Surviving Suicide Course – Chester Mail Centre

On 27^th February Guiding Light Coaching delivered a Surviving Suicide course at Chester Mail Centre. This pilot course was developed as a way of providing further training and support to our cohort of Mental Health First Aiders.

Sixteen delegates attended the course. Delegates came from a range of functions and locations within Royal Mail, including Chester Mail Centre, Collections, and Delivery Offices. A number of delegates had lived experience of surviving suicide and were able to bring deeply personal experiences to the course.

The course was delivered using a mixture of CWU Wales and the Marches and TUC North West funds, with Royal Mail providing paid release for delegates.

The course focused on a number of different aspects of the topic including understanding grief, navigating complex emotions, and developing coping strategies and self-care.

Feedback from the course was strong. All delegates fed back that the event was beneficial and helped them to develop coping strategies to deal with mental health issues and loss while also supporting their colleagues. Multiple delegates highlighted how Royal Mail’s ‘Help@Hand’ service is highly useful when dealing with mental health problems.

We hope to build on the success of this course by continuing to develop the Wales and the Marches region as a centre of excellence for mental health in Royal Mail. We aim to develop the region by delivering further Surviving Suicide courses including to staff who work nights, as statistically night workers are more likely to develop physical and mental health issues. We also hope to deliver further sessions which focus on topics such as stress and depression as we know that these are problems that our members frequently face.