International mental health movement brought to Balbriggan

Chief Executive of Fingal County Council, AnnMarie Farrelly, Mayor of Fingal Seána Ó Rodaigh (centre), CEO Mental Health Ireland Martin Rogan, Mental Health Promotion Manager Mental Health Ireland Jo Donohue, Development Officer Mental Health Ireland Caroline Brogan at Thrive N’ Conversations at Balbriggan Library 

                                 Mayor of Fingal supports Mental Health Ireland’s Thrive initiative

The country’s longest standing mental health charity invited key community stakeholders to a Think Tank at Balbriggan Library last week to introduce the international mental health movement ‘Thrive’ to the town.

The Mayor of Fingal Seána Ó Rodaigh and Chief Executive of Fingal County Council, AnnMarie Farrelly joined the engagement event on Tuesday, 28th September in the Hamilton Hall of the Library to discuss how the movement can create a happy and healthy community for the people of Balbriggan.

Thrive will be led by local people and supported by the charity.

The project has been inspired by the success of similar campaigns in London and New York.

Thrive is an international movement that supports communities through engagement and activities that build and nurture our mental health and wellbeing.  It is a community-led movement to build an understanding and awareness of mental health and wellbeing within our homes, workplaces, schools and society.

The Think Tank was an opportunity for local groups to meet each other and contribute ideas and resources for the roll out of Thrive Balbriggan later this year.

CEO of Mental Health Ireland, Martin Rogan said, “Thrive recognises the natural strengths already within the community and creates a platform for working together to improve mental health and wellbeing for all the people of Balbriggan.” 

Mayor Seána Ó’ Rodaigh said, “I was delighted to be at the launch of the Thrive initiative with Mental Health Ireland and support from Fingal County Council. It’s a really exciting, positive mental health, community initiative and lots of people from all walks of live from the Balbriggan community came with their ideas on where they’d like to lead this to. Mental health is one of the reasons I decided to get involved in politics. The idea behind this project is that we can do something that will protect people’s mental health. This is the first step of an initiative that will really benefit the people of Balbriggan, and who knows where the ripple effect will go.”

For more information please click here www.mentalhealthireland.ie