Josh is a manager at Liverpool music venue District and now a Mental Health First Aid champion.
Josh Terry is a manager at Liverpool music venue District and now a Mental Health First Aid champion after completing our MHFA accredited course. Josh said: “The course has allowed me to identify mental health issues whilst at work and be able to deal with them appropriately. I’d recommend it, without a doubt.”
What made you want to attend the Mental Health First Aid course?
District, where I work, is a good venue and they believe in training the staff up for the work that they’re going to be doing. We’ve just done regular first aid, and while we were discussing other ways in which we could develop both the staff and the company an email came through asking who would be interested in the course.
I said I wanted to do it because there’s a lot of people in my family and extended friendship group who suffer from depression and mental health issues and I wanted to have a better understanding. I’ve come to know over the years how to sort of help them out from a family or friend perspective, but I wanted to know from a little bit more of a professional person what I can do in terms of, if a person is having trouble at the time, if I need to sort of deal with them on the spot. Or what if someone calls me and tells me, “Josh, it’s literally like I’m on a bridge I’m about to jump off.” I want to know that there’s something that I can at least attempt to do.
In the bar as well, you sort of want to see who’s around and about and understand what the difference is between someone who’s had a bit too much to drink or someone who may have mental health issues and be able to identify that and then deal with them properly ideally.
Is there anything you found particularly interesting about the course?
Yeah, I think that the fact that it goes straight to the crisis point. I think going to the crisis point and understanding how to pull back from there is the most important part because out of anything, that’s like the worst case scenario which makes anything before that seem manageable. Training on how to deal with the worst situation helps you already feel in control over the lesser or not so advanced problems.
How will you use your knowledge?
I work for the District but I also work for another company, NPK Technology. It’s a hydroponic store but what we tend to do is sit round and have conversations about all kinds of subjects. It doesn’t really matter what it is, we literally throw a conundrum in the middle and we all sort of talk and people ask questions. Brexit’s been one recently and there’s things that people are going through at the minute where I think a conversation about mental health in room full of lads-lads is really going to sort of help.
Would you recommend the course? If so, who would it be for?
Definitely. I’d recommend it to any company really but where would I start? I think the information should be out there in general. I think it should be out there in lots of different places. Any manager, anybody in a management position who cares about the people who work for them.