“You need to tell someone, or I will.” Those words were what changed my friend’s life. As a young teenager, I didn’t know what to do to help my suffering friend. She was scared and needed my help. It was tough for me to make a decision. But as life went on, I learned to accept the responsibility of finding help for her. This girl was one of my best friends. She was always happy and laughing. This person would not liked to be named, so for the purpose of this story, we will just call her Sally.
It all started in seventh grade. The sun shone brightly that morning, but something about walking through the heavy doors of my school felt different. All of a sudden I was overcome with a wave of darkness. It was as if the sun had gone away when I walked into the building. Sally was sitting all alone at one of the cafeteria tables. When I saw her, it seemed like she had changed, so quick, almost like Minnesota’s weather. I pulled my tired body down to the uncomfortable chair right next to her. All she said to me was “I need to tell you something.” So many terrible situations popped into my mind. Like; what if she was moving away from school? Or maybe she was failing science class? But, what she told me next was way worse than the ideas floating in my head.
“I tried to take my life. Please don’t tell anyone. Do you promise me?” All I could do was stare, wide-eyed at my struggling friend. My head began to pound when the loud bell rang above me. I looked at her and reassured her, stating,“I promise. Are you okay?” I left that room feeling hopeless and confused. I kept thinking to myself; this isn’t real. A couple days ago she was a joyful, bubbly girl with big dreams. Prior to that, I hadn’t noticed any signs that would’ve lead me to believe that Sally had depression. She was miserable now and the corners of her mouth faced downwards. I had never seen anything so heartbreaking before.
The next couple days were extremely tough. I remember learning about depression and self-harm in health class The teacher always said, “If you or some else is hurting themselves, tell someone.” Then I thought back to Sally. Deep down in me, I wanted to tell someone what she was going through, but I couldn’t. I made her a promise, and I wasn’t going to break it. Plus, I don’t even know who I was going to tell. When my classmates or teachers would come up to me to talk, I wanted to let all the words roll off my tongue; I didn’t want to hold it all inside. I was also terrible at keeping secrets, especially from my parents. I needed to help her. I didn’t know what made her do this to herself. Was it because of me? Or did the other students in our grade lead her to do this?
After a while, I couldn’t handle not knowing what to do anymore. This thought was on my mind all the time, but I didn’t know what to do to help her. I won’t do anything, because I’m afraid that I will regret it for the rest of my life. As weeks past, I sat down at the kitchen table one day after school and confessed up to my mother about everything going on at school. It felt wrong, almost like I was stabbing my friend in the back. But it needed to be shared, I couldn’t keep it in any longer. It was like I had just leaked important information to the press. As I told her, my mother had a surprised look on her face and told me “Hailey, I am glad you told me and someone needs to tell the school counselor. You are doing the right thing.” I couldn’t tell the counselor, I already broke the promise once already.
The only other people who knew about this were my two best friends. Sally only told three people and told all of us not to tell anyone. We didn’t know how to help her. Soon enough we all got scared for our dear friend and we broke her promise. Each one of us told our parents, except Sally. We listened to our parents and decided to get more important help. During class one day, I heard one of my best friends called down to counselor’s office. Next, it was time for all four of us to go down to the guidance counselor’s office. Walking down to the office for me was difficult. It was like there was a little voice in my head telling me to protect her by keeping her secret. But soon enough I let that voice disappear and remembered back to what my mom said. As I walked into the big office, we all had to sit down quietly while the counselor asked us what felt like a hundred questions. It felt good to let everything off my chest and to finally protect my friend.
To this day, Sally is feeling much better and knows that she can talk to me, the counselor or her close friends. She knows that she has her best friends by her side now. We all have things we try to hide, but this incident shouldn’t be one of them. That is why I told people, to protect her. Now, all that matters to me is being a responsible friend and staying by their side when they are having tough times. Things have changed a lot since this event. I know now not to bottle these secrets up, but to seek help from someone who can heal my friends. One of my favorite quotes, from a frame in my room, is “Friends are like stars, you don’t always see them but they are always there.”