A nervous voice says, “Can I talk about a friend who is having a problem?”

“Absolutely, you sound pretty upset right now,” I say.

Kevin explains that he is worried for his friend. “I just got off the phone with her and she wants to give up,” he says. “She just kept crying, and I really don’t know how to help her.”

Kevin and Melanie have been friends for years. Their families are also close. “She’s like a sister,” he says. “She just started high school. I’m one year ahead of her so we don’t see each other much except at lunchtime.”

Melanie had been dating a guy during the summer and they broke up. A girl in Melanie’s class is now dating her ex-boyfriend. This is where the problems began.

First it started with Melanie getting dirty looks from the girl, who knows a lot of other students and seems to be a leader among her peers.

She has also been intimidating Melanie by laughing at her in the hallway, and tripping and shoving her. But this girl is popular, and a lot of the students laugh along with her. Melanie didn’t feel other students would support her if she spoke up about it, so she stayed quiet.

“It bugs me so much,” Kevin says. “I see that girl laughing at Mel, but I promised I wouldn’t get involved. It isn’t easy to stand by and see how miserable she is.”

Melanie is afraid that if she talks to someone about being bullied by this popular girl she will lose any chance of making friends. The few she had are starting to pull away.

I ask Kevin if she had been threatened in any way and if he felt she may be in danger. “They left her a note in the cafeteria,” he says. “It said that she had better watch her back.”

Melanie has also been getting threats through text messages. Anonymous calls are coming in on her cell phone through blocked numbers, but whoever is on the other end of the line just hangs up when she answers.

Melanie’s locker door has been defaced with crude and hateful words. “She doesn’t want to worry her parents, but she says she just can’t take it anymore,” Kevin says.

“I am really worried she is going to do something stupid,” he says. I can hear him crying softly.

I wait a moment. “This must be so frustrating for you,” I say. “What would you like to do to help her?”

Kevin says that he promised to respect her wishes and not tell anyone, but there are trained peer mediators at his school. They help students work things out way before anything escalates. If that doesn’t work, then professional mediators come into the school to help.

“Wow, that sounds like a really good system you have at your school!” I say.

I’m concerned about his friend, though, and ask Kevin if there is any risk Melanie might want to end her life. He says she promised to call him and that she said she would think about some of his suggestions tonight about their school’s mediation program. He has even offered to go to the program with her.

“That sounds like a great idea, Kevin. Do you think she will take you up on that offer?” I ask. I think about how Kevin is carrying a huge burden on his shoulders and that perhaps it is time that he talked to someone.

He decides to meet with his teacher who trained the students in the bullying mediation program first thing in the morning.

“That’s a great idea,” I tell him. “Will you talk to anyone else, like your parents, to help get some of this pressure off your chest?”

“Well, I feel a bit better already now that I’ve talked with you,” he says, “I might talk to my dad. He’s a calm, rational kind of guy; he always has a way of putting things in perspective for me. Yeah, I just might do that. Thanks again.”

How painful it must be to stand by and see a friend hurt like this! I’m glad he is taking a stand.

Can you imagine… being 17, at university, and away from home for the first time? You were always a good student, but here everything is moving so quickly, the work seems much harder, and your grades have fallen. You’re not sure why you’re not doing well, but every day is a struggle. There’s so much reading, so many assignments, and not enough time in the day – or the night – to keep up. You’re stressed, anxious, and can’t think about anything else. Your mom calls every day and has high expectations, which makes it hard to tell her how you feel – so you don’t. Plus, your parents have stressful jobs and their own problems. They know you’re a responsible person who can handle things, and you don’t want to burden them. Meanwhile, exams start in a few weeks…

If you are a parent, grandparent, aunt, uncle or friend of a young person, and that child was struggling with a difficult situation, wouldn’t it be comforting to know that Kids Help Phone is available, 24/7/365?

No matter the situation that a kid deals with, Kids Help Phone is there, offering support and hope.  Can you imagine reaching out for help … and receiving a lifeline?

I grew up in an era where as a young person you had to get support through other mechanisms, whether that was through your friends or other family members, otherwise you were left to figure it out for yourself, which was not easy.

I obviously made it through those difficult years, but there were times when anxieties, nervousness, and what seemed like overwhelming responsibilities might have compromised my confidence and opportunity to thrive as a young person. I don’t think that’s radically different from what a lot of kids experience today. And I look back and think, for every kid who has to go through that, some will make it, some will be stronger for it, and some won’t make it and there can be drastic repercussions to that.

If I had been able to use Kids Help Phone, I think it would have provided me with better coping skills, better solutions to situations, and the confidence to get through those times more easily. 

I’m not naive enough to think we can eliminate the effect of all of the tough problems kids deal with every day. But if we can reduce it, if we can change the path not just for one kid, but for many, then I believe that’s why Kids Help Phone is here. I think we do it for hundreds if not thousands of kids every month.

Knowing that you are enabling success in young people’s lives? That’s a great thing.

Can you imagine… being 15, and in the fight of your life with your parents? You’re a girl who is dating someone three years older than you and from a different religion, and your parents have just found out and they don’t approve. He’s a great guy and treating you well. Why can’t they be more open to your choices? Why don’t they seem to trust you, and what can you do about it?

No matter the situation that a kid deals with, Kids Help Phone offers hope.  Can you imagine reaching out for help … and receiving a lifeline?

Lori tells me she is a very young single mom of a two-year old daughter. She has devoted the last three years of her life to parenting and her education. She now has a good job.

Lori says she is questioning her emotional state. She wonders aloud if maybe her problem is a mental illness inherited from her mother. She explains, “My mom has schizophrenia.” Lori’s father raised her in another country up to the age of 13 and then sent her to live with her mom.

Lori’s mother was not capable of providing food, emotional support or guidance. Sometimes she was physically abusive. Lori learned not to trust or depend on anyone. She stole to eat, told school staff her bruises were from street fights and finally left home at 15.

She lived on the streets for a while until she met her first boyfriend. That year she got pregnant. Her boyfriend found a job and Lori homeschooled herself. They lived together for a year and a half. She went to single moms’ groups and made a few good friends. And now, she’s pregnant again, but this time she doesn’t think she can do it.

When I hear her say this, I know I need to make a risk assessment. On a scale of one to 10, where did she feel she rated with her suicidal ideation? She said her thoughts rated an eight but had no plan to act on them. She says, “Please tell me what to do!”

I reflect that it makes sense to be apprehensive and overwhelmed expecting a second child as a young mom. “You have actually ‘been there’ so you are aware of what to expect, plus you also have your daughter to care for, right?” I ask. “Yes, and I feel so alone!” She says, and then cries some more. I gently ask her if she has any support around her like friends or relatives, and if the father of the child is present in her life.

She explains that it is not the same father for this pregnancy. Last summer, she had started dating this guy and decided to “give love a chance.” She says, “He seemed to really love me and my daughter. But as soon as he learned I was pregnant, he said I had to terminate the pregnancy or we were finished. He was asking me to do something that I just couldn’t do.”

I reflect how incredibly difficult it must be to be trying to plan for the new baby while dealing with the shock and disappointment of the break-up. I tell her it’s not uncommon to feel this way, and that shock, denial, sadness, anger, confusion and guilt are some emotions you can feel when dealing with the loss of a relationship. As she listens, the crying seems to calm down slightly.

I ask her, “After all that you have learned about this man, do you really want him involved in your life?” She hesitates. “He has been showing a really selfish side of himself; I don’t think he’d bring anything good to my life right now,” she says.

All she wants is someone to care for her and talk to during her pregnancy. “Could you make a list of people who could offer that kind of support?” I ask. “True, it is not like your first experience. But nothing about this is going to be like your first. You are more mature. You are also better prepared than you were at 15. You have an education, a career, life experience and mommy experience, too!” I suggest that we could guide her to agencies that could offer her lots of help.

I say that it’s only human to want to connect with another person. The past year she must have been more vulnerable than usual, having invested a lot of effort in the past few years in her daughter and her education, building a life, but at great cost to herself. She sighs and sounds exhausted. “Yeah, I was pretty naïve too, come to think of it.”

“And maybe you just needed to be loved for a while,” I add.

I commend her on all that she has accomplished in the face of such adversity. I ask her how she found the strength to manage.

”Simple,” she says. “I didn’t want my kid to have a childhood like mine.” Lori says she was not afraid to call for advice or to connect with other young moms. She immersed herself in literature on child rearing and positive discipline. We talk about hormonal changes during pregnancy, the loss and disappointment of her recent boyfriend and how overwhelmed she must be under such circumstances.

I offer her referrals to a 24-hour mental health unit and a women’s support centre and tell her there may also be programs for single moms in her area that may even provide daycare. Lori sounds relieved and hopeful, and promises to call the crisis number for support. I ask her where she would put her suicidal ideation on a scale of one to 10 now. She says she feels she’s at a two.

What an amazing and resilient person to have survived so many obstacles growing up. As the call ends, I feel comforted knowing that this teen mom and her child are safe tonight.

Here’s a snapshot to give you an idea. These are real situations, from real kids, during a part of what might be one “typical” day at Kids Help Phone:

• One teen told us he was sure he had depression because for months he’d been getting upset about things that shouldn’t affect him so much. He hated feeling this way but didn’t know what he could do. 

• A 12-year-old boy who was starting to notice changes from puberty wrote in to say how embarrassed he was feeling, and worried that people could tell what was happening to him. He asked, “How should I go through this? It’s going to take years to end!”

• A young boy who was feeling ashamed told us he thought he might be acting in a mean way to others online, sometimes without even realizing it. He asked what he could do to be nicer to others.

• A teen girl who had a close relationship with her father wrote to say that lately her dad had been exceptionally angry, but other times he was just as he had always been. Her mom told her it was because of her dad’s arthritis pain, but the girl was still worried that she didn’t feel as close to her dad as she once did.

• A high school student who was feeling extremely anxious contacted us about going to college the following year. The student was scared about large class sizes and how he would make new friends, adding that he was very shy. 

• A teen wrote in to tell us her best friend had tried to commit suicide three days earlier. Her friend kept saying she didn’t want any help and to go away. “Im scared im going to lose her,” she wrote, “what do i do… please help me!”

• A girl told us her mom had beaten her the previous night, slapping her repeatedly, calling her terrible names, pulling her hair and hitting her in the head. She asked if her mother’s repeated abuse was illegal and wanted to explore how she could get CAS involved to get out of the situation.

This is just a small glimpse of what some kids in Canada deal with every day. Fortunately, these young people are also courageous, inspiring, and resilient… since they’re already reaching out for help.

With your support, we will make sure that professional counselling, information, resources and HOPE are always available to them, whenever and wherever they need it. Thanks for supporting the Walk so Kids Can Talk!

“Hmmm, that sounds pretty worrisome. Has someone been trying to coax you to use drugs?” I ask.

“No, but next year I’m going into a new school in Grade seven,” Amélie says. “I know lots of bad things happen in those schools.”

Amélie sounds quite assertive in her statement. I smile to myself. Summer is just around the corner and this caller is already worried about September! She continues. “Is it true they can hurt you if you don’t do what they want?”

I respond gingerly, “I get the feeling you may be a bit afraid of being bullied at this new school. Is that right?” She goes on to describe the type of bullying she has experienced this past year. “Wow,” I say. “It sounds like you are worried this may continue at your new school.”

Amélie starts crying, “Yes, it never changed. No matter what my parents tried, no matter how many times I told my teachers. You can’t exactly change me!! I’m tiny and look two years younger. It’s not my fault! On the bus it gets so frustrating and I’m afraid for September because I have farther to ride the bus to school.” She stops to cry. I tell her to take her time. “Take a few deep breaths and let’s wait a bit, okay?”

She then tells me that her best friend’s older brother had a problem with a gang bullying him and harassing him to take drugs. Amélie heard that a group of youths had said he could join their gang only if he took drugs.

“Hmmm, these stories must be frightening you!” I tell her. “But would you agree that sometimes stories can spread and rumours can get much bigger than they really are?” Amélie hesitates, “I guess…”

Amélie shares a bit about her experience at her current school and her friends. She says she had two good friends who always stood by her especially when others teased her about her short stature.. Amélie fears things will get worse in her new school and doesn’t know how she will handle this. At least at this school her friends stick up for her, but they will not be joining her next year.

Her current school is located in a very small town and in September she will be going to a “big” school. Just imagining having 800 students in this school compared to her 150 now boggles her mind.

We talk about how challenging it can be adjusting to change, no matter what it is: moving to a new house, a new neighbourhood, starting a new sport, and making new friends are all big changes for anyone, even adults.

I explain to her that going to a larger school has its advantages because there will be a greater choice of friends. Chances are there will be several grade seven classes and the students who teased her might be split up. Often, people’s behaviour changes when they are in a new and strange environment.

We talk about the importance of joining many school extra-curricular activities and interest groups/clubs and sports teams at the start of the year.

Amélie seems a bit more animated as she shares some of her interests. She asks, “are you sure no one will force me to use drugs?” I tell her that she may be asked to do something she never did before but that she has a right to choose and to just say, “Nah, I’m really not interested.” Some young people are afraid to say no because they are afraid to offend a person or that they won’t appear cool. Amélie agrees that sometimes even in grade school she was asked to do things she thought were silly, and she had no problem saying she didn’t want to.

I congratulate her for having the courage to do that, tell her it’s a good indication she will do well in September, and remind her we’ll be here, 24/7, any time she needs us in future.

“I think I was around 12 when I called Kids Help Phone. My father had been diagnosed with cancer years earlier, and it had been an ongoing battle since then. He had kidney cancer, stage four, the worst it could be. It was a very emotional time, and our family was told he wasn’t going to make it. My dad went through three or four surgeries and several clinical trials. Because most of his treatments were in the United States, and I had to stay in Canada for school, I didn’t have many people to talk to. My parents were away a lot. Or they would come home from a whole day of driving from a clinic and fall into bed after receiving more bad news….I don’t think they had the strength to comfort me as much as I needed it, and I didn’t have anywhere else to turn, particularly late at night when I thought about it the most.

One night, around midnight, I couldn’t sleep and I was feeling so terribly sad and alone. Suddenly I thought of a logo and phone number I had seen several years earlier for Kids Help Phone at Boston Pizza. The number was easy to remember, and it came right back to me. I was lying in bed, under the covers, and I dialed. A woman answered and we talked for about half an hour. It was so good to talk to somebody and have that release! I cried for the first time in a while. She listened to me, acknowledged that my feelings were real, told me it was important to let myself feel them, and helped me to let go of a huge burden. I didn’t have to give any personal information, which felt good because back then I didn’t want anyone to know I had called. Having that privacy, even as a kid – I was aware of it. 

My shoulders felt so much lighter the next day! It had been wonderful to hear this friendly voice, and to speak to someone who was clearly there to talk as long as I needed it.

I think my parents always thought… oh well, we can do it all, we can be there for her. My parents are amazing, but there’s no such thing as Super Mom and Super Dad; there’s always going to be a time when as a kid, you need that extra support. I’m so glad Kids Help Phone was there. 

Today I’m happy to say that my dad is fine. He was a medical miracle, and now he’s been in remission since 2007. We’ve been so incredibly lucky!

As for me, I know that call changed my life. I find I’m doing a lot of “helping” work right now – I volunteer as a crisis responder in my university dorm and often have younger students coming to me in the middle of the night, and I also work for my school’s sexual assault centre – and I think I do these things partly as a result of that one phone call. Whenever it’s difficult I think, “I needed help once, and now I am there for somebody else.” I have a feeling my future career path will have something to do with helping others. 

It meant so much to me during that really bleak time to speak to such a wonderfully caring counsellor, whoever she was. Today I tell everyone I can about Kids Help Phone.

Can you imagine… being eight and growing up in a confusing household? Your mom is never around, and your dad, the person who cares for you, acts strangely all the time….

Some days he is quiet and seems really sad – and everything stops. You stay out of his way and don’t bring friends over. Other times, he is really happy, and behaves as if nothing is wrong. You can’t figure out why your dad acts this way. Nobody else lives in a house like this – how would they ever understand? And you love your dad and know he loves you – how could you ever reveal his secret? 

No matter the situation that a kid deals with, Kids Help Phone offers hope.  Can you imagine reaching out for help … and receiving a lifeline?

After hearing that her son was only three years old, I was a bit perplexed as to why this was an issue at this moment.  She went on to explain that she was bullied all through school and her husband was as well.

This mother was obviously so upset; so I thought a bit about how I could be helpful to her… and to her young son. 

I explained that very often before Kindergarten, children get along quite well…even as they are learning to socialize.  If a young child says something mean, it usually is not intentional and often they are in the process of learning to manage their emotions and express them more constructively.  She seemed relieved to hear this….she went on to say she wanted to be on top of things so her son did not go through what she went through and experience “how mean kids can be.” 

We talked about how parents are sometimes reminded of difficult experiences they had themselves in childhood. Being a parent is an opportunity to process these memories, perhaps even with a counsellor, and to learn to identify certain feelings… Sometimes it’s a chance to ask, ”Is this really about me? Or is this about my son’s current situation?” One would hope we did not transfer our own fears to our children.

She seemed relieved with this response and thanked me, ending the call saying “You guys were there for me as a kid and a teen in the early-to-mid 1990s … I’m so happy you are still here and will be able to support my son too.”