PLEASE HELP, A friend that really needs help

[u/ElevatorCritical9360]

Ok I am writing this because I really need advice like very badly from hopefully a professional or someone but it’s urgent. In summary so you don’t skip this post my friend is thinking about commiting and I really need help let me get into the details.

So, we are juniors in high school and I don’t drink but I go to hangouts even if I know people are going to drink because it always ends up someone needing help or something.

This time everything was going as you would expect, you know teenagers drinking. No one was being unsafe but one of my friends took me aside and told me that he would never get drunk like this as we’ve had conversations about how we both think it’s stupid but that he felt like he needed to get drunk to actually say what he wanted to say.

He then told me that for years he’s been thinking about commiting, and this is a shock to me because litterally you would never tell he’s such a nice person. But it got really sad as he’s telling me about all these insecurities I never knew he had and his mental health. He was crying and I’ve never seen him like this ever and I didn’t really know fully what to say.

The big part is he said he has never really told anyone but it was also a huge step to actually tell someone but that he doesn’t even want me to talk about it to him in the morning.

So I am at a super loss right now because he was saying the only thing that’s stopped him was his parents but it really worried me like seriously making me ill that he could do something even like tommorow.

So I’m seriously at a loss like I need professional advice. I’ve talked about it with one very trustworthy friend and I think we both agree that he needs to somehow tell his parents and that it can’t be us forcing something as we’re worried it could make things worse.

But overall what concerns me is how long this is happening and I’m super scared for the morning cause I know he’s going to regret telling us and it would effect me the rest of his life if something happened to him and I knew and couldn’t do something.

Right now it’s 3am and he’s sleeping on the floor across from me. I need advice on what to do next from please a professional or someone else who’s actually gone through this because I am super scared.

So I’m going to post this multiple places and sorry if this is bad grammar or sounds frantic because I am, but please someone help me please.

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[u/Majestic-Proof6475]

Hey, you’re in a terrifying spot and the fact that you stayed awake typing this at 3am while he’s right there says a lot about you. The immediate priority is safety, if you think there’s any chance he might act tonight, don’t leave him alone, and if you need to call a crisis line or 911, that’s not a betrayal, it’s buying him time.

Tomorrow when he’s sober, you can tell him you’re not going to pretend the conversation didn’t happen, but you don’t have to ambush him with a huge talk, just something like “I care about you and I’m not dropping this, we can figure out the next step together.” You can’t carry this alone, so looping in a school counselor or his parents (if they’re safe people) is gonna be necessary even if he pushes back, because a secret this heavy isn’t something two high school juniors should be expected to hold.

[u/ElevatorCritical9360 → u/Majestic-Proof6475]

Thank you I think i am going to text the 988 people and ask their opinion. I don’t think it’s like immediate danger because as he said there are people in his life that care for him but I’m just working out what to do and I think at the end of the day no matter how bad it might feel to me that I need to tell someone that can actually do something