She’s jumping at Hickstead today and not home until the morning so Marcos can do whatever the feck he wants
Andy’s Man Club – making 7pm on Monday the time for men who need to talk Phil Hay Everybody here has a story to tell and step one is telling it. Or step two is telling it because you cannot avoid the conclusion that step one is walking into the room. The irony of Andy’s Man Club is that nobody can quite bring themselves to go. When they do, their only regret is that they waited so long. “It took me five weeks,” says George Willshaw. “Five times I pulled up at the door and didn’t go in. I tried and tried, and then I did.” Hundreds like him know the feeling. Andy Wilson went to his first meeting with stereotypical doubts in his head. “If I can’t speak to friends and family about my problems, why am I going to talk to a load of strangers?” he asks rhetorically. Alex Pattison drove to Andy’s Man Club (AMC) thinking he would encounter “a load of loons” — and then drove home smiling for the first time in ages. Carl Etherington kept putting the day off until he heard a podcast about the charity and bit the bullet. From there, there was no looking back. George, Andy, Alex and Carl are facilitators at the Castleford branch of AMC, a charity set up to provide support and space for men with personal anxieties and mental health issues to talk. They are volunteers, all unpaid, and along with Ricky Fisher, the fifth group leader, they are hiding from the rain in the stands at The Jungle, the home of Castleford Tigers rugby league side and the home of their branch. Together, they represent a certain demographic: Leeds United supporters (not that tribal allegiances matter) and ordinary lads in their twenties and thirties, with stubble, tattoos, big hearts and open minds. They all sought help from AMC before they began volunteering for it. Some of them still require that help. They have arrived early to chat en masse to The Athletic, to explain what the organisation’s weekly meetings mean to them. The roof of The Jungle keeps the weather out. Their stories are unique but the same, of men in dark places finding shoulders to lean on and shoulders to cry on. George, a former prison officer, spiralled into heavy alcohol use and suffered from suicidal thoughts after a traumatic incident at work. Andy tried to take his own life, for reasons he still doesn’t understand. Alex was in the armed forces and developed PTSD after an incident in Afghanistan in 2007, one he prefers not to discuss in detail. Carl felt his mood change sharply after he and his partner suffered a miscarriage. Ricky is a survivor of sexual abuse. These are extreme pressures on ordinary people: a project manager, a maths teacher, a train maintenance engineer, a police officer and a gas engineer. None of them had met before AMC brought them together but they are good friends now and the connection they forged in Castleford is a part of their lives they never want to lose. “It’s Bank Holiday next week,” Ricky says, the one day AMC doesn’t operate, “so I’ll hate next week.” All of them have come to see the AMC routine as a blessing, a mental reset. AMC’s mission was never specifically to reach out to football supporters or sports fans, so much as reach out to men in general. But bit by bit, it has tapped into that part of society, one where people might think men are most resistant to opening up; a part of society where outreach is sorely needed. The facilitators at Castleford want groups to form everywhere, to be available, as Andy puts it, “to every bloke whether he can drive or whether he can’t”. They want the day and time that defines AMC to fill diaries across the country: Monday, 7pm. AMC was named after Andrew Roberts, a 23-year-old from Halifax who took his own life in 2016. His death was typical insofar as none of his friends or relatives saw it coming. They thought he was happy and they thought he was content, because Roberts had not said otherwise. That same year, Andy Wilson survived a suicide attempt of his own, in circumstances that were similar. “I was in a bad place,” Andy says. “I’d just bought my own home and looking in from the outside, everything was perfect. There was no rhyme or reason to it: great family, a good and supportive group of friends. Nobody knew. It’s something I’ll probably never understand. Mentally, I just felt like I had no other answer.” He regularly attended Leeds games and football was the last place where he was tempted to hint at his struggles. It was not an environment where anybody was likely to ask about them either. “Those were some of the worst times in my head,” he says. “I used football to escape from it but why did I get to the point where it was so bad and yet I couldn’t speak to anyone? That’s what I think about now.” Roberts’ brother-in-law was Luke Ambler, once a Leeds Rhinos and Halifax rugby league player. Ambler and Roberts’ mum, Elaine, decided to launch AMC as a male support network which, to their eyes, did not exist in the same form anywhere else. The idea was simple: hold meetings, invite men over the age of 18 to share their experiences and try to give support to some who might otherwise feel dangerously isolated. Halifax, in West Yorkshire, was the first club to form and the expansion of AMC since then has been organic. Andy went to Halifax initially before discussions took place about forming one in Leeds. Once the Leeds branch was established, he helped to form another group in his hometown of Castleford. There are 109 clubs in the UK now, an ever-expanding network. During the COVID-19 pandemic, when sessions went online temporarily, people abroad began dialling into the conversations. please log in to view this image From left to right – Alex Pattison, Andy Wilson, Carl Etherington, George Willshaw, Ricky Fisher. All facilitators (volunteers) at the Castleford AMC branch (Photo: Tom Maguire, Castleford Tigers) There is no protocol for new members, save for the rule that what is said in a meeting stays in a meeting. There is no obligation to speak or to do any more than sit and listen. “At first I didn’t want to go,” says Alex, who had struggled to bond with his son after his birth two years ago and felt rising unhappiness. “I didn’t want to do it and actually, going through the door is one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. “All I did for the first hour and a half was cry. Then, little by little, I started coming out with things. I’d had PTSD and when my son was born, I didn’t feel like there was a bond between us, no connection at all. I was dying inside. But afterwards, I got in the car and felt myself smiling on the way home. That was a big thing for me.” Carl’s reluctance to attend his first meeting came down to the fact that his problems seemed superficial, or not serious enough. “I wasn’t like some of the other guys here,” he says. “I wasn’t suicidal. But I’d noticed a change in my mood and my marriage was breaking down.” He went to the Castleford group earlier this summer after listening to a podcast on The Athletic discussing a charity walk that Leeds United fanzine, The Square Ball, had arranged. The walk’s mission was to raise money for AMC and The Samaritans. “I was in the mind frame that to use something like AMC, you need to be thinking those thoughts, thinking of taking your own life,” he says. “But then I came and found people from different walks of life, different people with different problems. It was brilliant. I use these Mondays as a reset. I get things off my chest and then go bouncing into Tuesdays. It was the start of getting back to feeling like my old self.” George is the youngest of the five facilitators, as he likes to remind them regularly; 22 as opposed to 33 or 38. His concern was that he would be stigmatised as being too young to have meaningful issues. “I thought I’d be judged like that,” he says. “It put me off for a while, until I got here and found it wasn’t like that. “I’d been badly affected by something traumatic at my work and it affected my mental state massively. It made me so aggressive, very different to how I used to be. Six months after I first came to AMC, my best friend took his own life. That sent me down a spiral that was so bad I can’t comprehend it — really heavy alcohol abuse, self-hatred, suicidal thoughts. There were times when I’d sit at the bus stop, thinking about getting on the bus to go to the train station and finish it. “Five times I pulled up at the door (of AMC) and didn’t go in. The sixth time I went in, said nothing and didn’t even give them my name. There was no judgement at all. Three or four weeks later, I burst into tears and everything exploded, everything came out. I can’t tell you how much I needed that to happen.” George repeats the statistic that among men under the age of 50, nothing is more likely to kill them than suicide. It’s a scary fact and one that is repeated so often without sinking in emphatically as it should. Many of AMC’s users receive additional professional medical treatment and many of them feel the benefit of it but where AMC differs is that it brings real life to the fore. “Not one of us opening the doors here is a professional,” Andy says. “We’re all men who walked in ourselves at some point and we’ve experienced things that other members have. It can take time for people to get to see professionals and I always say that this can support you while you’re waiting. It offers something different.” George is matter-of-fact about his involvement. “If you stop one man from taking his own life, it’s mission accomplished,” he says. “That’s how we see it.” Ricky attempted to take his life more than once and his background is tough to listen to. He was sexually abused as a boy and did not tell anyone about it until he was 23. He lacked support from his family and was taunted for “being gay” by one of them, even though he wasn’t. His ex-wife was the first person he confided in fully but they separated after 14 years together. “I lost her and then realised how much of a rock she was to me,” Ricky says. His deterioration led to him being admitted to the Becklin Centre, a mental health ward at St James’s University Hospital in Leeds. “I’d question my own sexuality, even though I knew what I wanted and what I liked,” Ricky says. “Part of me questioned it because of that thing in your head: why did I let myself get abused? Then over time, you realise you didn’t let it happen, but for so long it destroys you. please log in to view this image Juninho Bacuna of Huddersfield Town wearing a shirt raising awareness of Andy’s Man Club before the match against Leeds (Photo: George Wood/Getty Images) “I saw a specialist, who was amazing, three years ago. I can talk about this now whereas before if it was mentioned, I’d burst into tears and start panicking. But I prefer talking to people who’ve been through things. My brother thinks this is all bollocks. ‘There’s no such thing as anxiety, what the ****’s that?’ But I thrive off seeing men come through the door (of AMC) upset and then leaving with a smile on their face. I’d be lost without this. And I think I’ll always need it.” AMC sessions are confidential and private and this one is taking place in the upstairs room of a building behind Castleford Tigers’ main stand. It’s agreed with the group on this particular Monday that The Athletic will not write about any of the discussions but Ricky is happy for his initial role to be spoken about and the responsibility it puts on him means that it should be. The anxiety felt by new members is caused by numerous factors: nervousness about speaking, the trust involved in revealing personal matters and the uncertainty about what others around them have gone through. On any Monday when new faces come through the door, Ricky likes to start the meeting by speaking first. He introduces himself and says, quite openly, that he was a victim of sexual abuse. He explains how his relationship broke down, how he misses his kids and how the worst times make him feel. Revisiting all of his emotional strain so often strikes you as a huge undertaking. “I tell them what I’ve been through — exactly what I’ve been through,” he says. “If I say, ‘I like coming here so I get things off my chest’ then no one really knows what that means. People can sit there and think, ‘Yeah, but what’s happened to him?’ I feel like I should tell them who I am, that if I speak like that, they know how much we trust each other and what we’re talking about. Maybe they can relate to it more.” In the tradition of social gatherings, there is tea, coffee and biscuits. A large group session takes place before the gathering splits into smaller chats, where people answer questions about their week, their life, their work, their soul. The Castleford club use a black ball, a little smaller than a football, which passes from person to person as they talk. It’s a useful tool, something for the participants to squeeze, throw around or fiddle with, helping them to get the words out. It takes no time to see why men come here, engage, return, get hooked. “If it wasn’t for this place, I’d have never opened up to anyone,” Ricky says. “It’s a buzz and a brotherhood. I still get **** days, don’t get me wrong, but I’ve made friends here who come and save me when I’m not in good shape. In the end, the only thing that made sense to me was to be brave and walk through these doors. Turn up, which is the best thing I ever did.” Awareness of AMC has increased over the years, as shown by the growth in the number of Monday-night clubs. The charity has had support from professional sports quarters, such as Castleford Tigers allowing the Castleford club to meet at their ground. please log in to view this image Leeds United players during the pre-match warm-up wearing tops to remember Gary Speed, with support for Andy’s Man Club on the back (Photo: David Horton – CameraSport via Getty Images) In 2019, Huddersfield Town donated money to AMC and gave exposure to the charity in their matchday programme and on the big screen at the John Smith’s Stadium. The following year, before a game between Leeds United and Huddersfield at Elland Road, the players wore shirts branded with AMC’s hashtag during the warm-up. More exposure came ahead of a Premier League fixture between Leeds and Brighton at The Amex last season. Josh Warrington, Leeds’ boxing world champion, has helped to push the message too. “I was on holiday when that Leeds-Huddersfield game took place and I saw a picture of Pablo Hernandez in an AMC shirt,” Andy says. “It blew me away. I couldn’t believe that a player and a club so close to me were wearing that.” Again, club allegiance is irrelevant at AMC but football and sport are not. You do not have to follow football to attend a group but plenty of members do. Intentionally or not, there is a connection between the terraces and AMC and it seems to be strengthening. “When you wear the (AMC-branded) hoodies and tops at games, people will pull you to one side and ask you questions,” George says. “I’ll come to the Cas club and see a lad here who turns up at a Leeds game a couple of weeks later. He’s got a smile on his face, whereas the last time I saw him, he was bawling his eyes out in the circle. “The conversation about men’s mental health is moving in the right direction but it’s still not enough. The statistics about male suicide are frightening, absolutely frightening.” But in a positive sense, so is the appetite of AMC to beat them. Towards the end of May, more than 100 Leeds United supporters and fans of other clubs hiked 92 miles from Wales to Elland Road in memory of the late Gary Speed. The four-day expedition raised more than £60,000 for AMC, on top of £23,000 for The Samaritans, and the walkers wore AMC branded T-shirts as they crossed the finishing line, led by Navjit Degun, a solicitor who lost his brother to suicide. Jon Kay, a 40-year-old Leeds fan, signed up for the event as soon as it was advertised. He had been attending AMC’s Leeds club for more than two years and he echoes the thoughts of others by describing the torment he was feeling before he found the charity. “It gave me my life back,” he says. “I couldn’t see a way forward from the situation I was in. “I’ve made five really good friends from the club and we get together every Thursday, for a coffee and a natter to make sure everyone’s okay after the Monday session. I don’t talk to my family about some of what’s in my head. Something about talking to strangers makes it easier. I don’t know what exactly but they don’t know me so they won’t judge me. That’s probably it.” Kay’s life was badly affected when the shop he was working in, one with a small post office attached to it, was targeted for an armed robbery. He held a door shut to try and obstruct the perpetrators, who escaped with a sizeable amount of cash. “They came through the roof just as the postmaster was putting away the money from the money van,” Kay says. “Afterwards, I had people telling me I’d have been killed if I hadn’t managed to hold that door shut. I was waking up to bullets being posted through my letterbox. They knew who I was and it became a nightmare. I went off the radar for ages. I didn’t go out the house and nobody saw me for months on end.” In 2019, the stress led Kay to take an overdose. He had already been thinking about attending AMC and while he was recovering in hospital, it was suggested to him that he go to a meeting. “I was like a lot of people — I got to the door and wasn’t sure whether to go in,” he says. “But one of the lads there said, ‘Come in with me, get a brew and let’s have a cig outside before it starts.’ It was a big step and I needed to take it.” Kay explains that in early 2020, he was convicted of possessing an offensive weapon, a baseball bat, and sentenced to serve time in HMP Armley. He says the incident stemmed from him trying to protect a neighbour who was being threatened in the street. In jail, the connection to AMC was cut overnight. “That sunk me into a deep place,” he says, “but it was waiting for me when I came out and right away I had people who would listen. I’ve had some tough times but I feel completely different now to how I was at my worst.” The charity walk from Flintshire to Leeds was his way of “giving something back”. It was long, it was gruelling, there were a handful of drop-outs and at the end of the slog, there were injuries aplenty. “I saw the advert for it and I put my name down straight away,” Kay says. “I’d have been gutted if I’d missed it or hadn’t been on it. I find it quite hard to put into words what AMC’s done for me but I can feel it. I’m good.” Two days after the AMC branch meeting in Castleford, I covered Leeds United’s League Cup tie against Barnsley at Elland Road. Before kick-off, I looked at some of the men in the stands and thought about the fact that for those under the age of 50, there was no greater risk to their lives than mental health. Put bluntly, nothing was more likely to kill any of them than suicide. “I still think if you ask that question, most people will say some form of cancer,” George says. The Castleford facilitators talk repeatedly about “finding that one man”, the person who needs them most on any given Monday. AMC has done so much for them that they all say they expect to be involved with the charity for life. Ricky, for one, says he will need AMC indefinitely. “I don’t think I’ll be cured, if that’s the right word,” he says. “I hope for it but I don’t expect it.” Carl is in it for the long haul too. “I might not need this for life but I want to do it for life,” he says. “People have helped me. I want to help them.” The Office of National Statistics recorded that 3,925 men in England and Wales took their own lives in 2020, the equivalent of 10 a day. AMC estimates that some 1,800 men use its clubs each week and the ambition of the facilitators in Castleford is to see that number rise over 5,000, or 10,000 if possible, with meetings everywhere and anywhere. “My family always ask me if I’ve been to the club because they know it’s good for me,” Andy says. “What I’d like to see is us get to a point where every bloke, whether they drive or whether they don’t, can get to a club in person. All you need is a room and volunteers. “What we always say is that we’re looking for that one man, the one man we can stop from taking his own life. Some of us here have been that one man and there’s so much work to be done, not just on our doorstep. None of us are in this for any recognition. It’s about saving men’s lives.” It is also about changing the way we think by pushing the message that the man next to you in the street, at work or on the terraces is the same as the rest of us; as strong as us, as vulnerable as us, as big-hearted as us and as anxious as us. AMC’s mission, the same as it always was, is to give the cry for help an answer and an outlet, a safe place to go. Monday, 7pm. Find your nearest Andy’s Man Club
Leeds will donate all the food that was bought for Monday, to the Leeds Utd Trust. They are also going to pay the agency costs for the staff that were due to work at ER
So, reports today saying that one of the reasons for cancellation of football was the authorities didn’t trust all fans to be respectful around the queen’s death (don’t know if they mean observing two minutes silence or chanting) believing it would be embarrassing for the nation around the world. By no means the only reason but a definite factor in the decision. As usual, disregard and disrespectful to football fans.
I’m the kind of person who thinks of others whilst it hasn’t cost me anything I am aware that some will have to cancel flights hotels etc.
