call will stay with me forever..
was set to finish a shift at midnight, at 11.50 a call came through.. i had the option to leave it for someone else (average call was 20 mins, so lifeline policy was to try not to take news calls in the last 15 mins of your shift as you had to free up the phone for the next person coming in)..
anyway, as saying, a call came through and something inside me said to answer it.. won't go into the full detail, but basically a young girl was about to kill herself and decided she just wanted to talk to someone one last time as she was in a location and alone..
ended up talking with her for 2 and a half hours, being there for her, but also trying to find what it was that would keep her alive (basically everyone has something that they will want to stay alive for, even if 99.9% of the rest of their life feels worthless)..
on top of that i was trying to get clues as to where she was (without her knowing i was doing that) so that we could get either a pysch response team or the police out there to get her to to safety..
so walked out of the call centre at 2.30am, with quite possibly the strangest mix of emotion i have ever felt - adrenaline, happiness, shock and sadness all in equal parts..
didn't sleep that night when i got home..
the thought is always in the back of my mind though - what if i hadn't picked up that phone...?
(of course, i allay that fear by reminding myself that one of my colleagues would have done as good, if not better, a job with her).
