How talking can save your life
A mural of two figures standing at the edge of a lake casting out their fishing rods, welcomes me into the base of operations to the aptly named Bearded Fishermen, a mental health and suicide prevention charity based in Gainsborough.
Mick Leyland, co-founder, greets me and offers a seat. A warm smile hides behind a great bushy beard, once again making no question of over their name.
‘Me and Rick [fellow co-founder] use fishing as a therapy, we used to go out every week,’ he says, remarking that in the past year they’d only been six or seven times because of how busy the charity has made them. ‘We’d chat with each other and to a lot of guys around the lakes, put the world to rights and it helped us. And one day we found out that one of the guys we used to talk to, had taken his own life.’ He looks down into his lap. ‘It basically just knocked everyone on the lake. We sat there on the side of the bank and thought is there anything we can do to help?’
In the five years since, they've evolved from a coffee group on a Tuesday morning, to performing shopping and medicine runs for the NHS during Covid, to a small remote phone line and now to a community space in the town centre. Mick shows me around the sofas, tables and booths, their gaming centre decked out with PlayStation’s and Xbox’s for their youth group on Wednesdays and a play area for babies and young children when their parents need some privacy, before taking me into the back where I’m greeted by volunteers sat at 30 odd desks, ready to answer calls. I ask how busy they normally are to which Mick says: ‘If it's a good day, we don't get many calls, that's what a good day looks like for us. If no one's actually needing support, it means we’re doing our job right’.
The Bearded Fishermen offer a 24/7 phone help line, counselling services and peer-to-peer support provided by volunteers. ‘We let them talk and ask them to elaborate on things. Of course if they don't want to we don't push it. I've had people who've been sexually abused as children all the way through to people who are suicidal and it's all about what that person wants to push on.’ Mick explains how his personal experiences with his mental health originally inspired him to create the charity and help him and his clients on a daily basis.
‘All my problems are from childhood trauma, I was sexually abused when I was 6 or 7 years old and you'd be surprised how many people carry that round with them. I got to the point when I was about 18 when I thought my family was better off without me, that I'd be doing everyone a favour. You get so blinded and you just see that one vision.’ I was shocked at how casually he talks about this, but he assures me it’s purely because he's a practical person and has to remain calm and composed in front of his clients. ‘I was lucky because someone drove past, got out the car and walked me round the field. This experience is essential to me now because sometimes people question whether I can relate to them, but actually I can. They can see that I'm still here and I changed what I was doing and saw things a different way. That’s when people really start to listen.’
Every week, a team at Bearded Fishermen goes out on the streets of Gainsborough, Scunthorpe, Retford and across Humber Bridge on their streetwatch project, chatting and meeting people in town to offer their support. ‘One day, this lady comes running up to us, practically jumps on me and says, “thank you, if it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t be here anymore”. I didn't even recognise her at first.’ He goes to explain how he’d been called out to the woman years previously, had seen her a few times and helped her out, before she disappeared across the country. ‘I didn't even have much time to help her, but she said I got her into the position where she could help herself, give her faith in herself. She'd done so well, after just a year, completely clean and her whole life had changed just because someone sat down and pointed her in the right direction.’ I ask how great that must feel, to have had a direct impact on someone like that. He smiles and says: ‘When you get that, it's amazing, it shows how much just sitting and listening to somebody can make a difference,’ before adding pensively, ‘but unfortunately you don’t always get that’.
Written 7th January 2025