A shorter post this Family Day, I thought I would take a few minutes to talk about the Twitter handle @RealTimeCrisis. Started by a Toronto police officer and a street nurse, they trawl Twitter for people demonstrating signs of lethality and reach out to them.
As I’ve written about in the past on my article on responding to suicide on social media, many people give people hints of their behaviour who never receive the support that they need. Sometimes family members and friends don’t know what to do – or, worse, they’re afraid of the answer they might get.
Enter Marie Batten and TPS Constable Scott Mills. Since 2012 they have been tweeting individuals in crisis and offering a helping hand, connecting them to resources in the community. Sometimes the Toronto Police will directly contact them and sometimes they’ll reach out. But either way – it is heartening to see people getting the support they need.
As online crisis chat and SMS/texting services become more common avenues for receiving emotional support and crisis intervention I suspect we’ll see more services like @RealTimeCrisis. For now they represent a best practice – an innovative strategy of reaching out when people need them most.