I keep thinking about the girl who called the hotline Sunday who wanted to cut. I think about her every day, and every time I think about her I cry. She said she was holding her stuffed tiger while she was talking to me. I can picture her curled up on her bed with her tiger in one hand and her phone in the other. It makes me sad.
So I called my supervisor today to see if the girl has called again, and my supervisor said that she talked to her yesterday and she is adding her to regular callers list. I’m so glad that she is continuing to call. She shared some more details, which I won’t go into here for confidentiality purposes, but it’s good that she is opening up. My supervisor said, “I’m sorry you’ve been thinking about her so much.” This got me worried, I don’t want her to think that I’m getting too emotionally attached to anyone. I explained that this was the first child that I’ve talked to on the hotline and I was just concerned, but I’m fine. Yikes, I don’t want to get kicked off the hotline. I’m missing my shift this weekend because I’m running in a 10K, and I’m disappointed that I won’t be there. I think I may check and see if anyone is looking for a sub for next week so I can fill in a shift or two.
October 30th, 2009 at 12:24 am
Oh wow! What a situation. I think it is great that she called. I always wanted to call a hotline when I was in those situations, but never had the courage! It sounds like you have really found your place there!
October 30th, 2009 at 1:08 pm
Harriet, what’s a regular callers list? (I mean, aside from the obvious….)
October 30th, 2009 at 5:51 pm
Sarah – about 90% of the hotline callers are ones who call repeatedly. They are the “regulars”. If someone calls frequently they are put on the “regulars list” so that when we pull up their profile on the computer we can see the latest about their situations.
October 31st, 2009 at 3:14 am
I think it’s great that you felt such empathy for her she obviously appreciated the connection since she called again. Do you think if she can talk about it (as difficult as it is) rather than cutting then she’ll be OK? Good luck with the 10K. At the moment I’m a bit ill so I’d battle to get round the block.
October 31st, 2009 at 4:58 pm
i wouldn’t worry too much about what your supervisor may or may not think about your experience of a phone call. you do great work with callers — if there’s something your supervisor wants to tell you, it’s all part of the experience, i think.
good luck with the 10k. i just dusted and vacuumed for half an hour, and i’m out of breath and pooped. i admire you tremendously.
November 1st, 2009 at 4:02 pm
Thanks, Harriet. Does that mean that the hotline is not anonymous/confidential? I’m just curious; I worked on a hotline a few years ago that was both anonymous and confidential and we didn’t have anything like a frequent callers list, though we were obviously aware of some of the more regular callers.
November 2nd, 2009 at 7:28 am
Sarah – the hotline is confidential. The callers information does show up on caller id, but we have it hidden. It is accessible to supervisors however. If we feel someone is in danger of hurting themselves we can ask the police to trace the phone number. It bothers me that the calls are not anonymous and that would prevent me from ever calling a hotline, unless I used a pay phone.