Steve’s Story
SAMH has a long-standing commitment to helping prevent deaths by suicide, and it’s one of three priorities in our current strategy, We Won’t Wait.
Every day our staff team work to prevent suicide, including in our community-based teams, by delivering training, funding research, and providing support to those in distress.
Our Changing Room programme runs at football clubs the length and breadth of Scotland, bringing together men in their middle years, who we know are at higher risk of suicide, in an environment that feels welcoming and familiar, to have positive conversations about mental health.
Steve attended The Changing Room in Falkirk after his mental health deteriorated and he started to contemplate suicide.
“A friend let me know about The Changing Room and it’s a miracle really. If that hadn’t happened I really don’t know where I’d be now.
“The lads from The Changing Room have a WhatsApp group and we chat about everything, even laugh about it. Mental health is not a taboo subject anymore, we’re just chatting away. Five years ago that would have been so embarrassing for me, but the last two years have been the best time of my life.”
