The theme for this year’s World Mental Health Day is workplace wellbeing. Middlesex FA recognises the value of supporting people with mental health problems and also raising awareness and understanding around the area, so we’ve decided to get involved!

Internally, we’ve encouraged all our staff to take part in a Mental Health in Sport workshop that’s to be delivered at Middlesex FA HQ by Brent Mind next week. The aim of the workshop is to increase our understanding of mental health and how we can do more with football in the County to help other people and programmes.

Externally, we wanted to take this opportunity to raise some awareness of some of the fantastic work that is already happening across Middlesex to support people with mental health problems.

North West London Mental Health League

In partnership with the NHS and local clubs, Middlesex FA administer an open ability adult Mental Health League. The venue for the North West London League is at a central point in the County – Brunel University (Hillingdon). All fixtures take place between 1pm-3pm and if you are interested in getting involved please contact info@middlesexfa.com

Hounslow Hawks

Hounslow Hawks is a mental health football team created in collaboration with Brentford FC Community Trust and West London mental health trust. They have been recognised for running football therapy projects for a number of years and continue to develop new and exciting offers for people with mental health problems in football.

They are also having a ‘walk & talk’ 10k event, this week on the 14^th October, where they are encouraging people to get active and talk openly about mental health and raise awareness. You can find more information about the event and how to get involved on the Brentford FC website: http://www.brentfordfccst.com/news-archive/walk-and-talk-2017.aspx

Off the back of this successful work, again in partnership with Brentford FC Community Trust, West London Mental Health Trust are been working with the Middlesex FA to create a ‘Social Football’ Turn Up & Play session. This is working on an FA programme to get more people with disabilities and mental health problems involved in weekly football and the session is proving to be a great success since starting in early 2017.

Hendon FC

One recent project, launched in the summer of 2017, is being delivered at Hendon FC. This mental health and football project, funded by the Wembley National Stadium Trust, uses football as a way to improve people's mental health and wellbeing - something the project has done to great success so far. Delivered by mental health services in Brent and Hendon FC, both organisations are now working alongside Middlesex FA to ensure the sessions can be sustained for years to come.

Richard Hay, Support Worker for Brent Mental Health Services said:

'Some of the boys, since they have been coming here, having started working, going back to university and three or four have done their Level 1. It’s about engaging service users in ways in which they want to be engaged and giving something back in terms of what football can bring to them.'

'With work and support a lot of things can happen and a lot of things can change in our community for people with mental health problems.'

Session coach, Nico Poole Williams-Fraser, commented:

'This was a new opportunity for me to work with people that might face challenges in their everyday lives, but on a football pitch it’s really the beauty of the game that brings people together. Positivity, enjoyment, communication, teamwork and the social side as well - it’s massive (for them).'

Photos from the session can be found here.

If you want to get into mental health football projects or are looking for some advice, please do contact us and we can try to help with providing you with the information you need.

These are just some of the great examples of how football really is ‘ForAll’ and is helping people improve their lives.

For help and support around mental health you can also contact Mind  or visit their website - https://www.mind.org.uk/