Hope

When I was in 7^th grade my best friend committed suicide. This completely devastated me. Some students at my school had previously done the same, so I had become somewhat indifferent. But the shock was horrible when my best friend died.

For a while I thought about doing the same right after the incident. I was so sad about him passing and I also felt like I was a financial burden to my parents. I started to feel very hopeless and was sure suicide was the only way out of this. I didn’t feel like starting the new school year and I almost didn’t go but my mom forced me.

My first day in 8^th grade changed my life. We started working from a new textbook, the content was great but what really made me lose my hopelessness was my teacher Mrs. Suarez. From the very first moment I met her I felt like she loved me. She doesn’t know this but she saved my life, every day I would wake up excited to go to Mrs. Suarez class.

One day when I was in her class one of my classmates asked her if it was bad to commit suicide. I felt offended that my classmate would ask that especially after so many from our school had done it. My teacher said that people that commit suicide feel very helpless and lost and don’t know why they are here on earth to live. She also said it’s a very sad thing when children don’t feel like they have a purpose and as sad as it was there was a God that understands the pain they had to live through. Then she started talking about a place called heaven for all of Gods children. I had never heard anything like this before.

Since the Mission Generation program has been at my school we have had no one else commit suicide. In my opinion it’s because students feel like they have a destiny and we feel loved by our teachers and chaplain.

-Daniela Camacho (Age: 17)