By Mikayla van Loon
Marcus Reeves knows what it’s like to battle mental health concerns, but is now using his pain and experience for the better.
As the founder of mental health fundraising event She Won’t Be Right Mate, hosted late last year for the second time at Yarra Glen Racecourse, Marcus and his team were able to raise $18,000 for the Eastern Health Families where a Parent has a Mental Illness (FaPMI) Program.
“We donated to Eastern Health the first year because that’s where I had to get help for the first time and then Anna (marketing manager) came to me and said there was a program to help families and kids,” he said.
“The more awareness kids can get around the issue and maybe what mum and dad are going through and to help mum and dad seemed like a really good charity organisation.”
Eastern Health Associate Program Director for Adult Community Mental Health Services Lisa Gill said the work of FaPMI has become critical in supporting children and parents through mental health.
“Victorian statistics show about a quarter of children in Victoria are living with a parent with mental illness, so it’s actually quite significant,” she said.
“Not all of them will come to a tertiary medical service like ours but there’s a lot of children out there with a parent with a mental illness.”
From peer support groups for children to martial arts therapy and family fun days, FaPMI does have a big focus on supporting the children but also working with parents to ensure they get the clinical help they need.
“[Eastern Health is] trying to really encourage clinicians and people who are working with parents to talk to them about how their parenting is going,” FaPMI coordinator Bronwyn said.
“Because in the past, what tends to happen is clinicians get focused on the individual and talk to them about their mental health but sometimes forget about their bigger context, like what’s happening at home, what’s happening with their kids.”
FaPMI lived experience worker Fiona said as a parent with a mental illness, getting support through a program of this kind was invaluable to both herself and her children.
“Parenting can be challenging anyway but having mental health challenges just adds a whole other layer of complexity,” she said.
“I talk to other mums and most of us experience some kind of mum guilt and I experienced intense levels of mum guilt, so the programs FaPMI run can be really useful for parents and for children of parents who have mental illness.”
Lisa said receiving such a large donation to the Eastern Health Foundation for FaPMI will be instrumental in providing more programs and offering more mental health support.
“It’s an amazing opportunity to have that sort of financial support. We have money to run some of the programs but we never have money of that quantity to run camps or even special things, she said.
“So it will be a fantastic resource to be able to really plan those sorts of things for the children.”
Grateful to have had the support of the nurses and doctors at the Maroondah Mental Health Inpatient Unit while recovering from drug and alcohol abuse, Marcus wanted to give back and hopefully help prevent young people and other men from going through a similar experience.
“I don’t think kids or men or women or parents should have to go through the things that unfortunately life throws at them and makes their lives a bit harder to keep on with and the effects of mental health and depression and alcohol abuse is a huge thing,” he said.
“Men but kids as well, they shouldn’t have to grow up thinking that’s what they can turn to and there are avenues they can go down and hopefully these funds can help FaPMI and the amazing things [they] do.”
Hosting the first She Won’t Be Right Mate event in 2019, the first car and bike show drew around 1500 people and over 100 cars, something that doubled in 2022.
“It’s based around a car and bike show because that’s what I’m into and that’s what a lot of men are into, it’s something we can bond over and talk about mental health,” Marcus said.
“As last year progressed we wanted to make it more family friendly and family orientated and have a lot more kids things to do. Hopefully this year we can make it more carnival-like.”
Marketing manager Anna Kennedy said from 2019 to 2022 the event definitely took a jump and grew in popularity, something they hope to capitalise on this year when the event returns in December.
“We were really overwhelmed with the community support who had seen the event advertised and came down and supported it, it was amazing,” she said.
“[Marcus] has put a lot into this event and it is huge and this year we just really want to get big sponsors onboard so we can make it even bigger and better.”
To find out more, go to www.shewontberightmate.net.au
