Does 'But I didn't know I could" mean 'But I didn't know I could be helped by you"?

Context:

As a child, my wife hated her school and wished she could leave.
Years later, when she was in her twenties, she disclosed this
unhappy fact to her parents, and her mother was aghast: 'But
darling, why didn't you come to us and tell us?' Lalla's reply is my
text for today: 'But I didn't know I could.'
I didn't know I could.
I suspect - well, I am sure - that there are lots of people out there
who have been brought up in some religion or other, are unhappy
in it, don't believe it, or are worried about the evils that are done in
its name; people who feel vague yearnings to leave their parents'
religion and wish they could, but just don't realize that leaving is an
option. If you are one of them, this book is for you. It is intended
to raise consciousness - raise consciousness to the fact that to be an
atheist is a realistic aspiration, and a brave and splendid one. You
can be an atheist who is happy, balanced, moral, and intellectually
fulfilled. That is the first of my consciousness-raising messages. I
also want to raise consciousness in three other ways, which I'll
come on to.