The tools to save a life are not scalpels or sutures or machines that beep, those are just instruments used to help repair a broken shell. The tools to save a life are much simpler and are often taken for granted. They also do not require an expensive medical degree. Such tools are often as simple as love or words, and they can completely change a person.

If I were given an opportunity to go back and change someone, the only tools I would require would be: a few boxes of macaroni and cheese, a hammer, and some band-aids. The macaroni and cheese to stop anorexia while it is still in the early stages and no one knows but you, the hammer to smash the phone that hurt her and the mirrors that made her hurt herself, and the band-aids to show that someone really cared when she cut herself.

I was too young and naïve when she needed me before, but now I know better. I can now recognize and operate the tools to save a life…can you?