Today marks the start of Mental Health Awareness Week, led by Mental Health Foundation, one of our key partners in Scotland. The theme this year is taking action for mental health.

At Penumbra Mental Health, we pride ourselves in taking action every day for the people we support on their many different mental health journeys. As we continue to grow, people and communities remain at the heart of what we do from Ayrshire to the Western Isles to the North East to the Scottish Borders.

We strive to maintain high levels of quality service, and we’re delighted to share that Borders Supported Living Services recently received top marks from the Care Inspectorate for supporting people’s wellbeing.

Lived and living experience of mental health is crucial to the work we deliver, with the largest mental health peer workforce in the country, individuals’ firsthand knowledge and experience can support you or your family member on a personal level.

Here at Penumbra, people take action by seeking support every single day through our programmes and services. This first step can often be a difficult one, and it may take people a while to be able to reach out for help.

However, when they do, the results can often be life changing.

Georgia went from feeling lost to being an advocate for her own wellbeing and will share her transformative experiences with you later this week. She will talk about how the support she has received from South Angus Mental Health Peer Service, has not only helped her, but her family too.

Taking action is open to interpretation, for Henry from our Supported Accommodation Service in Glasgow, he takes creative action and will be sharing his poetry with you on Wednesday.

Our staff will be out and about this week across the country, like they are every other day of the year, supporting communities and delivering vital outreach. A good example of this work is our Justice Wellbeing Service, led by Alan Clark, who supports some of the most vulnerable men in society.

Our Self-Harm Network Scotland Team are also driving conversations with men too. They have been busy behind the scenes producing a new podcast series on the effects of self-harm on men. Look out for their online teasers this week before the series launches later in May.

Our work with third party organisations is continually evolving to better suit the needs of society. For example, we are one of the partners of the In Care Survivors Alliance. As part of the Alliance, we deliver the Redress Support Service, providing tailored trauma-informed support to people at all stages of their redress journey. You’ll be able to learn more this week about this important work through their latest podcast series, where Sara Zielinska, Redress Support Service Programme Manager, talks about the support they offer during the application process to the scheme.

We’ll round off the week by checking in with our Edinburgh Wellbeing Team who will be visiting Police Scotland to offer awareness raising sessions on self-harm and bipolar for their officers.

This year’s Mental Health Awareness Week falls right after the Scottish Parliament election. We hope that the new MSPS and the new Scottish Government will all take action to support good mental health. We will proactively be working with all parties to ensure that mental health remains a top priority over the next five years.