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By Margaret R. McLean

Mental Health Awareness Week – OSB Group leads the way with colleague support

As a leading specialist lender in the UK, OSB Group understands the importance of nurturing a diverse, equal and inclusive environment for colleagues, customers and the communities around them.

One year on from the launch of OSB Group’s initial Mental Health support programme for colleagues, there are now 38 qualified Mental Health First Aiders spread across their locations.

This week marks the annual Mental Health Awareness Week running from 15th to 21st May 2023 with this year’s theme centred on the impact of the cost of living crisis on people’s mental health. The 38 strong team of volunteer Mental Health First Aiders are on hand to listen without judgement and signpost available support via both professional and charitable organisations.

 

 

Running alongside this hands on support, are a variety of courses that colleagues can sign up to and range from ‘Every Mind Matters’, ‘Stress Management Techniques’ and ‘Wellness Action Plans’.

As the increased cost of living continues, OSB Group recognises the financial impact this may have on colleagues and has allocated an additional cost of living payment to all staff beneath senior management level again in 2023. Internal webinars have also been developed to help colleagues with budgeting and highlight everyday hacks that could help reduce costs.

Jon Hall, Group Managing Director, Mortgages and Savings, OSB Group said “Mental Health Awareness Week is a great opportunity to highlight available support and encourage conversations to flow but it’s also important to ensure our colleagues feel supported all year round as they are the key to our success at OSB Group and their health and wellbeing is a central focus. Helping colleagues when they need it most is critical and I am extremely proud of the range of support OSB Group offers.

 

Our Mental Health First Aiders programme goes from strength

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By Margaret R. McLean

Smooth sailing! Prince William goes rowing with Royal Navy crew for Mental Health Awareness week

The Prince of Wales joined Royal Navy crew for a rowing trip as he marked the start of Mental Health Awareness week with a slick new video.

The six-minute clip – which was uploaded on the Prince and Princess of Wales’ YouTube account today – opens with the royal arriving at Dorney Lake in Windsor to meet members of the HMS Oardacious.

The campaign was founded in 2019 to provide mental health support to those working in submarines.

The father-of-three, 40, met with Lieutenant Commander Hugo Mitchell-Heggs and his team who are crossing the Atlantic in their new eco-friendly boat this December.

The group included marine engineer and submariner Izzy Rawlinson, who will lead the first all-women’s team to cross the Atlantic next year.

The Prince of Wales, 40, met with HMS Oardacious crew members. The campaign was founded in 2019 to provide mental health support to those working in submarines

The Prince of Wales, 40, met with HMS Oardacious crew members. The campaign was founded in 2019 to provide mental health support to those working in submarines

William was also introduced to marine engineer Jon Norfolk and Lieutenant Callum Fraser, who joined Hugo in rowing the Atlantic four years ago. 

After being introduced to the group, William happily boarded the new boat to row along the lake.

However, the bashful royal joked that he might not be able to keep up with the professionals and may accidentally ‘slap oars’ with one of them.

Although Hugo assured William that the boat should remain upright at all times, William laughed: ‘If we capsize, we’re going well!’ 

Before stepping foot in the boat, William asked the team what they eat on their longer journeys at sea.

Looking back on his Atlantic trip, Hugo said: ‘We took 50 odd days’ worth [of food] – which means we could really tuck into the Haribos and Percy Pigs.’

This then promoted William to joke that the team’s snack supply had probably been

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By Margaret R. McLean

Activities Planned to Help Protect America’s Mental Health

America’s mental health has reached a crisis, and with the beginning of Mental Health Awareness Month, efforts to raise the conscience of Americans are taking place nationwide.

The Georgetown University Center for Global Health Science and Security partnered with the Office of the D.C. Auditor to evaluate the data available to quantify the impacts of COVID-19 on mental health across the District of Columbia.

In the study released on April 23, researchers identified more than 50 datasets related to behavioral health care service needs, supply, and demand at the local, regional, and national levels. 

Experts also found a notable increase in mental health diagnoses during the COVID-19 pandemic in D.C. 

The researchers concluded that investments in behavioral health data systems could lay the foundation for early solid warning systems to identify crises and target responses across all levels of the behavioral system.

“Given the wide range of patient needs, care providers, and services offered, layered analysis and interventions are needed to understand ongoing and emergent needs related to behavioral health in the District,” the researchers determined.

“Accordingly, stakeholders involved in response need access to timely, publicly available data to inform these efforts.”

 Meanwhile, experts note that mental health challenges like eating disorders have also increased.

According to a recent JAMA report, “a common misconception is that eating disorders affect a specific type of person: the media’s portrayals are not always accurate.”

In the United States, the organization said eating disorders already affect 28.8 million people, and those aged 12 through 25 comprise 95% of cases. 

The National Eating Disorders Association (NEDA) reported that eating disorders are severe mental and physical illnesses affecting “all genders, ages, races, religions, ethnicities, sexual orientations, body shapes, and weights.”

These disorders have the second-highest mortality rate of all mental health disorders, surpassed only by opioid

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By Margaret R. McLean

10 Mental Health Awareness Month Activities

In the weeks after my daughter returned home from an inpatient mental health treatment early this year, she and I spent a lot of time by the stream that curls through my apartment complex. There, she began to rediscover some of the simple joys she once loved as a curious, carefree child. We turned over rocks in a stream to see the life in miniature living beneath, pulled up some wild onion grasses, and took samples of everything back home to look at under a microscope.

There was something essential in these mental health awareness activities, in the science, the learning, the wonder, and in the grounding of her and me together. There was something profoundly human about reveling in the everyday parts of nature that we come to overlook when our lives get too complicated and hurried. Here are other May mental health awareness month activities you can try with your kids, or alone, as needed throughout this month and beyond.

Walk in the Sunshine

With healing properties (killing bacteria, reducing high blood pressure) and vitamin D, sunshine gives us so much, often in as little as 10 minutes a day. But putting aside the quantifiable results of time spent beneath the sun for a moment, simply walking outside in nature as it is being woken up in the spring, as it grows strong again, and as it radiates in the sun’s glow can transfer all of those effects to us! One of the simplest but most beneficial of the many mental health awareness month activities you can do anytime…providing the clouds part overhead…is taking a walk in the sunshine.

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Journaling

People often find it difficult to articulate their feelings and emotions verbally. This is true of adults, but especially so in the case of kids who are struggling

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