Time to Talk Day - Thursday 5th February 2026

I’m supporting Time to Talk day to raise awareness of mental health and challenge stigma.

Twelve years ago, I lost my dad to suicide. At the time, I believed suicide was selfish. I couldn’t understand how someone could leave behind their family. As a 23-year-old nurse working on an acute medical ward, I thought I understood suffering. I had cared for patients with complex physical illness and believed I could recognise when someone was truly unwell.

What I didn’t understand then was that mental illness is often invisible, and that distress doesn’t always present with abnormal observations, blood results, or clear risk indicators.

My dad had asked for help but was unable to access appropriate mental health services. Later, through my own experience of complicated grief and recurrent panic attacks, I learned how easily psychological distress can be dismissed when there are no obvious physical signs and symptoms don’t fit a physical model of illness. 

I continued to work, parent, and function while struggling internally — something many healthcare professionals recognise in themselves and their patients.

Twelve years on, there are still gaps in access, continuity, and parity of esteem between physical and mental health. As clinicians, we have a responsibility to listen, to believe people when they tell us they are struggling, and to advocate for timely, compassionate mental health care.

Mental health is everyone’s business in healthcare — because what we can’t see can still be life-threatening.

Mental health will affect everyone at some point – which is why talking about it, and acting on it matters.