Alex's Answer

Hi there and welcome to Ask Alex.  

Thank you so much for reaching out to us and trusting us with your thoughts. We appreciate you sending in your question and we are happy that you felt comfortable getting in contact with us.  

You’ve said that you have made numerous fake calls in the last few weeks to the 999-emergency number. You say that while you won’t admit to others that you’ve done it, you do think you need help to stop making hoax calls to emergency services.  You also think that you might be seeking attention and that’s why you make these hoax calls.  

You have been very brave and honest telling us about this. It is not easy to talk about our emotions or worries or admitting to doing things that aren’t constructive or helpful to ourselves or society at large.

You mentioned that attention seeking might be a reason you make these calls. Do you feel there is a lack of attention from others in your life at the moment? Do you have a trusted adult in your life who you would feel comfortable telling this to? This can be a family member like parent, aunt/uncle, grandparent or someone outside of the family like a teacher, neighbour or sports coach. You might find that some of the adults in your life may have experienced similar emotions and might be able to offer you advice or provide you with the kind of healthy attention that allows you to feel valued and fulfilled.

Have you any thoughts on what might help you to stop contacting the emergency services? Perhaps there is a thrill that goes with making these calls, is there anything you can do in your daily life that would provide you with a similar sense of excitement? Perhaps a sport or taking part in a play might work in this regard. 

Remember, you can always phone Childline on 1800 66 66 66 to talk about what is going on for you if you don’t feel ready to talk to someone in your day-to-day life quite yet. We are here 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Our text service, which can be reached on 50101 and Web Chat service through www.childline.ie, are also available daily. While we will not tell you what to do, we are here to listen to and support you, and to help you to explore the options that are available to you in your life. We are here to help you in a way that suits you.   

We hope that the information we have given you is useful.  Please do not hesitate to get in touch with us if you have any other questions.  

Take care,  

Alex