Mental health

Reports

Revealed: Bristol Uni plans to cut student wellbeing services are ‘reckless’, staff warn

Proposals are to reduce the number of staff in the student wellbeing service, despite concerns about impact on student mental health.

‘The most liberating feeling’: how an ADHD diagnosis changed one Bristol business owner’s life

A home for the ‘Hypochondriac, Mad and Distracted’: remembering the ‘madhouses’ of Fishponds

Listen: Bristol Unpacked with Neil Maggs

Listen: Bristol Unpacked with filmmaker Aodh Breathnach on surviving being stabbed – and documenting its impact on him

With knife crime a tragically common part of life in Bristol and other cities, Neil talks to Aodh about the psychological trauma of being the victim of an attack, and the process of recovery.

Voices

Healing is a justice issue: how can we radicalise the voluntary sector, amid a perfect storm of cuts?

Photography

The gloves are on: the boxing charity helping young people bounce back

When words fail: Meet the Bristol group nurturing male musicians’ mental health

The Seed Sessions project combines counselling and music mentoring to help young men express themselves. We heard from its founder, one of the participants and a counsellor working with the group about the power of music as a therapeutic tool.

How talking clubs are getting Bristol blokes to open up and be vulnerable

I joined Talk Club and learned I can’t regulate my emotions. Then I got schooled by a therapist on toxic masculinity and dangerous role models. But how are you doing, out of 10?

Lost opportunities: are inquests failing to prevent future deaths?

Jess Durdy’s death followed clear failings by those charged with caring for her, her mother believes, but a coroner didn’t see it that way. Bereaved families, campaigners and lawyers say an opaque, inconsistent system needs change.

‘I was finally diagnosed with ADHD at 25. Would I have got this sooner if I was a boy?’

After years of being misdiagnosed and incorrectly medicated, Dolores has finally got an ADHD diagnosis. But how different could her childhood have been if she’d been diagnosed sooner, like boys often are?

‘I needed therapy after I gave birth, but now I’m going it alone’

Steph experienced a mental health crisis while having her second child. Therapy saved her, but when it ended she felt loss.

Bristol mental health patients are still being sent miles from home. How are local services trying to eliminate the damaging practice?

The city’s mental health trust is failing to stop out of area placements, but it's an uphill battle amid high demand for treatment, limited funding and staffing shortages.