Prayer Circles

Dear Shirley,

We're sorry you feel so badly right now. We wish we had more help to offer here, but it sounds as if you would benefit from talking to a caring person who is trained to help. We have three resources you could try. We hope you will contact one of them as soon as possible. You deserve to get help, and to get it sooner rather than later.

1. If you are in the U.S., call 1-800-SUICIDE any time, day or night. When you call this free number, you will be connected immediately to a caring, trained counselor in your region. The sooner you make this call, the better.

2. If you can hold on for a few days, free anonymous crisis counseling is available by e-mail from an international charity called Befrienders International (known in this country as The Samaritans). Send an e-mail to Jo@samaritans.org and you will receive a caring response within 24 hours.

3. There is a website you may find helpful, called Suicide: Read This First.

You are in our prayers.

The Beliefnet Community Staff

Hi Shirley, it's now July 8, 2004. I noticed the date on your prayer was for last December. How are you doing now? Have you been able to talk with someone or get help? I, too, have gone through a difficult time which led to drugs and eventually left me on a bridge. That was last December. By the grace of God and my mother who called the police on me I was saved and taken in under 5150, an automatic hold. At first, when they asked me why I wanted to die and I told them, they told me I was lying, that I was so drugged out I didn't know what I was talking about. Well, that totally shut me down, because then who can I get help from if the ones who are supposed to help don't even believe me? So I tried again at the bridge two weeks later, but this time the police took me by surprise and took me in once again. This time was a different place. This was the beginning of my healing. It has now been almost seven months, and I feel sooo much better. I am still down at times too. My situation also included an abusive relationship. He kicked my head in so hard and so much that I ended up with a cracked skull, went blind temporily, and a broken arm. Everyone told me to leave him, but I kept saying it was the drugs, not him. Well, with persistent prayer and therapy, we are not together and I have my life back on track. I just got a new job yesterday. (I didn't mention that I lost my eleven year career last October because I resigned to relocate with my "other" and then he changed his mind)Now, he is calling me saying he is sinking. I guess it his time.
For six months all I did was pray that God would change him. Then one day with all of the therapy, advice and my prayer books, I realized I was praying for the wrong thing. I then asked God to help me to let go of those memories which kept me in bondage. Then something left me and now I feel free. At least getting there. I still relapse from time to time. But because of the therapy and the 12 step plan, I now know other people instead of staying isolated. I was good at that.
Shirley, I pray for God to help you too to be able to let go and move on and get out of the house! Isolation alone will kill you. It has been seven months since you placed this prayer, I hope you are still with us and that you are at the same place as me.