Kevin Hines was desperate.
For years, he’d fought a relentless enemy: His own mind, torn by the delusions of severe bipolar disorder.
On Sept. 25, 2000, 19-year-old Hines was poised to lose not just that battle, but his life.
Perched atop the Golden Gate Bridge in California, Hines didn’t want to jump.
But the voices screaming in his head — a symptom of his illness — convinced him he didn’t have a choice.
“Are you OK? Is something wrong? Or can I help you? Those were quite literally the only words I desperately needed to hear, the day I found myself standing atop that bridge walkway, believing…that I had (no choice) but to die,” Hines said.
Many people walked by Hines as he sobbed on the bridge, staring down at what he believed was his death.
None tried to stop him. His friends and loved ones had no idea he was there.
“I believed I was worthless,” Hines said of his feelings in that moment. “I thought I had no value. I thought all my family and every one of my friends hated me and wanted me gone.”
So he jumped.
A life changed
Now, nearly 24 years after the day that didn’t end his life but changed its course forever, Hines stands as one of 36 people who survived a suicide attempt from the Golden Gate Bridge — less than 1% of those who try.
Hines’ ordeal, the struggles that led to it and the extraordinary events that followed, and why — and how — suicide can never be the answer: Hines touched on these and more during his recent speech at Reading Area Community College’s Miller Center for the Arts.
A crowd of about 150 attended the suicide prevention event, sponsored by 28 local businesses and organizations.
Crisis counselors were on hand to speak with anyone who was struggling.
Many who attended indicated that they had lost loved ones from suicide or struggled with suicidal thoughts themselves.
They aren’t alone — more than 49,000 people died by suicide in 2022 in the United States, as well as 82 people in Berks County last year, according to county Commissioner Michael Rivera, who spoke at the event.
“Suicide was the second leading cause of death for people ages 10 to 14,” Rivera said. “It’s hard to even fathom that … Bullying, child abuse, sexual abuse, those are all contributing factors … each and every one of us has an important part to play in reducing those numbers.”
Childhood neglect
Abuse and neglect played a large part in Hines’ mental health issues — he said his parents were addicts and fed him a diet of soda and spoiled milk from infancy.
“We were born in abject poverty … we lived in and out of crack motels,” Hines said.
Eventually, a sympathetic motel attendant called child protective services, and the infant Hines and his brother were placed in the foster system.
The neglect didn’t end there. Hines and his brother contracted a virulent strain of bronchitis in one foster home. His brother died next to him.
“I immediately developed a severe detachment disorder from reality,” Hines said. “Abandonment issues that follow me. Every time someone I love dies, I feel like they’re leaving me on purpose, and I can’t shake it.”
Luckily, Hines’ next foster parents would be his last — he was taken home by Debbie and Patrick Hines.
He said he lived a childhood grateful for the opportunities afforded by the Hineses until his teenage years, when the symptoms of bipolar disorder started to appear.
“Paranoid delusions, hallucinations, auditory and visual, panic attacks feeling like my heart was pumping out of my chest,” Hines said. “Having all these things I was dealing with, I didn’t know they were called symptoms, I just thought I was losing my mind.”
Despite being diagnosed with bipolar disorder at 17, Hines hid his most serious symptoms from his loved ones and doctors out of fear.
“(Age) 17 to 19 was a very rocky road,” Hines said. “I would skyrocket up to manic euphoric highs, then crash into … depression and pain.”
Hines’ unstable state led to frequent fights with his adoptive father.
“He was just trying to reach me in my state of psychosis,” Hines said. “No one taught Pat Hines how to deal with a child with mental illness.”
His spiraling mental health eventually led Hines to an unbearable place, and he resolved to end his life.
He said his father was worried and tried to connect with Hines the day he planned to die but didn’t know enough about suicidal ideation to recognize the signs.
“That man would have moved heaven and earth to keep me safe from myself that day,” Hines said. “And so would the people that love you. Know that. I didn’t … I tripled down on the silencing of my pain.”
His pain eventually brought Hines to the bridge that day. It forced him to the edge.
‘Instant regret’
“The millisecond my hands left that rail, and my legs cleared it, instant regret and the absolute recognition that I had just made the greatest mistake of my life,” Hines said. “In those four seconds before hitting the water, these four words rang in my mind: God please save me.”
Whether it was God, fate or plain luck, something did save Hines.
Despite breaking his back, he didn’t immediately lose function in his limbs and was able to swim up for air.
Even though no one stopped Hines from jumping, a witness immediately called her colleague in the Coast Guard who happened to be nearby.
And perhaps most bizarre as Hines bobbed in the water, expending the last of his strength, he was kept afloat by an unlikely savior.
“I was thinking to myself, this is one hell of a nice shark … I was very delusional,” Hines said with a laugh, noting he later realized that a sea lion saved him. “This creature that didn’t speak my language kept me afloat when no person would help me that day. Incredible.”
When the Coast Guard finally arrived, he told Hines that in his entire career, he had pulled 57 dead bodies from beneath the bridge, and only one live one — Hines.
“That gave me the greatest point of perspective I’d ever received in my life,” Hines said. “In that moment, I made the decision that no matter the pain I would be in, I would never again attempt to take my life.”
A new outlook
When he reached the hospital, Hines was greeted by one of the world’s foremost back surgeons, who happened to be visiting the grounds that day.
“He decided to clock in and do my surgery, reshaping my entire back with titanium, and saving me the ability to stand, walk and run,” Hines said.
Hines’ struggles didn’t end that day.
He said he’s been to the psychiatric ward 10 times since and has begun taking himself there for a voluntary hold if he feels he will be a danger to himself.
Hines said that every time he has those thoughts, he reassures himself that his thoughts don’t have to become his actions.
“The next thing I do, and the most important thing, is say four simple words: ‘I need help now,’” Hines said. “I don’t stop saying I need help until one person is willing to answer the call.”
Silencing his pain is what Hines said caused his issues, and he urged those in the audience not to do so, or that pain could fester into greater mental health issues.
“I got great at silencing my pain,” Hines said. “If you are going to learn one thing from me today, and one thing alone … never again silence your pain. Why? Because your pain is valid.”
Loved ones of those who struggle with suicide should also become accustomed to asking three questions, Hines said: Are you thinking of killing yourself? Have you made plans? And do you have the means?
Even if they lack the ability to fully understand suicidal pain or weren’t aware of how to help, loved ones of those who die by suicide should never blame themselves, Hines noted.
“Know this: It was not your fault,” Hines said. “They passed on because of a lethal emotional pain that had nothing to do with you. Take that weight off your shoulders and brush it off. That’s too much weight for anyone to carry.”
Reframing his issues in a way that freed him from his own victim narrative has been immensely helpful, Hines said.
“For years I … called myself a sufferer,” Hines said. “I made me the victim of my own story. Until I woke up one day and realized I could fight my pain, despite my pain.”
Source of hope
That realization is what fuels Hines’ efforts and has enabled him to become a source of hope.
“Sometimes you have to push through the pain so you can give back to others, because when you do that, the overwhelming sense of hope you receive saves the day,” Hines said. “And you then become the catalyst to changing and saving a life.”
Hines said he was grateful to everyone who came to the event and considered it a gift that he is able to share his message.
“I’m in a lot of pain every day, physically, from what I did to myself (that day), and … from living with bipolar depression,” Hines said. “I take responsibility for jumping off that bridge. And I need no pity for those two types of pain, because they remind me that I get to be here … And I firmly and formidably believe that getting to be here is a privilege and a gift, no matter the pain you might be in.”
Help available
Crisis Intervention Hotline
• Phone: 610-379-2007 or toll free 1-888-219-3910
• Text: 484-816-7865 (RUOK)
