Che Allison & AJ Greet:

We decided that we'd like to challenge ourselves and do something for charity to support Mental Health. So many people struggle with mental health issues and unfortunately suicide is a very prominent killer, especially among men. We've both suffered with mental health struggles throughout various times in our lives and appreciate how difficult life can be in those periods. We are incredibly passionate about promoting positive mental health and supporting anyone that needs it.

We looked at various physical challenges that we could do for charity, such as the 100 push up challenge, where you do 100 push ups every day for a month. Ultimately, whilst we respect anyone who takes on that challenge, we decided that something like that wasn't challenging enough for us to warrant raising a significant amount from donations. From looking at that, the idea of creating our own challenge came about. We decided to create a challenge called "Mental Health Marathon".

Every day for the course of an entire month, we are going to put ourselves through strenuous exercise to raise money to support our chosen Mental Health charity "Mind". We are completing this challenge throughout May 2023.

Mental Health Marathon

20km Cycle

5km Row

1km Swim

100 push ups

100 sit ups

100 squats

Every day. For a whole month!

By the end of the month we would have travelled 806km (each) across cycling, rowing and swimming. That's the equivalent distance of travelling from London to Zurich, Switzerland. On top of travelling that distance, we will have completed 3100 Push ups, Sit ups and Squats!

We have set up dedicated social media accounts/pages for our charity challenge. We will be posting regular updates and videos on these pages about how we're getting on. If you'd like to support us and follow our journey throughout the month we would really appreciate it - Even if the main reason you're following is to enjoy watching us suffer!

You can follow us on the following platforms:

Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/MentalHealthMarathonMonth

Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/mentalhealth_marathon/

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@mentalhealth_marathon

YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@MentalHealth_Marathon

After completing the Mental Health Marathon challenge, we are finishing off our donation push for Mind by holding a charity football match that is open for anyone to attend. The event will be family friendly and have various competitions and activities to get involved with.

The charity football match will be held at Havant & Waterlooville's football stadium, Westleigh Park, on June 4th, with the match commencing around 6:30pm.

As mentioned previously, our chosen charity is "Mind".

Mind do a fantastic job supporting Mental Health matters in the UK so we believe they are a great charity for us to support.

Che Allison - Personal mental health story:

My personal reasons for creating and taking part in the Mental Health Marathon.

January 2023, my mental health was in the drain and I was really struggling. I was stressed out from a few different things and wasn’t feeling myself, I felt miserable everyday. Most days I was struggling to find the motivation to get out of bed and I wanted to sleep the days away. I had so many sleepless nights worrying and overthinking everything that I ended up having no energy through the day. I was binge eating and drinking a crate of beer most days to take my mind off things. I was well overweight at 17st8 and had completely lost all confidence in myself.

I’ve always been the sort of person that friends can come to and discuss their issues and feelings with, happy to be a shoulder to cry on or give advice. But I have always found myself struggling to open up to others and speak about how I’m feeling. I just bottled things up and dealt with it. It’s difficult to be in that situation, you feel like you’ll be a burden and don’t want to drop your problems on other peoples plates or feel like they’ll think less of you as a person, you don’t want to come across “weak”. So many people find themselves in similar situations, especially men, and this is why we find it so hard to open up and speak about things.

A month later I hit rock bottom, I wanted to “handle things” by myself like I always had. My mental health started to impact my work, friendships and family, they noticed that I hadn’t been myself for a while and didn’t have my normal chirpy positive spark.

This was a blessing in disguise.

My mum asked me what was wrong one day and I didn’t know what to say, I just started crying (I don’t get upset very often, I can count on one hand how many times I’ve cried in the past 10 years). She sat with me whilst I sorted myself out then I opened up and tried to explain about all the things that had been bothering me. I can’t explain how much of a relief this was for me, it was a weight off my shoulders.

A problem shared is a problem halved so they say.

One of the things we discussed was that I was stressed about how my mental health was impacting my work. After some encouragement I was convinced that it would be healthy for me to take some time off work for myself. I spoke with my manager and team at work about it and they were super supportive about the situation, they thought it was a good idea too. I took a week off of work and focused on spending that time doing activities that I enjoyed. This made a massive difference, enjoying myself and not having to think about work relieved so much stress!

Your physical and mental health are more important than anything else, they’re the foundation that everything else in your life is built on. It’s ok to take time out when you need to reset and recover, it’s important to understand when you’re body is telling you that’s what it needs!

After opening up about everything with my family and friends, I had a realisation, a light bulb moment. I realised that the biggest obstacle to my happiness and mental health was my mindset. The mindset that I’m a strong person and I can tackle the world and all of my problems with no help or support. The mindset that I would be a burden to anyone if I shared my problems with them and that they wouldn’t want to listen because everyone has their own demons they’re fighting. This is a mindset that is so incredibly difficult to drag yourself out of. It’s a mindset that you have when your mental health is down in the dumps and you’re constantly fighting a battle against your own mind everyday.

It’s one of the main stigmas of mental health that we need to change.

Everyone needs to know it’s ok to open up, it’s healthy to talk, it’s important to have support.

People are happy to be there for you if you let them and you shouldn’t be scared to do so. They’d rather listen to your problems than attend your funeral.

Fast forward 3 months, after focusing on my physical and mental health I’m down in weight over 1.5st and have never felt healthier.

I looked into things that could have a positive impact on my mental health. I started focusing on having a healthy diet. I started going to the gym and exercising regularly. I started spending time with my friends again. I focused on hobbies that I’m passionate about. I focused on personal development. I stopped drinking so much and realised that I can have just as much fun doing something I enjoy regardless of whether there’s alcohol involved or not.

These things have changed my life and I’m all the better for it.

I decided I wanted to do the Mental Health Marathon because I wanted to help people that have and are struggling with their mental health, just like I have in the past. I hate to think what situation I’d be in if I didn’t get the support I received.

If what we’re doing inspires and makes a difference to just one person then all the hard work and pain will be worth it💪

Thanks for all of the support, take care of yourselves everyone❤️

You can find our donation page on Just Giving at the following link -

https://www.justgiving.com/page/mental-health-marathon-month

Any donations and support will be greatly appreciated!

Thanks for taking the time to visit my JustGiving page.

Donating through JustGiving is simple, fast and totally secure. Your details are safe with JustGiving - they'll never sell them on or send unwanted emails. Once you donate, they'll send your money directly to the charity. So it's the most efficient way to donate - saving time and cutting costs for the charity.