With Apricot’s staff and partner-led CSR programme, PlayItForward, priding itself on giving something back to the community by powering positive change for people, places and the planet, the award-winning initiative was thrilled to team up with Isle Stand Up To Suicide (ISU2S) last year.

Having always been staunch supporters of local charities on the Isle of Man, we felt that the organisation had the potential to make a real difference on the island and were only too happy to support it with a donation to train additional volunteers and raise further awareness of its mission.

Currently in its first year of operation, ISU2S is a new charity dedicated to suicide prevention on the Isle of Man. Originally conceived in Warrington, UK, following a discussion over the alarmingly high suicide rates on the island, what started as an initial chat swiftly grew into ISU2S’s commitment to offering a viable alternative to the services that already existed for IOM residents.

Needless to say, further coffees, conversations and commitments from other like-minded individuals – the majority of whom now form the charity’s Trustees and Committee – followed and ISU2S soon became a reality. After that bold initial step, the organisation quickly set about raising public awareness of its services by speaking at a wellness conference in November and holding talks with various organisations and groups including IOM government, third party charities, the Women’s Institute, church groups and sports clubs on the island.

Importantly, ISU2S also placed its business cards and posters in a range of locations throughout the community including GP surgeries, libraries, pubs, cafes and public noticeboards, so that all IOM residents knew how to contact them if they needed advice. Now available by freephone from 2pm to 10pm every day of the year, callers can confidentially talk to volunteer respondents to discuss any concerns they may have and can be offered brief intervention from a counsellor/therapist to support them through their difficult time or have been signposted to another support organisation.

Of course, in order to give volunteers the tools they need to provide telephone support, a big part of ISU2S’s work is providing suicide awareness training and further education on the subject. With the World Health Organization (WHO) estimating that approximately 1 million people die by suicide each year, there are still sadly many myths and misconceptions surrounding the issue which ISU2S aims to dispel by teaching its QPR (Question, Persuade, Refer) training programme.

An accredited scheme that is widely used in the USA and has resulted in a marked reduction in suicide rates within the communities where it has been deployed, QPR is designed to give people the confidence to talk about suicide and ask the difficult questions that need to be asked. By offering QPR training to the public, ISU2S hopes more members of the community will be able to recognise the warning signs and reach out to individuals who may otherwise have lost hope. In this way, they become their own gatekeepers and are always alert to those who might need help.

In ISU2S first year alone, the charity has trained over 70 individuals in QPR suicide prevention and has had over 20 volunteers manning its phoneline. Having received further investment from PlayItForward, ISU2S has also been able to offer places for the highly commended Applied Suicide Intervention Skill Training (ASIST), which will further support the organisation’s ambitions to invest in volunteers and counsellors by providing a gold standard of learning and development.

With one full course already booked for September 2024 and another to follow in spring next year, the goal of this training will be to further promote suicide prevention awareness in the community and ISU2S hopes it will also reach taxi drivers, bus drivers, pub managers, sporting clubs and other charities working with people who may experience thoughts of suicide. Ensuring that these conversations are taking place, and these connections are being made should help to end the stigma around suicide and help more volunteers offer HOPE (Hold On Pain Ends) to the Isle Of Man community.

Naturally, this message of HOPE is something that has underpinned everything ISU2S has been involved in over the past year, with the charity supporting its fundraisers in amazing challenges from swimming and running on the island to climbing the UK’s Three Peaks Challenge. There have also been coffee mornings, auctions, bingo, raffles, bucket collections and golf days, with every event raising awareness and empowering local communities to stand up to suicide once and for all.