Life Left To Go

If you’ve read my earlier post Staring at The Sun, you’ll know that I’m passionate about issues surrounding mental health.  One of my main concerns is lack of awareness of mental health issues and the treatment available amongst young people, and one of the bodies that I think can be most helpful in tackling this is schooling.  Today, one of my colleagues showed me a report on mental health services provision in schools, which was put together by the St Albans Youth Council (SAYC).  The report is based on research into the awareness of and need for counselling services in schools, and makes some amazingly pertinent and important observations and recommendations, most of which I whole-heartedly agree with.  I’d like to summarise some of them here in the hope that others will share my enthusiasm, spread the word and where possible take steps to act on them. 

The SAYC contextualise their report by noting that their concern for mental health was brought on by what they saw as an alarmingly high number of incidences of suicide among young people in their region.  Touchingly, they dedicate the report to those young people who felt that this was the only option available to them.  What better reason could we want to work towards improved mental health, to ensure young people get the support they need during difficult times?  I share a vision with SAYC that by providing appropriate levels of support and signposting, we can make all those who are suffering realise that there are other solutions to their problems.  I find that songs can express my own thoughts and feelings better than I can half the time, and a simple but effective lyric that springs to mind is “There’s more life left to go…”.

One of the main points I want to iterate is that there quite clearly is not enough mental health provision out there for young people.  In their report the SAYC note that a local charity that provides talking therapies for young people had recently had to close their waiting list, because the need for help was simply too great for the provision available.  Whether this is due to a lack of funding, lack of willingness by those in power, or something else, I don’t know.  What I do know is that, if we want to stop young people from reaching a critical stage in their mental illness, whatever the cost, the need for mental health services needs to be given a lot more attention in the coming years on both local and national levels. 

The SAYC collected data using questionnaires in 11 schools in their region. Whilst all but one of the schools provided a counselling service, an average of 65% of pupils were not aware of this provision; in some schools this figure was in excess of 80%.  Quite rightly, the authors therefore recommend that schools use better signposting to ensure that pupils know what help is available to them, both inside and outside of the school setting.  As we can see from my previous point, the need for services is far greater than the provision as it is.  But I ask this:  what is the point in providing a service for young people if they simply aren’t aware of it and therefore cannot make use of it?

Another part of this report I find particularly striking is to do with factors that deter pupils from seeking counselling.  Those rated highest were those regarding privacy, such as ‘fear of friends finding out’ and ‘school setting’.  In other words, young people do not want to seek help for mental health issues because of fear of people finding out.  At first glance, this might suggest that we need to provide better signposting to services outside of schools, to reduce the fear of friends finding out.  But the wider issue highlighted here is the stigma around seeking help for mental health problems.  If young people saw it as socially acceptable to do this, then surely friends finding out would not be a deterrent from seeking help? 

For me, this all goes back to the need to educate young people about mental health, bringing it to their awareness in the same way as physical health.  I’m pretty sure a young person wouldn’t think twice about seeking medical attention for, let’s say, a sprained ankle, so why on earth should they feel any differently about a mental health problem?  As Nick Clegg has recently noted, “mental health must have the same priority as physical health”.  I don’t often have a great deal of time for what our ‘top’ politicians say, but I couldn’t agree more with this!

There’s a lot more I could say, but I’ll leave it here to keep this a reasonable reading length!  I hope you will all agree that this is absolutely one of the most critically important issued faced by our society today.  If there is one small thing you can do to help the cause, such as sign the Time To Change pledge (link below), increase awareness by sharing this page with other people, or signposting a young person in need to a local mental health service yourself, that would be amazing.  If you’re someone who has the power to do something big like take steps towards increasing funding, or set up a new mental health service, even better!  As my song lyric from earlier goes, ‘there’s more life left to go’, and I really do believe that the quality of that life can be enhanced for a lot of people with the right services and strategies in place. 

Thanks for reading and comments welcome as always.

Links:

http://www.time-to-change.org.uk/pledgewall

You're The Inspiration

Sooo… Unfortunately the ‘inconveniences’ of going to work, job hunting, etc. appear to have taken over and my poor blog has suffered for it!  But I’m back now and hoping there will still be people who are interested in what I have to say.  Thanks for dropping by and I hope you find this an enjoyable read!

As those of you who know me well will already be aware, I’m into keeping fit and am a particularly keen cyclist.  I’m even hoping to get into racing this year, but I’ve had a bit of a setback in recent weeks with a dodgy knee.  I’m resting it and hoping it’s nothing too inhibiting in the long run, but it’s got me thinking about inspirational people who do amazing things in the face of adversity.  I’ll share two of my favourites here and would love to hear from you all about who and what inspires you.

The first person I want to talk about is Katie Piper.  To me, she is just about the most amazing and inspirational person around.  Katie was a happy-go-lucky twenty-something just starting out in a modelling and presenting career, when a crazed ex-boyfriend had an accomplice throw a cup of industrial strength sulphuric acid in her face.  At the time, her face was one of the most important things to her, and it was destroyed.  She experienced injuries to her throat, nose, eyes and arms, and was fortunate to survive.  If you watch the documentary Katie: My Beautiful Face, which follows Katie during her recovery, you’ll see heart-breaking images of her evidently confused and unable to do anything for herself in the days following the attack.  If you read her autobiography, Beautiful, you’ll find out that on one of those those days, when her only mode of communication was pen and paper, she wished not to be alive and wrote to her mum “Kill me”.

Things could not have been darker for Katie, yet she not only survived but has gone on to do truly amazing things.  She started a charity, the Katie Piper Foundation, which raises funds to help burns survivors through their recovery, both physically and mentally.  Not only is Katie helping other burns survivors (she’s intent on using the word survivors, not victims), but she has also written an incredible self-help style book, Things Get Better, which gives inspired  advice for anyone who’s having a hard time (I personally believe every living being should read and take direction from this book!).  She’s even written a book called Start Your Day With Katie, which gives a little nugget of inspiration for positive thinking for every single day of the year.

Last year, I was happy to see that Katie won a Pride of Britain Award for her efforts; extremely well-deserved in my opinion.  If you haven’t already, I urge you to find out more about Katie, watch her programmes and read her books.  You’ll come away feeling awed and inspired!

The second person I want to mention is a talented and charismatic American girl called Amy Purdy.  At the age of 19, she suffered from a bout of meningitis which resulted in both her legs being amputated from the knee down.  This left her depressed for months, unable to get out of bed.  Then one day, she began to realise the positive elements of her situation and banish the notion of limitations from her mind; she instead chose to look at how she could shape her new reality to her own advantage.  To cut a long story short, Amy is now a professional snowboarder with her sights set on the 2014 Winter Paralympics.  Amazing!  But don’t take my word for it; watch this video in which Amy’s charm, determination and sense of humour speak for themselves and, I hope, leave you feeling inspired…

 http://www.ted.com/talks/amy_purdy_living_beyond_limits.html

I’m hopeful that after a few weeks of rest all will be well with my knee and I’ll be able to get back into my cycle training.  But if things don’t turn out as I hope, I know that the stories of people like Katie and Amy will inspire and motivate me to do well despite my difficulties.  I hope that by reading this you’ll be feeling inspired too, and that you’ll find some hope in these stories if you find yourself in difficult times now or in the future.  Thanks for reading, and please do comment and share your favourite stories too: I doubt there is such a thing as too much inspiration!