‘He stood on the platform edge, ready to jump’

“Harry had been struggling with periods of depression but on his way home from a new Year’s party, he suddenly felt massively down and couldn’t see the point in living. He stood on the edge of the train station platform thinking about jumping onto the tracks, but the incoming train slowed down – Harry thinks the train driver spotted him – and that gave him the chance to think again.

The next day he broke down and confided what had happened. as a mother, it’s heartbreaking and scary to hear your child say they have nothing to live for. I took him to a&e and by midnight, 10 hours after we’d first arrived at the hospital, psychiatrists decided Harry was too high a risk to be allowed home but there was no bed available. eventually, they found him a cubicle to sleep in. The next day, Harry was seen by a team from the Child and adolescent mental Health Services (CamHS), who concluded that although he had considered suicide, he didn’t want to be dead.

He was diagnosed with anxiety disorder with underlying depression, with a recommendation for cognitive behavioural therapy, for which there is a waiting list of four to six months. Harry was given a care plan that identified the triggers of severe depression and what might help him cope, which included asking me to make him a cup of tea. all I could think was that that didn’t even scratch the surface of what he needed.

The health system is overstretched and not designed for people with mental health problems – I don’t want to add to the pressure staff are under, but when I talk to them I feel as if I’m walking on eggshells. I am looking into private psychotherapy because Harry needs treatment right now, not in six months’ time.”

Emma, 52, is mother to Harry, 17†