By Matt La Faci | Community Fundraiser
With summer coming to an end, we'd just like to say a massive thak you to all our donors who have supported us this past year and share some updates about what has been going on at our charity in the past three months.
At the end of August, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge paid a very special visit to the YoungMinds Parents Helpline headquarters as part of their Heads Together campaign.
Their Royal Highnesses got to witness first-hand the hard work and dedication that goes into running the Parents Helpline. After friendly chats with staff and volunteers at YoungMinds, The Duke and Duchess received a helpline short course in becoming a volunteer. This taster session provided them with an in depth understanding of the caller’s experience upon contacting the helpline.
As the morning progressed, Their Royal Highnesses observed some of the calls the helpline received and experienced a typical debriefing session to round off the day. All the while, volunteers were able to talk with the Duke and Duchess about their experiences and motivation for joining the Parents Helpline.
Of the visit William said:
“I found it very eye-opening. I thought the service was fantastic, the idea that you’ve got these very caring, lovely people on the end of the phone who listen for as long as they need to, to build the picture of what is going on, and then provide extremely good advice - and then the fact that you’ve got the mental health professionals later down the line if necessary. I think that is a really good balance of getting the right support straight to these families who are clearly at their wits’ end at what to do, and reaching out. Thank goodness they do reach out to something like this.”
Everyone at YoungMinds are incredibly greatful for the Duke and Duchess for coming down to show their support for this vital service.
The Parent's Helpline received over 10,000 calls last year. We can't thank our donors enough, without your continued support we wouldn't be able to provide parents who are worried about their child's mental health with help.
Project reports on GlobalGiving are posted directly to globalgiving.org by Project Leaders as they are completed, generally every 3-4 months. To protect the integrity of these documents, GlobalGiving does not alter them; therefore you may find some language or formatting issues.
If you donate to this project or have donated to this project, you can receive an email when this project posts a report. You can also subscribe for reports without donating.
