Mr Shmigel knows how difficult it can be knowing someone close is in one of the darkest places imaginable.

His own son attempted to take his own life on three separate occasions.

"I wasn't perhaps giving him the attention he needed," he said.

"He was close to the dux of his school, but I needed the kick in the bum that he provided, he's fine now and doing lots of things for himself."

Recently he walked from the southernmost point of Australia to the northernmost and raised about $50,000 for Lifeline.

Mr Shmigel is aware he isn't the only person who has been affected by suicide with more men than women taking their own lives.

"More women talk about it," he said.

"60 per cent of women call, while 75 per cent of men actually do suicide."

He said Lifeline volunteers were some of the hardest people working.

"Suicide is mainly to do with a feeling of loneliness and isolation and you don't need to be suffering from a mental illness to think of suicide."

Mr Shmigel was hopeful a new text message service would enable men to talk about how they were feeling which would break down the barrier of having a one-on-one phone call.

"When you go to the pub of a weekend you look around and see most men looking at their phones," he said.

"So what we want to do is have a text message service where men who are thinking of suiciding can send a message instead of having to ring a number and physically talk about it.

"We're keeping up with the community."

He said Lifeline had been in contact with one million people in the last 12 months with 16,000 phone calls made from the Port Macquarie area.

"That's where these volunteers come into it," he said.

"Port Macquarie is very special because there's more than 300 volunteers here and I like to refer to them as Australia's angels.

"Working at Lifeline is about empathy but effectiveness and listening to people in need.

"Our volunteers come up with safe plans to implement to people who ring in crisis. They can save up to 120 lives a day."