Kristen Christy is no stranger to overcoming adversity. At just 15 years old, after becoming a world-class tennis player, she had a massive stroke that led doctors to tell her she’d never walk again.
She did that and more.
As a child of a career Air Force officer, the military was all she knew, so it was no surprise when she fell in love with Don, an ROTC Air Force cadet at the University of Texas where she was attending school. They began building their life together with their two boys in Colorado when he was deployed to Iraq. Don was second in command at the Baghdad airport in 2004 and when he returned home with a Bronze Star, nothing was the same.
Shortly before being promoted to Colonel on April 21, 2008, he took his own life. (Editor’s note: If you or someone you know is struggling with mental health, please get help by dialing 988). It was almost four years to the day of his deployment to Iraq. Their sons, Ryan and Ben, were only 14 and 12 at the time. Though Christy had tried for years to help Don and their marriage was suffering because of his lingering wounds from the deployment, she couldn’t reach him.
Two years into being a widow, she was up in the middle of the night—unable to sleep.
“I honestly call it God’s time when you find yourself awake like that, thinking through things. This time at 3 a.m., I found myself wondering why we had a national emergency number, 911, but we didn’t have a three-digit number for suicide prevention,” Christy explained. “I didn’t have a big sphere of influence, but I still had some connections in the military so I began socializing with the idea of a three-digit lifeline for veterans to everyone I came in contact with.”
She called Mark Udall, the former Senator for the state of Colorado and began talking with his staff about the need.
“I honestly got a lot of no’s because people just thought that it was going to be too hard to accomplish. But I always say no just stands for next opportunity,” Christy quipped.
In 2014, the Colorado Springs Business Journal chose her as one of their women of influence for the year and she also received the Leadership Pikes Peak Community Trustee Award a year later.
In the midst of pursuing advocacy for the three-digit crisis hotline, tragedy rolled in once again when her oldest son, Ryan, disappeared at 20 years old after a long battle with mental illness, drug use and mourning his father. He left his mother a message on her phone that day and has not been heard from since.
“I miss Dad so much. I can’t live without him—I can’t. I need him so much. I’ve been mourning eight years of my life. I’m not okay right now. I really need help.”
Christy began speaking about the rippling impacts of suicide on the families left behind, sharing their story often with the hopes of saving lives and also secretly hoping Ryan would hear it and come home. In the midst of all this, she met and fell in love again with Technical Sergeant Sean Lange, a reservist for the Air Force.
She began another mission, this time to dedicate March 4th as National Survivors Day. It brought her to the White House, working hand in hand with then-Second Lady Karen Pence. Her work also led her to co-founding the National Veterans Vocational Village, a community for veterans to heal and work together.
In 2018, she was recognized as the Armed Forces Insurance Air Force Spouse of the Year for her work as a resiliency trainer and devotion to preventing suicide. Each September, she continued traveling all over the world, sharing her story and saving lives.
Three years later, there were ripples of talk that the three-digit number may finally become a reality after over a decade of pursuing it. In 2022, that middle-of-the-night God moment and idea turned into reality.
The 988 Suicide and Crisis Hotline was launched, giving struggling people the option to connect with counselors based on their needs and self-identifying choices. Veterans simply press 1.
There were many times Christy hit barriers, more heartache and what felt like endless challenges to her own faith. But she never wavered.
“In those moments where I struggled, I found that when I was able to help other people, it kept me going. It helped grow my resilience and perseverance. My youngest son told me watching me go through all of this has led him to really believe he can accomplish anything,” she shared.
Her next goals? Getting March 4th designated officially as National Day of Resilience and making sure every American knows about the crisis hotline.
“I want 988 in everyone’s cell phone and to understand that it’s not just for them when they’re in crisis. It’s for them when they have someone in their sphere of influence in crisis, a trusted agent who comes to them because they celebrate with them, they mourn with them, they sit in the hole with them,” she explained. “It’s okay to call and say, I have a friend who’s in crisis. How do I help my friend? Right? People think it’s, oh, I won’t need it because I won’t be in a crisis. I’ve never thought about that at all. It’s for every human being with a beating heart.”
You can learn more about 988 by clicking here.