A thread of tweets on Twitter went viral last Sunday, Nov. 6, wherein people, mostly consisting of teens, shared their personal contact information for people who were in dire need of someone to talk to or vent out their frustrations. It had initially started off as just a huge number of people giving out the contact details until Roanne Garcia, 18, a De La Salle University student, decided to compile the entire thing. “When I found that a friend of mine lost a battle to mental illness, I saw people tweeting their details and I just wanted people to see all the ones who are willing to help,” Garcia said in a direct message via Twitter about the reason as to what pushed her to keep the thread going and to compile it for everyone to see. “We decided to make the thread to create a community to spread awareness and to be there for one another. Because sometimes, what we need is someone to be there. Someone who'll listen. Someone who understands,” she added. There have also been growing sentiments regarding the newly launched HOPE hotline being not much of a help to people who are seeking assistance. “I'm not dissing on the HOPE hotline, but I feel like they should step up a bit more. They are professionals,” Garcia said. In terms of awareness on suicide Garcia went on to say, “Well, for me, mental illnesses don't often lead or correlates to suicide. It may be the cause to commit suicide, but that's not the only outcome. Some people tend to harm themselves due to their mental illness (i.e., cutting wrists).” Replacing the HOPE hotline; however, is not the aim of these young people who want to reach out and help people who are in need. Rather, they aspire to ""serve as a reminder that there are people who are willing to listen whenever somebody needs it," according to Adrienne Onday, a Sociology student from the University of the Philippines Diliman, who was one of those who compiled the contact information based on the Twitter thread. “I’d like to say we’re just really a peer group who promise to have each other’s backs. But the documents are just there for easier access because Twitter is a very limited platform,” said Onday. “Sadly, we’re not trained professionals and there’s a lot of debris to navigate in these uncharted waters but I think we’re just trying to do what we can as people who know and understand how mental health issues feel like,” Onday added. When asked as to how she would explain the thread to someone from the outside looking in, Onday likened it to friends being there for one another. "Whoever you are, even if we do not speak or we do not even see each other, in times of great need, we're friends and you can count on us to be there," she said. The Twitter thread has garnered over 672 retweets and 1,075 likes while the public Google document which contains the complete list of all the contributors' contact details has an overall of 234 people on the list. Click here for a link to the said directory.
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