The entire June 23, 2021 edition of The Weekly Advertiser is available online. READ IT HERE!

By SARAH MATTHEWS

A four-week physical and mental challenge embraced by sporting groups, businesses and schools across the region will culminate in a celebration on the banks of the Wimmera River.

ACE Radio Horsham will host ‘The Final Push’ on the front lawn outside its office in Stawell Road on Friday.

The event, from 10am to 3pm, will include live broadcasts on 3WM and MIXX FM, along with food and beverages for sale courtesy of Laneway – Café without Borders.

Wimmera Amusement Hire has donated the use of a jumping castle to keep children entertained and headspace Horsham staff will provide information about the organisation’s youth-oriented mental-health services.

Headspace Horsham has been the region’s major beneficiary of this year’s Push-Up Challenge, which started on June 1 and runs until Friday.

The challenge involves participants completing 3318 push-ups – to signify the 3318 lives lost to suicide in 2019 – in 25 days.

One in four young Australians will experience a mental-health issue, with 75 percent of these disorders developing by the age of 25.

ACE Radio Horsham announcer Adam Roche encouraged the community to attend The Final Push, perhaps complete a few push-ups and find out more about the challenge and the organisations it supported.

“It’s a rolling event, so people don’t have to come the whole time,” he said.

“People can drop in and buy morning tea or lunch, thanks to Laneway café, see a live radio broadcast and meet some of the people involved in the challenge, in a COVID-safe environment.”

Mr Roche said the nationwide Push-Up Challenge was designed to shine a light on Australia’s suicide problem.

“A few people at ACE Horsham have been touched by suicide, including myself,” he said.

“Personally, the more time I spend here in the region, talking to people, the more stories I hear.

“There is a lack of support groups and mental-health groups and the services we do have are absolutely stretched to the limit. This is not just in relation to mental health, but anyone who needs to see any type of specialist has to travel hours and hours to do so.”

Mr Roche said there was a need to combat a lack of services to keep people in the region.

“Headspace is a wonderful service in that it doesn’t see race, gender, sexuality – it just sees young people and says, here’s a safe space for you to be yourself,” he said. 

“We think it’s a fantastic organisation to get behind and through promoting the challenge, more people have become aware of the work they do.

“Having sporting clubs like Laharum and businesses like CHS Group jump on board to help spread the word has been fantastic.

“It’s also been a great opportunity to raise money to be used locally.”

Headspace client services officer Andrea Coxon said support for the challenge was ‘beyond what we’d hoped for’.

“At the start if we could see 100 to 150 register from our community and try to raise $5000 we would have been happy – but to see 357 pushing for better mental health and headspace Horsham with more than $19,000 raised so far, we are ecstatic,” she said.

“It’s fantastic to see people from all over the Wimmera and southern Mallee getting involved.

“We’ve received some really positive feedback, which can also be attributed to how well the Push-Up Challenge is run.”

Ms Coxon said bringing people together for such an important cause created open discussions and increased knowledge about how mental health could affect people.

“The Push-Up Challenge is helping us remove the stigma around mental health. By openly discussing our health and wellbeing, we can work towards providing confidence in those suffering to seek help, whether that’s with a friend, family, your GP or a mental-health specialist,” she said.

“Every conversation we continue to have about the importance of mental health creates a ripple that reaches people close to you; friends, family, colleagues and far beyond it just as the Push-Up Challenge has done these past four weeks.”

Ms Coxon encouraged people to drop into The Final Push. 

“Friday is a great chance to come along, not only to continue the conversations but meet people in the community and learn about the different services available,” she said. 

“We would also like to thank as many of you as possible in person – putting faces to emails, photos and videos is so much fun.”