Strength Through Pain
Kevin Hines devotes himself to advocating for suicide prevention. He knows what he’s talking about, having survived a jump off the Golden Gate Bridge when he was 19. These days, he uses his storytelling skills to build resilience—within himself and others.
[00:00:00] Stephen Calabria: From the Mount Sinai Health System in New York City, this is Road to Resilience, podcast about facing adversity. I'm your host, Stephen Calabria, Mount Sinai's Director of Podcasting.
[00:00:12] On today's episode, we welcome Kevin Hines, a storyteller, author, and filmmaker. Due to the pain of bipolar depression, Kevin jumped off the Golden Gate Bridge when he was 19 years old.
[00:00:23] He survived, and now he advocates around the world for suicide prevention. He was also a big part of getting a net installed around the Golden Gate come. We're pleased to welcome Kevin to the show.
[00:00:37] Kevin Hines, welcome to Road to Resilience.
[00:00:41] Kevin Hines: Thank you for having me. I'm glad to be here. Nice to meet you.
[00:00:43] Stephen Calabria: Our pleasure. So could you give us a brief primer on your background?
[00:00:49] Kevin Hines: Sure. Born in abject poverty in the Tenderloin district of San Francisco in the 1980s. Lived in and out of crack motels with my birth parents, taken in by foster parents, many different homes in a short amount of time.
[00:01:03] Take it away from my birth mom at least five times before that. My birth brother and I in one of the foster homes filled with neglect both contracted a vicious strain of bronchitis. He died. My only full blooded brother. I bounced around from home to home.
[00:01:18] Unlike my poor brother, I got very lucky. I landed in the home with Patrick and Debra Hines, eventually. They made me their son. They are my mom and dad, and they gave me a beautiful childhood and adolescence for my
traumatic infancy, where I was fed Kool Aid, Coca Cola, and sour milk, my first diet, ravaging my gut, destroying my brain.
[00:01:38] I ended up living this great childhood and wonderful adolescence, but at 17 and a half years of age, my brain broke. I had a complete mental breakdown in front of 1, 200 people at my theater show, playing one of the leads at Archbishop Reardon High School.