Harmless - El Camino Hike

First of all thank you for taking the time to look at my fundraising page. Its my 40th Birthday on September 29th. To celebrate this turn of a decade, I'm hiking 580 miles starting from Biarritz to Santiago de Compostela. I will continue past this famous city and hike the final 80 miles to the coast. Pilgrims have been walking these routes for thousands of years all for different reasons; to form a spiritual path, for spiritual growth and increasing in popularity for the challenge of the hike. After reflecting on the last decade and being aware of how far I've come with my own mental health struggles in life, I knew I wanted to do this hike not only to celebrate the transition into my forties, but more so for a higher reason and to utilise this amazing opportunity I have to raise awareness about mental health. The charity and the cause id like to support along 'the way' is a wonderful charity based in the East Midlands called Harmless. www.harmless.org.uk They do incredible work towards self harm and suicide prevention. I attended a workshop ran by Harmless and resonated so much with the content, especially as several of the young people I was coaching at the time were struggling with self harm and suicide ideation. The knowledge and experience share by the trainer was invaluable to the way I adapted my coaching style and gave me the confidence to work with these sensitive issues. Id love to see more charities, organisations, schools have access to this training and information and help breakdown the stigma and shame associated with suffering from mental health issues and the feeling of not being able to ask for help, or more so, not knowing where to get access to help. I hope by sharing my journey of not only the Camino but also snippets of my own personal journey that this will raise awareness and perhaps give others hope.