Calls keep soaring at crisis hotlines: 'It spiked and hasn't stopped'

PHILADELPHIA – Since 2016, Mark Trainer has worked as a counselor for Crisis Text Line, a national nonprofit organization that provides a free mental health texting service for people in crisis. On any given day, he talks with texters about a "very wide swath of challenges," including struggles with school and relationships with their family or peers. But in March, the tone of those conversations shifted as the pandemic took hold across the country. Trainer, who is based in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, found himself talking to people who couldn't see their therapist due to social distancing measur...