It’s probably worth starting this post is a long one with a trigger alert as some of the topics discussed cover suicide and depression. 

To say the Summer of 2025 has been unusual would be an understatement. I didn’t go into it thinking it would be as challenging as it has been. I got to my 56th birthday and something very strange happened. I woke up and thought what am I doing? why am I doing this? and I started to doubt everything I’ve learnt about myself over the last 56 years. My confidence and self-esteem had completely deserted me. My Mental Health has always been a little bit up-and-down, I tend to be the emotional one of the three brothers, I’m not as laid back and I enjoy doing things that are not necessarily straightforward. I don’t know where this comes from it’s certainly not from my dad, he is very straightforward and likes things to be simple. 

To try and set some context to this post it is worth hearing a bit of my history and where the charity came from. I’ve always enjoyed spending time with different cultures and interesting people so most of my life I’ve enjoyed travelling the world and over the last 25 years much of this has been international through my work. Brexit sadly put a stop to this as a career as we lost the mechanism to secure international contracts through the European Union Erasmus plus programme. My company had been involved in over 250 life changing projects with young people and to say this was life changing for all of us involved would be an understatement. This work gave me a real understanding of job satisfaction, making a difference and shaping young lives so that they could aspire to be something different. There is a book to be written about some of the young people we’ve worked with and what they have gone onto achieve because of these projects. But that is for another day.

I think I started to understand poor Mental Health in 2019 when many negative things collided – Brexit, a changing job situation, exhaustion and the loss of a friend Dale Caffrey to suicide. I remember going to Dale’s funeral and making a simple promise to Dale’s family and friend (Jay Lucas) that I would do something to prevent other families going through the heartache of suicide. Jay who is the other official founder of Mental Health Motorbike said I will do this with you Paul. October 2019 a seed was sown.

Shortly after the funeral I presented the idea of working with the motorbike community to Jay and he said I trust your judgement I will help you create this. And we started planning. We spent about three months researching what this should look like, talking to bikers we asked one simple question  “Do you think there is an appetite for a dedicated Mental Health Charity working with bikers?” And we asked many people this question and overwhelmingly the answer was yes, but make sure it is a group that isn’t just for male bikers but open to all.

On the 1st of March 2020 we launched Mental Health Motorbike. And we started to train bikers in Mental Health first aid. Andy Elwood who was one of the previous trustees (and another key person) took a lead on driving the Mental Health first aid training forward. We started to bring a number of trustees on board, Andy, Mark JJ Johnson, Ken Finlayson and the aim was to become a registered charity as soon as possible. This happened on the 4th November 2021. I was so proud of the team when we received our official Charity number. It had taken blood sweat and tears for us to get to this stage.  

We had never taken a conventional approach on how the charity was funded. Most charities would go down the grant funding route but this makes them a little bit more vulnerable as when this funding dries up, the charity starts to struggle. 

A few years previously I’d been working over in Amsterdam on a very inspirational international project (Digg-Out) it was founded by a good friend called Nanette De Jong-Becker. The project was working with street prostitutes and young homeless autistic people. Nanette became a very good friend but she’d always said if you set up a charity don’t rely on Grant funding, find the useful people who can give you pro bono support and utilise this as it will save you thousands and have real community impact. When we set the Charity we looked at this model and we started to talk to the industry, to bike groups, to road safety partnerships and when we needed something we asked for support rather than financial contributions. Nanette’s model of working was really introduced early on with our Charity and it’s meant that we’ve never run out of money and we really utilise the support and caring nature within the motorbike community. It also allows others not necessarily involved with the day-to-day operation of Mental Health Motorbike to have an input. We owe Nanette a great deal in giving us the confidence to look at this as a different type of approach. 

The problem with setting up a charity that comes from a very personal place means that you are completely invested. What it doesn’t take into account is just how much this investment will take out of you. Looking back over the last five years I cannot begin to imagine the hours I’ve put into this Charity and how much of my time it has taken me away from my family. I have a very supportive and loving family and they have been incredibly proud of what I’ve set up, but I’m sure at times they have really got fed up of her hearing the words ‘Mental Health Motorbike’. They are obviously much too nice to say this to me but I’m sure deep down they’ve probably felt it from time to time. As external observers looking in they have seen the impact the Charity has had on so many. They hear the stories, they read the social media posts and they see the growth of the Charity and for me it feels very very special to be able to share this with them and I know they are all very proud of me. 

But there is always a dark side to being so invested. It is something that gradually creeps up on you and this is what I experienced shortly after my 56th birthday when I woke up and started to question everything. This went very deep to my whole existence of why am I here. I didn’t feel as though I should be here and I couldn’t work out what was going on. I found myself in a world of pain wasn’t quite physical but it was making me feel really ill. I didn’t know what to do. So I just stopped doing the thing that had consumed me for five years and that was the Charity and caring for others. This hurt so much, in the blink of an eye I had just fallen out of love with something that I cared about greatly. I certainly felt very lost and angry and alone. Everything went very dark and I didn’t want to see anyone except my family. 

I knew things were bad because the one place I’ve been avoiding going was the doctors but I realised I needed to go and talk about what was happening to me. So I tried to get an appointment it took about six weeks of trying to fill out the online forms and getting nowhere. Eventually walked into my local village doctor was humiliated by the receptionist. Despite being in floods of tears asking for help I ended up walking out without that help – despite being distressed not a single person stepped up to offer me any help. This was me at my lowest walking down a local nature trail in floods of tears thinking what next? I don’t know what to do. At this stage I was desperate and wanted to hurt myself, or do something to stop the pain. All I could think about was my beautiful daughter and her fast approaching wedding, I knew I was safe from actually harming myself because I wouldn’t do anything to jeopardise her special day – again I dread to think where I would’ve been if I’d not got the love of my family. I can also see how things escalate very quickly in the moment.

As I walked went online and I found the complaints procedure for the medical health group of my doctors and wrote a very emotional letter of complaint and sent it to them. This triggered a quick reaction and suddenly the doctors couldn’t do enough for me. I think it was because they realised I was the founder of a national Mental Health Charity. This made me a little bit frustrated and angry and something I will pick up with them at a later date. However I got in front of a very caring doctor and it was probably the most difficult appointment I’ve ever had as i has just cried for 20 minutes, not making any sense. I really felt for the student doctor that was there observing this! Dr Taylor was very patient despite my initial resistance, he gave me medication to get this under control. He also arranged another appointment for the following week. At this stage I’d started taking the tablets and my emotions were a little bit more in check and we sat and talked about feelings at this second appointment, he listened and cared and this was so important. He obviously checked into the charity and talked about the amazing work we we’re doing. He said he needed to get me well so I could continue doing this incredible work. 

I’m sat here writing this post four weeks later I’m looking back I think without this professional medical intervention I don’t know where I would be. In fact I’m scared to think what would’ve happened without it. I think I am very typical of men of my age, stubborn, find it hard to talk about personal feelings, we have this belief it will just go away. So reaching out is probably one of the more difficult things men find. It doesn’t help when you’re treated badly by a receptionist. But reaching out can be life saving. We have to make this process easier and charity’s like ours are an important conduit for helping with this.

I know the road recovery is not going to be straightforward as the last few days I’ve had a complete relapse and I’m struggling again. But at least I have a plan and people are aware of what I’m dealing with. Please remember others aren’t mind readers and as a species we are very good at masking and hiding things – so sometimes telling people straight – I am not very well can really help with your recovery. It has been very hard to tell people just how bad things are. Strangely I don’t feel less of a man for doing this. 

I’m writing this blog post with I hope that other men (and women) might resonate with it and it might give them the confidence to reach out for help. I believe the initial step od asking for it is the hardest.

Moving forward I still think it’s too early to make a decision about where the Charity fits in my future. But it’s worth mentioning how many people have reached out from this Charity and given me proper meaningful support and words of encouragement. I cannot thank them enough and I want to say a special thank you too all my friends (you know who you are), my family. But most importantly to an incredible man Weeble who has been there for me daily. 

Please if you’re reading this and struggling find those people to talk to, no matter how hard it is it does get easier the more that you open up. 

The charity has been one of my life’s biggest and proudest achievements and navigating the professional medical minefield has made me realise just how important it is for so many. I truly hope I can rediscover the love that I’ve always had for this incredible charity and the people that run it but I know this will hopefully come back in time as I work on myself. Once again thank you for being there and caring

Paul Oxo x