Counselling charity seeks new fundraisers

As demand for counselling services continue to rise, a St Albans charity is calling for fundraisers to  expand the support they provide to young people.

Chief executive of Youth Talk David Barker explained that the pandemic has had a huge impact on the mental well-being of young people and said they are now facing a silent pandemic of mental health problems.

David said: "Everyone feels sad, angry, frustrated and scared sometimes. When these feelings are overwhelming or happening all the time, we encourage young people to talk about them. Talking about things confidentially can help young people to work out what is really worrying or upsetting them and explore what they could do to try to make things better.

"But we rely on the generosity of our local community to keep Youth Talk running and as demand increases we need to grow our service so that we can be there for the growing numbers of young people who need our help”.

Despite lockdown, Youth Talk has been offering over 80 sessions a week (up from 60 before the pandemic). Over the coming months the charity envisages, for the first time in its 23 year history, it will provide 100 sessions a week.

Since 1997, over 3500 young people have trusted Youth Talk to provide this free, confidential and expert support from a dedicated team of experienced professionals.

David  added: “It costs us over £50 to provide one young person with one vital counselling session - and this does not take into account all the other costs associated with running a charity like Youth Talk. On average each young person will have around 12 sessions with us but we will see people for up to a year if need be. It makes effective fundraising absolutely critical and we need more people across our community to get involved and support us."

If you want to donate, volunteer or need support yourself visit https://youthtalk.org.uk/