In my spare time, I volunteer for a Christian internet-based radio station called Remedy Live that ministers to youth. They have a chat room that teens can access through their phones or computers to talk about anything. I’ve been working with them for several years. I’ve helped students deal with relationship issues and cutting, among others. Some of them just want to chat about silly things. Some weeks when I volunteer, no one jumps online. I’m just happy I was there in case anyone did.

Tuesday, though, was a first for me. I had to prevent a suicide.

I logged on around 5pm, and after only a few minutes, someone chimed in saying he wanted to kill himself. Not only that, he said he had a gun next to him and he was ready to pull the trigger.

I immediately contacted the radio station via Facebook and phone and told them what was going on. As the chat progressed, they observed and sent me coaching messages.

At first, I thought this chatter was a girl, but then he started talking about an ex-girlfriend who cheated on him with his best friend, so I thought he was a guy. By the end, though, I wasn’t sure. Regardless, I learned that he was 17 and his family—especially his stepfather—was verbally and emotionally abusive. He thought everyone except his grandparents hated him.

By this point, the radio station was tracking his phone number and attempting to call the local police, so I did my best to keep him talking. This kid was smart, though, and suspected something like this might be happening, but I was able to persuade him I wasn’t doing that.

I’ve known people who had martyr complexes, but this kid took it a step further. He honestly believed that by killing himself he was being like Jesus. He thought everyone would be happier if he was dead, so by dying, he was doing them a favor just as Jesus “died for the people.” I told him Jesus didn’t kill himself, he was executed, and that what he was doing was selfish.

I used several other arguments against suicide. One was that only God had the right to decide when someone died. This chatter then seemed to start power tripping. He said he was the one who holding the gun, not God. I said God could keep the gun from firing. The chatter then said he was putting the gun to his head as we spoke. He wrote something about how the tables had turned and how he held all the power. I managed to calm him down.

In the end, after an hour-long chat (which included two disconnects), he asked to speak with a female volunteer, so I passed him to a fellow volunteer.

I don’t know what happened afterward.

Remember the famous scene in the first Lethal Weapon film where Mel Gibson handcuffs himself to man threatening to jump off a building? He does this after distracting the guy with cigarettes. Then after getting irritated with him, he jumps, taking the suicidal man with him, and they land on a huge air mattress. While I didn’t have to do something that crazy, I can tell you trying to keep someone from killing himself isn’t nearly that easy (or fun). It was nerve-wracking. I held a person’s life in my hand, in a way. I was concerned that one wrong word would push him to pull the trigger. What was worse was it seemed like this kid had a retort for every argument I typed. He refused to be encouraged. It made me wonder why he even bothered starting a chat in the first place. If he was so determined to commit suicide, why drag random strangers from the internet into it? Either he wanted to be talked out of it or he wanted attention. (I could be wrong on those. Feel free to tell me and elaborate on other explanations).

As I said: Mel Gibson I’m not.

It’s made me think about my own life. I haven’t had the best of times for several years, yet I’ve never seriously considered suicide. Sometimes I wonder why. Regardless, I do know I can be just as stubborn about being encouraged. When I’m at my lowest, I refuse to hear anything good. Yet I don’t want people to agree with me in my misery. There’s this part of me that wants to argue. It’s the weirdest thing. No wonder I sometimes drive people crazy.

I’d like to think I helped save the kid’s life. That he went on and did great things.

I may never know.

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