Cork volunteer: ‘I felt a bit lost, Aware was there for me...’

Once our chat concludes, 34-year-old Conor Murphy drives from his home in Blackpool to the city centre, to begin his evening shift as a volunteer with Aware.

At about 6.30pm, Conor will arrive at the Next Step Building on Sullivan’s Quay, where this evening’s group meeting is due to start at 7pm.

He makes sure he arrives half an hour early to ensure the venue is warm and welcoming, to arrange 14 chairs in a circle, check the readiness of the post-chat tea and coffee facilities, and be on hand to welcome the attendees as they begin to arrive.

Working full-time in the tech industry and studying part-time at MTU – Conor is in his first year of a psychotherapy and counselling degree – he has volunteered for several years as facilitator with Aware, a national group offering a range of services to people suffering from depression, bipolar and anxiety.

However, his long-time connection with the organisation, which this year celebrates a landmark 40th anniversary - is rooted in a difficult time he experienced in adolescence.

Glandular fever had dogged Conor all the way through his Leaving Certificate Year, resulting in an unexpectedly disappointing bunch of results.

“We only actually realised what it was towards the end of the Leaving Cert year, so the diagnosis was a bit belated and I didn’t recover in time to do a good exam,” he recalls.

The illness, combined with the social anxiety he had been experiencing, and the disappointing exam results, all created a perfect storm, he says.

“The Leaving Cert year and its aftermath were very difficult. I felt very much on my own. I saw my GP and then a therapist and I was prescribed antidepressants and some anti-anxiety medication,” he recalls,.

One day in 2010, after spotting an Aware poster in his GP's surgery, the 19-year-old attended a face-to-face Aware meeting at Cork’s Erinville Hospital.

“It was run by a facilitator,” recalls Conor. “I vividly remember how welcome I felt at this first meeting; and how the atmosphere was very warm and welcoming.

“The group sessions provide a safe place for people to talk about things with other people. It’s just about being able to talk about what you are going through in a non-judgemental space.

“At the time, I was feeling a bit lost. I hadn’t got the college course I wanted, and I was working part-time while I figured out what to do next.

“I found that the group sessions were a safe place to express things. Nobody’s really shocked by anything there!

“It was about having a place to talk about how you felt,” he recalls.

In 2018, Conor signed up for Aware’s training programme, and by mid-2019, at 26, had started volunteering as a facilitator.

“A lot of being a facilitator is about active listening, paraphrasing, and clarifying what people are saying,” he explains.

While the issues that come up are diverse; they can range, he adds, from money worries to problems with ageing parents, job stability, workplace relationships, and family issues - the emotions people express are often quite similar.

Isolation is a problem, Conor says, and personally, while he feels social media is having a significant impact on people, it doesn’t tend to arise as a specific topic in meetings.

Social media is an interesting issue, agrees Dr Susan Brannick, who is Aware’s Clinical Director.

“If you use social media in a passive, avoidant way it can be isolating - for example, doomscrolling.” she says.

“Social media can be used as a way of avoiding feelings of anxiety and sadness,” warns Dr Brannick, who is also concerned about the potential effect of Artificial Intelligence on how some people go about seeking information about mental health.

Traditional person-to-person connections are becoming less common, she feels, pointing out that Aware group sessions offer an excellent opportunity to connect with others and to talk - depression is a very isolating condition, which encourages people to avoid people and social situations, she warns.

For Aware members who experience improvement, Conor has some advice – stick with what’s working!

“When people know what is good for them, or have a routine that works for them in terms of self-care, for example exercise, talk therapy and Aware group sessions, they will start to feel better,” he explains.

However, once they are feeling better, people can prematurely assume that all is now well, drift away from the meetings, stop walking, and give up the talk therapy that had helped them.

Recovery, Conor warns, can be a long journey. “You need to stay with the helpful services and routines that make you feel better – even when you’re feeling better!

“It is also very inspiring for other people in the group to see the progress being made by someone who had previously been in a bad place themselves.

“Over the years, there have been amazing facilitators in Cork who put in great work and do it in their own time,” Conor says, adding that, crucially, facilitators themselves also receive strong support from the Aware team.

“It was other facilitators who inspired me to become a facilitator with Aware.

“It’s a fantastic organisation that does a huge amount of good work.”

Conor plans to continue his work as an Aware facilitator for the foreseeable future.

“I find the work very rewarding,” he says. “My job is in the tech industry, which requires a lot of work online, so the switch once a week to meet people face to face in close proximity and to have that human connection is refreshing.”

However, warns Dr Brannick, the State needs to step up. The government must double what it is allocating to the mental health sector if it is to come into line with the recommendations of the World Health Organisation (WHO), she says.

Dr Brannick points out that, while Aware offers a wide range of services, there is still a huge gap in terms of what the State itself is doing – at just 6% of the health budget, the money allocated to mental health is only half of what is recommended by the WHO.

More State investment is crucial for the provision of adequate services and acceptable waiting times, she insists.

For more information, please visit aware.ie.

For more information on Aware Mental Health Week or to access free support, therapy and education services, visit aware.ie/mental-health-week

SYMPTOMS OF DEPRESSION

At Aware, depression is described as having eight main symptoms. Use the acronym FESTIVAL

F eeling – sad, anxious, guilty

E nergy – low energy, feeling tired or fatigued

S leeping – under- or over-sleeping, any change to normal sleep pattern

T hinking – poor concentration, thoughts slowed down

I nterest – loss of interest in hobbies, family or social life

V alue – low self esteem

A ches – physical aches and pains with no physical basis

L ife – loss of interest in living, thinking about death, suicidal thoughts

If you experience five or more of these symptoms, lasting for a period of two weeks or more, Aware recommends speaking to your GP or mental health professional.

AWARE’S 40TH ANNIVERSARY

Aware is the national organisation providing a wide range of free support, therapy, education, and information services for people impacted by depression, bipolar and other mood related conditions.

From one support group in Dublin in 1985, Aware now offers free services nationwide, supporting approximately 40,000 people annually.

These include the Support Line and Support Mail services, Support and Self-Care Groups, and a range of evidence-based education programmes including a Resilience Programme, Family Support Programme, Living Well with Bipolar Programme, and a Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction Programme.

In the last 10 years, Aware has had more than 87,200 visits to its Support Groups.

Since 2010, the Aware Support Line has received more than 197,000 calls.

In 2025, Aware introduced a free Counselling service for people 18+ experiencing depression or anxiety.