Weʼre raising £500 to help Brothers In Arms to launch #brotherstayalive - a free suicide prevention app available to all men in Scotland

Date: Friday 01 Dec 2017

I will be completing a marcothon this December in order to raise funds for Brothers In Arms to launch #brotherstayalive - a free suicide prevention app for men in Scotland. The marcothon is simple: I'll be running 5k every day in December (even Christmas!) and my inspiration for doing this is below...

My dad has suffered with mental health problems since I was a teenager but for many years I was not involved in his treatment or management. This was partly down to the stigma surrounding his condition and that many people do not feel comfortable talking about their mental health. Removing the stigma around mental health, especially with men, has become a personal goal of mine in the last couple of years.

I believe that if it was as socially acceptable to discuss your own or a relative's mental health as it would be for a physical ailment then the lives of my family and thousands of others would be improved for the better. Even more importantly lives could be saved instead of being lost to suicide.

Suicide is responsible for killing more young men in the UK than any other cause, disease or condition. This is galling when you consider that it should be entirely preventable.

These unfortunate facts have inspired my friend Dan Proverbs to launch Brothers In Arms the first charity focused on preventing male suicide in Scotland.

Brothers in Arms is about and on behalf of men. We will use men’s peers, their voices and interests to reach them.

We want to work with men so that they can feel respect and be comfortable with the message and mission we want to get across, that there is a cultural barrier preventing men from seeking help because they are expected to be in control at all times, and failure to be seen as such feels like a weakness and a loss of masculinity.

Thank you for your support!, the link is HERE