A Mental Health Resource for Youth Workers and Volunteers
1. Introduction This resource is an initiative of The One Foundation and its portfolio of youth and youth mental health organisations. It has been compiled by Craig Hodges Consulting (CHC) with input from staff and volunteers from BeLonGTo, Foróige, Headstrong and ReachOut.com.
It is intended to offer a “user friendly” entry point into what can sometimes be a complex system. The resource is designed to be used electronically, to sit on your computer desktop, so that you can link directly to listed resources and current information. It can also be used as a hard copy document by those with limited access to a computer.
This resource does not attempt to provide an exhaustive list of existing services and supports; however, there will no doubt be some gaps and overlap in services listed.
Who should use this resource? Traditionally mental health and in particular mental illness has largely been the responsibility of mental health professionals. However, we now know that roughly 1 in 5 young people will experience a mental health problem at some point (Kessler et al 2005). This means that more people, from the community, family, friends and those working with young people need to understand more about mental health and how young people can best be supported.
Finding help for someone who is experiencing distress from a mental health problem, or who may be in crisis as a result of a mental illness, can be a challenge.
It is difficult to know where to start, firstly in understanding what the mental health problem might be, or how to find the organisation that offers the support and services if you feel you can’t.
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