Good morning readers!
Today we’d love to hear about who has inspired you by speaking out about mental health, and share with you somebody who has inspired us in turn.
But first things first: your donations aren’t letting up.
With gift aid and match funding included, you have now raised a whopping £78,130. Can we raise £100,000 by the weekend?
If you want to help us do just that, you can donate here.
Talking frankly about mental health issues is often daunting – but with openness and bravery comes powerful stories which can really help other sufferers.
Such is the case with Irish musician Niall Breslin, a coach on the reality singing TV show The Voice of Ireland and former frontman for The Blizzards. Breslin made a moving speech about his own struggles with generalised anxiety disorder at a live event in Dublin this past weekend. The video of his speech at Lovin Dublin Live has been shared thousands of times on Facebook and had a positive response when we posted it to our own mental health tumblr.
Breslin, fondly known as Bressie in the Irish media, says during his speech:
The best advice I was given was by the Cycle Against Suicide entrepreneur Jim Breen, who said: ‘When you’re doing this Niall, never, ever, ever try to tell anyone else’s story. Tell your own story. That’s where the power is.’
It’s 25 minutes long, but well worth watching if you have time to spare. Breslin talks about how he started struggling with mental health issues at just 15 years old, how it affected his sporting ambitions and how his own breaking point came as he was taping the first season of The Voice of Ireland. He also speaks about how important he felt it was to go public:
I started to realise something: it was important that I stopped hiding it from the public. Part of my job, like it or not, is that you’re in the public eye.
I was on my hands and knees as a 15 year old begging for somebody to come out and say I wasn’t insane, that this was normal. And no one ever did. I promised myself if I ever got to the point that I could be that person for a potential teenager who’s going through the same – that I was going to be that person.
I thought all these crazy, irrational thoughts that people with generalised anxiety disorder think. It’s all irrational. I told the press and I thought I was going to lose my job, but the public support was the greatest feeling I’ve ever had.
Since going public in 2013, Breslin has become an ambassador for Cycle Against Suicide and set up My 1000 Hours, which “aims to help bring clarity to the subject, exploring ways we can improve both our emotional and physical fitness”.
Thanks for all your kind words on the @LovinDublin speech. It's all going the right way. Follow @My1000Hours for more on talks/blogs
— Niall Breslin (@nbrez) December 6, 2014
Who are your mental health role models? Are they someone close to you or someone whose writing and campaigning on mental health you admire? Let us know in the comments below and we’ll feature some of your recommendations on the blog and our mental health tumblr. If you’d rather submit something anonymously, you can use our tumblr’s Ask Box.
