Monday blues
Children reach out to helpline most often on the first school day of each week
THE majority of the contacts made to the Safespot child and teen helpline were on Mondays between the hours of 6:00 and 7:00 pm.
This data was among the helpline’s statistics for 2022, shared by the Office of the Children’s Advocate (OCA) on Wednesday.
Over the 12-month period, Safespot received 2,345 contacts of which the majority were females while 485 were males. Those who made contact with the helpline aired concerns including emotional distress, family relationship, peer relations, suicidal ideation, and suicide attempts.
According to Children’s Advocate Diahann Gordon Harrison, for the contacts by hour on Mondays, there were 183 by 6:00 pm and 178 by 7:00 pm.
“I don’t know if this mimics the Monday blues that adults feel sometimes, but Monday is overwhelmingly the leading day on which we get contacts. The day on which we got the least interaction was on Saturday,” said Gordon Harrison at the briefing.
A breakdown of the data showed that Whatsapp was the preferred medium of communication, with 2,000 of the contacts being made through the app.
“They don’t want to talk, they don’t want to necessarily hear a live voice, but they use the channel that is most comfortable and teenagers and youngsters are a texting nation,” said Gordon Harrison.
She shared some of the cases reported through Whatsapp, including one which involved a 14-year-old experiencing conflicts amid her relationship with her caregiver.
The child, Gordon Harrison said, shared that she was reaching out to Safespot as she was struggling with depression as her mother abused her physically and verbally.
“It was mentioned that the mother beat her with a shoe, until her hand was swollen and that the mother kept saying negative things about her and towards her, for example, ‘She never wants to see her again’. She mentioned as well that she was hit in the head and her head was hurting,” Gordon Harrison shared.
“She was so concerned about the contact that she made with Safespot, that she went on to say that apart from being very grateful for the advice and the support, she was going to delete the number because she didn’t want her sister to see the messages between Safespot and herself,” added Gordon Harrison.
She said the matter was flagged and referred to the Child Protection and Family Services Agency for further intervention.
In another instance, the Children’s Advocate said a 13-year-old reached out for help with peer issues.
“She was feeling excluded from her peer group. She said that she has been best friends with another individual at her school since they started last year. However, she still feels as if her friend is drifting from her as she has been getting closer to another girl at their school. She feels as if she was being used, as this friend only talks to her now when she wants to talk about her problems,” said Gordon Harrison as she noted that contacts like that of the 13-year-old shows the difference between a helpline and a hotline.
“A hotline deals with a lot of high-level issues and issues that require a response in terms of investigation. In contrast, a helpline catches those matters that could fall through the cracks, those matters that are so little, that there is no criminal matter, no child in need of care and protection, there is no great psychological distress,” she said.
Other contacts were made by Web chat at www.safespotja.com, while a few called and others sent messages via social media platform Instagram.