How to find hope at rock bottom?

Rock bottom has a silence of its own. It feels as if nothing will change, as if every door has closed. If you're there right now, the first thing to know is this: many people who are standing today were once exactly where you are.

What to do now

1. If hope is completely gone, ask for help now. If you are thinking about taking your own life, call CVV at 188, free, 24 hours a day, or talk by chat at cvv.org.br. If you are in immediate danger, call 192 (SAMU) or go to an emergency room. You don't need to solve everything today; you need to get through today.
2. Look for one small reason. It doesn't have to be a great meaning of life. It can be a child, a pet, a person, a task, the curiosity to see how things will turn out. Hope starts small.
3. Remember what you've already been through. Make a list of the times you thought you wouldn't make it and did. Rock bottom has a short memory; you need to remind it.
4. Talk to someone today. A friend, a relative, a leader in your community, a health professional. Hope often arrives in someone else's voice.
5. Take care of your body the way you would care for a loved one who is ill. Water, food, a shower, sunlight, a few hours of sleep. These are small acts of hope.
6. Seek ongoing support. Persistent hopelessness can be a sign of depression, which can be treated. Your city's primary health unit (UBS) and psychosocial care center (CAPS) provide care through SUS.
7. Listen to stories of people who got out. Real testimonies show that there is another side to the pit.
8. Go back to the basics of routine. Waking up and going to bed at similar times, leaving the house a little every day, eating at regular hours. Routine holds life together while hope rebuilds.

When it happened to Bairo

Bairo Leandro Gonzalez Martinez describes his own rock bottom without embellishment: broke, broken and beaten. No money, no apparent way out, not a single plan left in the drawer.

But, he says, there was still a flame. Of hope and of faith. It was by listening to testimonies in a Christian congregation that it began to grow again: ordinary people telling how they had crossed through the impossible.

In a time of faith and silence, he says he saw his best self: a prosperous man, not only in money, in peace. He came out of it with an image and no map. But for someone at the bottom, an image was already a lot. For him, that is where everything began.

The path

Hope isn't being sure everything will work out. It's believing it's still worth trying. Bairo found his in a small flame that didn't go out. Yours may be in a conversation, a memory, a person. Protect that flame. It doesn't have to be big today; it has to stay lit until tomorrow.

If you are with someone who is at rock bottom, your presence counts more than any advice. You don't need to have the right answer. It's enough to be close, listen without judging, help with the basics and, if you sense risk, help the person call CVV or seek health services. Hope often arrives on loan, in the hands of someone who stayed.

Read also

• The God of the impossible
• The coin and the road
• How to stop feeling like a failure?