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Last week at the National Ploughing Championships, there was a constant hum of noise at the Irish Farmers Journal stand as we chatted to readers.
Yet, the noise level dropped and people sat up and listened when George Graham spoke on stage about his struggles with mental health in recent years, as part of our Break the Cycle campaign.
Growing up on a small farm in Wexford, George was always involved in farming and is a third-generation sheep shearer; he has represented Ireland 11 times at The Golden Shears, the world shearing championships.
Around 12 years ago, after months of not eating properly, not being able to sleep and having a restless mind, George realised there was something wrong.
“What I remember is not being in good order for quite a long time,” he says. “But being a typical man, I wasn’t talking about it to anyone as I didn’t know what was wrong with me. That kept going on, not eating properly, then not sleeping properly.”
George developed a racing mind that he couldn’t control.
“That racing mind is a horrible, terrible thing, I couldn’t stop it. I would go to bed early at night and the only thing in my head, that I couldn’t stop happening, was the thought I want to end my own life,” he says.
Planning
No matter what he did, George couldn’t stop that thought from being there. He used to go on his phone at the dinner table and pretend someone was ringing him because he couldn’t bear sitting at the table as he had no appetite.
“I put in hours and days at the back of my own house sitting in my jeep, planning on how and where I was going to end my own life,” he says.
The darkest point for George came when he hit the point of nearly following through on his thoughts. “I was there and for whatever good reason, whoever was looking after me, that just didn’t happen,” he says.
However, it wasn’t like switching on a light and these thoughts and actions stopped. George travelled to the north of Norway to shear sheep – trying to run away from his problems. However, no matter how far he travelled, they followed him.
Eventually, he took what he describes as his first step in Norway while shearing for a farmer whose wife was a psychiatric nurse. George asked her to help him translate in English with a farmer down the road.
“She said she was only a phone call away if I ever needed her and that was a great comfort,” he says. “At the time I had two weeks of work left; I decided if I got out of Norway in one piece, I would look for help when I got home to Ireland.”
George went to see a family GP and got the help he needed. Although he was slow to tell his family and friends about what he was going through, he eventually did.
George has been asked many times where he got his glimmer of hope, or where it changed for him. Although it was a combination of many things, if he was to put his finger on one point, it was his GP.
“I remember he said to me, ‘I have known you for a long time, if anything happened, it would break my heart’,” says George.
“You can feel that somebody wants you, somebody appreciates you and somebody cares for you. That doesn’t mean that their own family and your friends are not but it’s in your mind.”
In George’s opinion, it is very difficult for anybody to understand mental health challenges if they haven’t been through it themselves.
“One way of describing it is like going through a long, dark, twisty, narrow, steep tunnel. It can be very steep in places and can get very narrow. It’s very difficult to get through that tunnel on your own.
“There are times you will get tired and you need someone’s shoulder to put your hand on. But if you can keep going, there is a light at the end, and that light will get brighter and brighter,” he says.
He encourages people to not try and fight it on their own.
“Don’t be afraid to talk to somebody. No matter who it is, there’s going to be somebody who will listen to you, whoever it may be, pick up that phone and talk to somebody.”
Awareness Head to Toe
George wanted to help other people so he started training in mental health supports and is now chairman of the voluntary group ‘Awareness Head to Toe’ which is aimed at promoting mental health, general health and farm safety awareness throughout the rural community.
The hardest step you will ever do, according to George, is that first step of speaking to a professional whether that be a psychologist, psychotherapist, doctor or counsellor.
George has gone through training on mental health and now helps others by giving talks across different community groups and offering help and support. Everything he does is confidential and he prefers meeting people face-to-face.
Awareness Head to Toe is a voluntary committee formed to promote mental health, general heath and farm safety awareness throughout the rural community.
It is a not-for-profit organisation and funds donated will only be used in hosting events, participating providing support to any person who needs to talk.
For more information, visit the organisation's website here.
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