Kingdom Pursuits, where you hear from ordinary people instilled with an extraordinary passion. Together we explore the stories of men and women who take what they love and let God turn their passion into Kingdom Pursuits. Now live from the Truth Booth, your host, Robby Fillmore.
Good morning and welcome to Kingdom Pursuits. I'm Jerry Mathis filling in for Robby this morning. He is on vacation.
And as a matter of fact, I guess he's probably in the air heading to Spain as we speak this morning. I tell you what, here in North Carolina, it's been cold looking forward to some warmer weather coming in. And for all those, I tell you what, I know we have, this is a lot of people be hearing this who have connections that are in the mountains of North Carolina and stuff and just always continue to want to lift them up in prayer and stuff.
And a lot of struggles they're going through, but one thing we do know, Jesus doesn't walk with them and they're walking with the Creator of it all when He's going to take care of them. This morning, one of the, I'm excited about this morning. I get to talk and you get to hear some pretty interesting stuff. One is going to be Micah Mills, who's in the studio with me. Just, I guess it's her first book she has ever wrote.
Yes, sir. And we're going to get you to tell you a little bit about yourself and also a little bit later on Fonda Bryant with, who's a mental health expert and suicide prevention and just does a lot of stuff in that community and stuff and a lot of, we're going to talk a little bit about what's going on in that and the struggles that are in this world. But first, we're going to talk to Micah and I'm going to say, Micah, introduce yourself, kind of tell a little bit about yourself. One thing is I'm sitting here and this is a, I'm looking at Micah, but this is a family that loves Jesus Christ and is hard at bringing people to Christ in a lot of different avenues and stuff.
I mean, go to church with her and her, you know, her parents and her in-laws and her husband. Justin just, as a matter of fact, I don't know if Justin just moved up to the leadership of the deacons at Pinedale and I'm excited about seeing that. Gunner, his son, Thomas, which eats breakfast with me every Wednesday morning and like I said, it's just a great family and I'm really just excited to have him part of my church family at Pinedale, but also excited to be seeing what they do for Jesus Christ. Micah, go ahead and introduce yourself and fill in all the gaps that I missed there because I missed a lot, I know. Thank you so much, Jerry, for having me. I'm Micah Meals and I have a son named Gunner. He's eight years old and he actually, I don't even know if you know this, Jerry, but he's getting baptized tomorrow.
Thomas, a stepdad, is baptizing him. So tomorrow is a very special day. Hey, I'm here. Yes, sir.
Yes, sir. Something we've prayed for ever since he's been in my belly. So so I'm very I'm very just so happy about that. God's been answering prayers. But so last year the Lord laid on my heart to write a book and I am not an author. I just tell everybody like Jesus is this author because he's the one who gave me the words for this.
It's called I Carried the King of Kings and was going down the road one day and my husband looked at me. He said, You should write a Christian children's book. And I said, What are you talking about? And he said, You should write a Christian children's book.
I think you'd be good at it. And I literally took my phone out of my pocket and I started writing a story. And like the next morning, I started writing a little bit more and that was it. And I was like, Okay, what do I do now?
And the Lord led me step by step. My I was like, Well, I guess I need to edit this. And so my sister, Hannah, she edited for me and I said, Well, I need an illustrator. And Alexis Berg, she is awesome.
She's local as well. And she, she's my illustrator. But the book is called I Carried the King of Kings. And it is the donkey, which is Sippy. It's a donkey's perspective of he goes to Bethlehem, and he really finds out he does carry the king of all kings when he sees Jesus being born. And I want to kind of back up a little bit on the beginning of you mentioned the name of the donkey. But as I read the forward of the book at the beginning, a lot of the characters go back into your childhood.
It does. So I had a horse named Sippy. And he was my childhood horse and actually rode up on him whenever I was married. And he was just very, very special to me. And then the farmer who owned Sippy is Charlie Mac. And Charlie Mac was my granddaddy growing up and he went on. He taught me how to stop.
He taught me how to fast pitch softball. And on Mondays, we would go to Cagney's, which was country kitchen back then in Midway. And we would eat cornbread with pancake syrup drizzled on top. So I had to put that in the book. So so Sippy gets to eat cornbread with pancake syrup drizzled on top. So a couple little things that is just in my childhood in this book.
Yeah, that kind of stuff. And it goes back to part of the my daughter teaches elementary in elementary school. He's a kindergarten teacher.
And every year we kind of will have a conversation at some point. And she talks about how parents don't sit down and read with kids anymore. I mean, she's been teaching. She taught in South County.
Now she's in Davie County. And it's just sort of no matter where you see, it's just sort of a thing that parents just don't do anymore. And it kind of that's the stuff that kind of mold our kids and stuff. And then especially when you're trying to make sure what you're reading to them is something that's going to nurture them. And especially if it's something sort of bring them to Jesus Christ and stuff.
And that's what I'm excited about. And hopefully, you know, my message out there, if you have a child, man, always during Christmas, I'll just... Christmas time was a time that when we were sitting around at some point or another, I always wanted to just sit down with Taylor and just read the Christmas story out of the Bible, because our kids aren't hearing those stories anymore unless we make sure, you know, it's great. The church is supposed to do that, but the church can't be the only one doing that. It starts at home. It starts at home. And being a mother, I know at nighttime you're just tired and you're ready to get your child to bed.
You're ready to go to bed. And so I wrote I Carried the King of Kings for it being a very short book to the point. But to keep the kids interested in the illustrations are just beautiful.
Lexus Berg did an amazing job. And it does have John 3 16 at the very beginning for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have everlasting life. And it says he came to save the world for our sins. And I just pray that this is plants, seeds and little children's hearts and in the parents hearts that reads this books there to their kids.
And it would grow in Lord Jesus Christ forever. Yeah, if you'll get close to your radio right now, I'm gonna hold the book up because it's like I said, the illustrations. I mean, it's awesome. So can you see it?
You got to go out and buy it to be able to see it. Okay. But also part of when you said, you know, Justin said you ought to write a book and stuff. And that doesn't surprise me because of just just the background and stuff. And that's one of the things I've just been impressed with the fire that burns in your family. I mean, when I talked to Thomas, your stepdad, one of the things he said, well, Micah probably is the only person I think that can keep up with Linnea when it comes to just thinking that she needs to tell everybody about Jesus Christ. My mom has done that my whole entire life, like, Lord laser in her heart when we'd be going down the road, she'd be like, y'all lock the doors, I'm turned around, talking that person on the side of the road, Lord just wants me to talk to them. And so that's just how I grew up. I grew up in church every Sunday. And I'm blessed to have a husband being a follower of Jesus Christ and the leader of our household. And his parents are Christians. And so they both live beside of me. My mom was, I mean, my in-laws will sign me.
Thomas was side of me. I have an awesome dirt road family that we just have a lot of support. And, and that's just, that's just awesome to have a firm foundation in the Lord. Yeah. But did you go and I don't know if this is, if you win or not, did you go with them to Las Vegas or I did not, did not, I did not.
But my mom and her husband, Thomas and several others from Pinedale and not from Pinedale, but they went to Las Vegas recently and just was on the streets and the Lord led them and tell the people about Jesus. Yep. We'll be back in just a moment. Kingdom Pursuits. And again, if you've got a question for Micah, give us a call.
866-348-7884. Welcome back to Kingdom Pursuits. Again, we've got Micah Mills in the studio with me. We just talking a little bit about her background and, and all the exciting things that, that, that God is doing and stuff in her life. But also I've got Fonda Bryant who is on the phone.
I'm gonna get right back to Fonda in just a moment. But then also, I just want to just take a moment to just mention when, uh, Micah, we talked about going to Las Vegas and stuff, and this is where I, where I said it didn't surprise me. She wrote a book because her family tradition is doing what God leads them to do. And whenever God calls is to say, and I'll go.
And in the Bible, it says, you know, go ye into all the world and preach the gospel to all creatures. Um, Jerry, my grandma right now is on her deathbed and she's going to be taking her last breath probably today, tomorrow, in the next couple of days. And I spent a lot of time with her yesterday. And, um, she's, she's, she's, she's, she's and I just held her hand and just looked at her and I was just thinking, you know, she is not going to take the money that she has in her bank. She is not going to take her family that is around her right now. She is not going to take anything with her except the relationship that she had with Lord Jesus Christ. And that's the only thing at the end that is that matters. And I just looked at her and just, she's not responding now and she's breathing hard and you know what, what a glorious day it is going to be for her because she is saved and she is getting ready to meet the Lord Jesus Christ. And that just brings me into happy tears knowing that we're all going to be there one day and you know, um, it's, it's, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter. You're not taking your house, you're not taking your car, you're not taking your family, you're not taking the clothes that you are wearing when you die.
It's just your relationship. And so, so we've got to tell our people about Jesus. And that is one reason why I wrote, I carry the King of Kings just to teach little children, um, just to plant a seed, to teach them just about the birth of Jesus. And, and hopefully that will lead into, um, into a bigger seed that will be planted.
Cause I think it takes about maybe, I think it's seven times to hear the gospel before you receive it. And wonder if that was number one seed, but what if that was number seven seed? Yep. We'll just do our part.
Sometimes it is the water. Sometimes it's to throw the seeds, let God cultivate it and stuff. And as, as this morning, your first thing, when I sit there and talk to Fonda here in a minute is what is this connection between a children's book and, and suicide prevention and Fonda's, uh, nonprofit that she's going to talk about and stuff. And part of it is I think the culture in which we're growing our young kids up in where parents aren't really engaging with them and spending time, how important it is, because now with the world and so many pressures, as I said earlier, it's just taking time to sit down and read a book with our kids and spending time with them.
Um, I think that's something that, that, that, that can go a long way in preventing a lot of the troubles we have in the world. And especially, you know, as you mentioned, sitting with your grandmother and stuff, and made me think about a statement that, that, that, um, Frank Shelton said one time, which is an evangelist that, uh, I know and stuff that he was speaking somewhere and we talked about a little bit, but he made the statement, he goes, you know, one of the problems with churches I see in churches is they spend all this time praying to keep a 91 year old out of heaven and not spending time praying for that 21 year old who doesn't know Jesus Christ. And that was, you take a step and think about that a moment. And that was pretty deep, deep when you think about it. And so true Fonda, uh, I'm excited about, I'm, I'm excited about what you're doing, but also kind of sad in that it is such a, a crisis out there in the world we're living in today. Yeah, it is.
Good morning, everybody. And thank you for, um, having me on, uh, we could not be in more crisis than we are at this, at this moment, at this pinnacle of what is going on in the world. You know, yesterday I read a report that, um, president Trump, uh, is putting a, um, pause on the health agencies that we get our stats from in order to get funding for mental health resources, uh, suicide prevention. Um, we're, um, he put a hole on the CDC, the FDA, the national Institute on health, the national Institute on mental health. And that is where we get our stats from to be able to go and say, Hey, we need this money because in this area, North Carolina, they're dealing with this much suicide and this side of the country, they're dealing with this much and we don't have the resources.
So if we think things have been bad and the suicide rates continue to soar, we haven't seen anything yet because without the help, without the resources, we're going to lose more people to suicide, especially our youth. And you were just talking about our youth. And yesterday I live in the Concord area, Cabarrus County. I went to AL Brown high school. I was at the grocery store about a month ago. And the manager told me, he said, Hey, there was a suicide before the holidays at AL Brown. And I said, you know what?
I need to get by there and offer my services and talk to them. So I finally got by there yesterday because Thursday I got my car fixed and the lady that was in there, her daughter goes to AL Brown and she elaborated more on the suicide. It was a young black female in the 11th grade.
Now let that sink in for a minute. 11th grade you about what? 16, 17, somewhere in there. Way too young.
I know that much. Way too young. Exactly. Went home and found, I don't know where she got a hold of a firearm, but she took her whole life with a firearm.
16, 17, that young using a firearm. So I went over to the school yesterday and I was just thinking about her because I know what that pain personally feels like. And I also know in that moment, we feel like no one cares.
No one understands. And then the biggest reason we don't come and talk to people in the first place is because of fear of judgment. We're already struggling and we don't need that hammer down of judgment. Well, you need to be doing this. You need to be doing that. That does not help.
Of course, you know, from taking QPR training. So again, we got to do better because what we're doing in this country to present to prevent suicide is not working. It's not working. It's more for the crisis side, the money that we get. We need to be doing better with preventative care and we need to rip that bandaid off or we can't talk about suicide. Yes, we can because one person down by suicide is one too many. It's just one too many. Yeah. And Fonda also, and I don't want to put you on the spot here because I think you know most of these percentages and these numbers, but it always just staggers me when you start talking and then I start looking at the suicide rates and the groups and the numbers.
I mean, from preteens to teenagers to it's just, I mean, it's hard to even understand it at times. Yeah, it's hard to wrap your hand around it because see the media does not report suicides. So therefore, most people think suicides are isolated incidents. So let me just give you a few stats. And before I give you these, before you do, I hope everybody sits down because this is going to be, it's going to be, you're going to be shocked when you hear these numbers.
Yeah. I want everybody to realize though, when you're sitting down that these stats that I'm getting ready to call out are worse than what I'm saying, because suicide is under reported. So let's start with our youth. The second leading cause of death for young people, 10 to 34 is suicide, but we have youth as young as five and six year olds dying by suicide. The second leading cause of death on college campuses is suicide. Over 24,000 college students attempt suicide every year. Now let's bring up our student athletes.
Jerry and I go and sit and watch the Wake Forest games all the time, but I look at student athletes through a different lens. I look at them through the lens of mental health and the NCAA just came out in April of last year and said that suicide has doubled among student athletes. And now that is the second leading cause of death. White males, 45, 65 and older have the highest rate of suicide at any group, any group at all.
And this is something else. We always, when we watch the news and they talk about gun violence, they talk about black people killing black people. They talk about the number of school shootings, but this is what they don't talk about. 54% of people who die in this country with a firearm is for suicide. Three out of five gun deaths in this country are suicides. 59.9% are males.
And this is what's so alarming, Jerry, because you got more and more women buying firearms. And that is a lethal means to take your own life. 34.2% of suicides are females are females.
More people die in this country to suicide than car deaths and homicides. And before people start saying, well, you know, they're weak. They just need to pray harder.
Give it to God. Let me just tell y'all something. 46% of people who die by suicide have a treatable mental health condition. 90% have displayed symptoms of a mental health condition. And you know why we don't get help?
Crazy, nuts, psycho, mass killers, lazy. When you're labeled like that, who wants to go get help? See, it's a lot of empathy and compassion for those who have cancer, diabetes, even if you bring it on yourself with cancer, with smoking and getting lung cancer. For people with mental health conditions, not so much. And then also the fact that we don't look sick. You know, I deal with clinical depression. I deal with anxiety. Depression is the number one debilitating disease in the world.
And it's also the number one disease that can take us down that path to die by suicide. I might look great on the outside, be at the football games cheering, but, and Jerry, you know, I tell you, I work out three to four times a week. There are days I don't have the energy to brush my teeth.
How much energy does it take to brush your teeth? Foam my hair and take a shower. So we need to do a better job with helping one another and getting rid of that stigma around mental health. Yeah. If we're going to a break and find them, we'll come back. I also want to just talk a little bit about how we can get help on what we need to do and also how we can get the Micah's book and stuff.
So a lot of exciting things coming up. Give us a call if you've got a question. 866-348-7884. This is the Truth Network.
Welcome back to Kingdom Pursuits. And again, this is a calling show. I tell you what, if you'd like a question to Micah about our book and also just, you know, and Fonda, which is, I mean, we're going to talk as we wrap up about how we can get in touch and how we can help and what resources are out there, because I think there's resources out there that people don't necessarily take advantage of.
And there's also resources out there that organizations don't take advantage of. And I've just, you know, me and Fonda talk, not a lot, but quite a bit and stuff. And one of the things that always sad has been as we talk is missed opportunities and stuff. And as we live in a society now, as mentioned, you know, we love college sports.
Me and Fonda both love college sports. But what our kids and these college kids, the pressures they're under and the expectations just add to that. And as me and Micah were just talking, you know, the fact that parents don't spend time with their kid, you know, it's with an iPad or on a computer, sit down with it, you know, this book and just read it and just sit down and spend time with our kids.
Man, that'll go miles and miles and miles to make them the person that they're going to grow into be. And one of the things that I just want to say with Fonda is the fact that I love the fact that sort of we need to always kind of refocus that suicide and that part of it and the struggles that people can have isn't that they're crazy and it isn't that they're lunatics and it and all this other stuff. It is an illness. And mental health is a illness just like cancer and heart disease and whatever it may be. It's an illness. And too many times it's a treatable illness that doesn't get treated. And Fonda can chime right in there on that. But it just seems to me that there's opportunities there that we need to make sure that we need the voices need to be heard. Yes. And this is the thing, you know, everything I say, I always back it up with stats that a lot of them come from the Center for Disease Control.
And the thing is, is that this is the thing. By the time a child is 14, 50 percent of them are already dealing with a mental health condition. That's why preventative care is so important to early detection is so important. Then by the time they're 24 is 75 percent. And the reason why that stat rises is because when they were 14 or before that, they didn't get the help. And if they don't get the help by the time they're 18, you cannot make them go get help because they're considered an adult.
And this is really the kicker. If they do not receive treatment for a mental health condition, 50 percent of them turn to substance abuse. And I see that all the time, especially smoking weed.
And I tell these young people that I'm talking to, I said, guys, your brains do not fully develop until you're 25 years old. So if you're drinking or smoking, it takes a direct hit to your brain. It's going to accelerate that mental health condition. And what is it's just a terrible thing because all mental health disorders to me are awful.
But smoking weed especially can cause psychosis and it can cause the worst mental health disorder of all, which is schizophrenia. So this is what I always tell parents when I do the QPR suicide prevention training. I always tell parents I know it's hard. I have a son that's 41 years old, but I tell parents you have to wait a second. Wait a second. Forty one. My son's 41.
I'll be I'm 64. I know you don't think so. But I remember when Wesley was small and I used to always tell him, especially when he got to high school. Oh, you don't have to worry about anything.
Just go to school and make good grades and play football. They do worry. They do have stresses. And that's why I tell parents, if you don't listen to the small stuff, they're not going to come and tell you the big stuff. And that goes for your kids in college, too. You got to listen to them because they could be coming to tell you, hey, I'm going through something.
I'm thinking about suicide. And because you've dismissed some of the small stuff they told you about and thought it was no big deal, they won't come and tell you. And that's another reason why our suicide rates among our youth are through the roof.
Yeah. And that goes back to what I was talking about, how it's kind of this whole morning kind of bleeds together in so many ways is, you know, just like with Micah's book and stuff and sitting and spending time with our kids, if we spend time with them at an early age. And as you mentioned, we got to act like we're interested in the small things. When the big things come around, they feel comfortable talking to you about them. I mean, that's one thing I'll tell people when when my daughter was growing up.
You know what? I'd come home on a Friday night and I didn't know if I'd have one girl in the living room or be eight girls in the living room. I mean, it was just but we all sit there.
We'd do popcorn and watch a movie or read something or play games, get the floor with them. That's what we need to to to do more of, in my opinion, and spend time with them and praying for them. It's never too early to pray for your child. I started praying for Gunner when he was in my wound. He's eight years old and I'm praying for his wife right now. So it's pray for them. Pray for them every single day.
Pray without ceasing. Yeah, and I know Fonda will tell you, I mean, how many times do you have young adults come to you or college students or high school kids who say, well, I can't really, I can't, I can't, I don't have nobody to talk to. I more times than I can count. And I mean, not just in the state of North Carolina or in the Concord Charlotte area. I just got finished helping a young man, 37 years old, that lives in Minneapolis, Minnesota, because one of my extended sons works for the Minnesota Vikings now. He actually went to Wake Forest and played football, a keen bird. And he reached out to me and he said, Miss Fonda, our barber is going through a rough period. Now, I didn't know this young man and I don't live in Minneapolis. But the first thing I did was start looking for him resources to help him because that's the lifeline. I spent time with him on the phone, put him in touch with resources.
And he thanked me and thanked me. So like I said, so many of us because we're so busy now, and everybody's face is stuck in their phone or iPad. We don't, we've lost the art of communication and conversation. And to me, like one of my dear friends who's a retired police officer said that social media is the devil because it does, it puts a trance over our young people. It's putting, it's taking a toll on their mental health. And a lot of times parents feel like, hey, you know, they're not doing anything online. It's a lot of, it's a lot of predators online.
These kids, every time they log on to the computer, they're logging on to something that could get them in a lot of trouble and could even cost them their life. Yeah, absolutely. And I'm going to say one thing about Fonda and the fact I have gone through the live training with Fonda. I've gone through the online training with Fonda. Before we get off the air, I want you to go ahead and give how and what may be the next training coming up. But also if you are a, if you get the opportunity to do any of it, please do it. I mean, the online training is, is wonderful, but if you have an opportunity to sit in the live training, if you are a business owner, a church leader, and you're looking and you, everybody can see the problems we have out there. And if you have the opportunity to bring Fonda in for a live training session, I can't tell you how beneficial that would be for your staff, for your congregation, for your church leaders, for anyone. I mean, it's just, it's just a great, great resource that I wish that more people would take advantage of.
And we're going to come back to how they can get in touch with you, Fonda, on that. And also just with Micah on the book and stuff, if I encourage you to, if you're listening, go out and buy this book. And if you want to buy it, how do you buy it? Can you go online? Is it at stores or now?
Because it may not be in the local area that we're broadcasting is catching this. So right. Yes, sir. So, um, you can go on Amazon and buy it. Um, it's called, I carried the King of Kings.
And it's a picture of the donkey Sippy looking at Jesus with a, um, the star in the background. Um, so you can't miss it. Um, also there is a couple of, so about five stores locally, um, in Winston Salem that you can, um, that you can get it and welcome in Lexington. There's, um, even Brook, um, Kaiser country and Midway Market and also Timber Creek trading and in barn loft. So there's a couple of stores that has it locally.
Yeah. So locally you can pick it up or go online. If you put it in there, it'll come right to it.
Cause I did and went right to the website and it also gave me where they can be purchased at online. And so it's a great opportunity. And again, I would hope that we get everybody to do that. Fonda, I know we're getting to the point of, uh, going into our last break.
We come back. I want to make sure that we kind of touch base on, on how they can get in touch with you as far as, uh, your, your, your nonprofit and also the suicide training. And again, if you're listening and you have that, the, the means to bring Fonda in, I would encourage you to do it. Welcome back to Kingdom Pursuits. I'm Jerry Mathis, uh, raised body shop and record service.
Also filling in for Robbie this morning on Kingdom Pursuits. Um, Fonda, as I mentioned, I mean, you can give me your take on it, but just the importance of the live training and the opportunity that, that, that somebody that could, could get you to come in would be, could be life changing for a lot of people. And a lot of people that you wouldn't even recognize. Cause I know that I've gone through the live training and then I've heard comments from people who said, come out of there saying, you know, I didn't even realize I was struggling with that, but it's kind of opened my eyes into, uh, I came thinking I was going to be able to help somebody else. And then I realized, you know what?
I have a lot of these struggles. Yeah. And that's why I love QPR training so much. And QPR stands for question, persuade, refer suicide prevention training is very upbeat and positive. And it does four things. Number one, it helps you to recognize the warning signs for someone in crisis or suicidal. Number two, it helps you gauge your mental health.
And that's what Jerry's talking about. And I trained the rookie officers of CMPD, Charlotte Mecklenburg police department. And I just did a training on December 17th with 198 class. Suicide is the number one cause of death for police officers. And so one of the officers, because it's such a stigma around mental health, when they, when they emailed me to get their certificate, they can let me know anything. And one of the officers told me, he said, thank you so much, Ms. Fonda for this training. He said, I struggle with depression and because of this training, it helps me not to be so ashamed because you please send me the help that you talked about.
That's what QPR does. The third thing it does is if you pick up on the signs early enough, the more clues and signs observed, the greater the risk, but the more signs that you pick up on, you can prevent somebody from going into crisis or becoming suicidal. And the fourth thing it does, it gives you that confidence to act because you know what to do, what to say. And I always tell people, somebody asked me one day in training, but Ms. Fonda, what's the best way not to panic when you're helping somebody that may be suicidal or in crisis.
I said, that's easy. Know your resources on the front end. You can ask them, do you have an employee assistance program at your job?
Do you have insurance? You can go to, and I want to call out some of these resources that people can go to and get help. You can go to NAMI, the National Alliance on Mental Illness. They have a helpline that's, it's not 24 hours a day. I think it's from eight to four, but it's 800-451-9682. And that's for North Carolina. You can text help 741741. And I'm so proud that North Carolina has a warm line. And for those who don't know what a warm line is, more and more states are putting together warm lines. And what it is is it's made by people like me, peer support, who've been through drugs, alcohol, mental health, combination of all, even some of them been in prison.
They got in their life together and you can call 855-733-7762. It's 24 hours a day, seven days a week. And sometimes we just need to vent. Sometimes we need to talk to somebody who's not going to judge us and tell us what to do, but just listen.
And it's only for North Carolina residents, but it is a wonderful, wonderful tool. And more and more peer support are popping up. So my next QPR training will be Saturday, February 15th. That is one day after me celebrating, which I'm going to celebrate the whole month and this whole year, my 30 year anniversary as a suicide survivor, 30 years. Now that doesn't come off my, it might roll off my tongue easy, but Jerry hasn't been easy. Having a mental health condition is not a quick fix. It's an ongoing journey. And if I can just say this, 30 years ago on Valentine's day, don't smoke, drink, never done drugs. I was struggling with clinical depression. And in my culture, I tell people all the time, you have to bring culture into account when you're helping someone, because in my culture, the black culture, we've been taught, pray about it.
Don't claim it, give it to God. And more importantly, it's a sign of weakness. And when you're raised that way, you sure don't embrace it. So I was in tremendous pain from the top of my head to the bottom of my feet. And when your brain is not well, you will do things and say things you thought you'd never do. But I was in pain. I called my aunt Spanky, my hero, and told her, you can have my shoes. We hung up.
That's giving away a prized possession. She called me back. She said, are you going to kill yourself?
And I said, yes. And she went into action like a superhero and saved my life. And because my aunt Spanky saved my life, other people are here because she saved mine.
So anyone, I want everybody to hear this. Anyone can save someone's life. I do youth training as well. QPR suicide prevention training for youth. The only difference between the youth training and adult training, we go through some situations that youth face. But the only difference is we urge youth to go tell an adult.
And they do. I had a young lady in the marching band at Hopewell High School took my training. Soon as she got off the phone, she called the school, told the principal. Principal called me. She said, Fonda, was this young lady in your class? I said, yes.
She said, she just saved someone's life. You know, we tend to discount youth and don't think that they know or we can't talk to them about stuff like that. Yes, we can.
Because every time I go and speak at a school from K through 12th grade and ask them how many of them are going through stuff, a lot of them aren't there. So if anybody's interested in my free online QPR training, they're more than welcome to reach out to me. Yep. As we're going off the air now, I want to say thank you, Fonda. Thank you, Micah.
Thank you for having me. See, the book is available online. Fonda at Fonda North Carolina or F-O-N-D-A-N-C underscore 40 at yahoo.com or wellnessactionrecovery.org. Go on wellnessaction.org website. And it has a, if you scroll down, it has an area that you can just donate to her ministry and stuff and what she's doing and stuff and to her nonprofit. I encourage you to do that. Bring her in if you can.
