[Note: A significant amount of the information below has been changed or omitted, for various reasons, but the core issue left undisturbed. If I feel I can safely divulge further particulars in subsequent posts, I will, so don’t get offended that I didn’t initially.]
I have a young acquaintance (13 y/o) that I quasi-mentor (long story)-I’ve always told him that he can talk to me about anything, if he wishes. Well, today he did. He has been telling me for months that he has grave doubts about God. He’s also quite a loner (well, so am I as it turns out). The problem is that his grandparents are very religious, so he feels if he comes out to them, as it were, they’ll look very disapprovingly on him. It’s not just that tho (so I don’t want to overemphasize the religion angle)-he’s moving to another state soon and is anxious about that too, and all this is in addition to general adolescent angst. He said he wants to kill himself, which is the real problem here-feels like he is a loser and a failure, even though in his current school he’s doing rather well (something I managed to grudgingly pry from him). He was very agitated and angry when he told me all this.
The issue of course is the suicide threat. If I go behind his back and tell his folks (his mother is divorced-he lives with her but the g-parents are a big part of his life), I’ll destroy the trust and rapport we’ve built up. If I don’t, and he does something drastic…well you see the problem. I don’t want to commit the possible mistake of not taking the threat seriously, even if it is 99% probable that he’s just being dramatic about the whole thing.
The kicker is that I’m, as I’ve divulged here before, a survivor of clinical depression. I’ve managed to turn around almost all of my bad mental habits, living daily with a joy my younger self could scarcely imagine. So naturally I told him all this, including the key event in my turnaround and how nobody can know how the future can turn out-he listened politely, but I sensed he was rather skeptical. I suggested that he risk being honest with his g-parents, and trust that they will be understanding and not go off the handle about it (as he apparently fears-I’ve met them and they don’t seem like a-holes, but public and private faces often aren’t the same of course).
Any ideas or advice appreciated.
I wouldn’t actively encourage leaving the religion, even if he’s slowly moving there himself. Sometimes even the most minimal belief in the spiritual can be a great comfort to someone who is feeling at loose ends.
I would encourage him to either take advantage of counseling the school or the community might provide, or else speak to his mother or his grandparents about seeing a psychiatrist (this assuming, of course, that they could pay for something like that). For whatever reason, he doesn’t want to be completely open with them, and he doesn’t have to be, and you can also tell him to make it your idea, i.e. “I’ve been feeling really confused lately, and I talked to Mr. DiFool about it, and he told me that talking to a counselor was really helpful to him when he was young.”
Have you offered to talk to the g-parents or his mother with him, or on his behalf?
I don’t see why he has to tell his grandparents that he’s falling off the spiritual wagon, so to speak, if he senses or anticipates an unpleasant reaction from them.
They were teenagers once themselves, and hopefully they remember it a little. He can talk to them about feeling lonely, feeling inadequate despite doing well at school (which, as a teen, is his primary “job” right now), his anxiety about the upcoming move, etc.
All of these things are normal things for him to talk about. But none of them necessarily involve any magical sky pixies, and I don’t see why his faith, or lack thereof, or questions about the lack thereof, have anything to do with teenage angst, anxiety, etc.
Does his school have a decent councelor?
Tell someone about his thoughts of suicide. This is a very bad sign. It doesn’t mean he will necessarily attempt suicide, but it definitely means he is depressed and in a very dark place. Let him know there are suicide hotlines out there where you can talk to someone who will not judge and is glad to listen and help them find help.
With regard to his questioning of religion - and I say this as someone who is not and has never been a member of any organized religion, though I do believe in God - a lot of very religious people have gone through a period of questioning in their lives. Some of them come out no longer believing, but some of them come out with their beliefs strengthened. It’s really important for everyone to explore religion for themselves and make these decisions from an informed standpoint. And when I say informed, I don’t mean ‘inform yourself about exactly what the scientific world is 100% sure of and nothing else’, I mean ‘inform yourself about the tenets of major religions and why it is that people find belief in God to be a positive thing.’
So purplehorseshoe is right about how his grandparents will probably understand what he is feeling right now - but I think they may also understand why he is feeling confused and uncertain about God, and they may have some insight to share about why religion is important to them and why they believe. Of course, he may also decide that religion doesn’t work for him - and IMO, you can still appreciate the beauty and the goodness in the world even if you don’t believe it’s all part of a grand design.
What if you offered to be with him when he speaks to his mother/grandparents? Maybe even offer to do the talking for him to start with?
Often children feel like they don’t have a voice, maybe you could be that voice for him.
Thanks all. Perhaps it was a bad idea to post this on this board; like I said I didn’t want to overemphasize the religion angle, but that’s precisely what some have done. My main concern is the suicide threat (again, kids say things like that all the time, only a small percentage actually follow through). And as I indicated in my disclaimer, things are more complicated than I’ve outlined (I don’t want this getting back to anyone involved, and weirder things have happened on the internet). I’ll flag down a mod and close this thread; sorry for futzing up my first “advice” thread here.
Thread closed per request of OP.