Club support to become Mental Health confident

We want to support sports clubs, groups and facilities to become confident and open about having a conversation about mental health.

One in four of us will experience a mental health problem in any given year, mental health issues can affect any one of us and it’s almost certain that there will be participants in your organisation with mental health problems.

We’re asking you to get your participants, coaches, volunteers, parents, fans and local community talking about mental health so that your organisation becomes somewhere which encourages kindness and concern for others, where someone can go and feel comfortable that they to be treated well and be asked about themselves. Somewhere where talking and listening about feeling low or life pressures is OK and there is no stigma attached to talking about your mental health.

Ideas for your club:

•  Identify a Mental Health Champion or small working group within your club/ organisation to start to develop a plan of actions your organisation is committed to working towards to provide a safe and supportive environment for anyone who may be experiencing mental health difficulties.
• Take a look at the Mind Mental Health and Phsycial Activity Toolkit for guidance, tools, templates and good practice case studies to help organisations provide an inclusive and welcoming environment for people experiencing mental health problems to be physically active.
• Attend the Mental Health Awareness for Sport and Physical Activity  online course from UK Coaching, Mind and 1st4sport.  This course will help you to gain the knowledge, skills and confidence to better understand and support people living with mental health problems, and create a positive environment that ensures they enjoy the benefits of being active and keep coming back for more. Note:  We often have free codes available for clubs to access this, just e mail us at hello@thinkactive.org  to see if we have any available.
• Take a look at the locally based  ‘It Takes Balls to Talk’ campaign which uses sporting themes to encourage people, particularly men, to talk about how they feel.
• Warwickshire Clubs can sign up for the Open Door Project, a partnership between Think Active and  South Warwickshire and Worcestershire Mind,  clubs which sign up tot he project will receive support to  create a supportive environment within your sports clubs for both existing and new members, click here for more information
• Encourage your Junior Members to visit Kooth, an online mental wellbeing community offering free, safe and anonymous support for children and young people.

Finding Help Now

For help, advice and specialist support with your mental health please visit the following:

• Coventry and Warwickshire Mind Website here
• Solihull Mind Website here