Yeovil Rugby Club

After struggling with his own Mental Health demons, Tom Simms, Yeovil rugby club current Player started a new initiative to informally invite all men to meet up and take a walk for mental health.  With the pressures of lockdown enforcing the vast majority of peoples lifes to have completely changed and with a new third national lockdown here for the foreseeable future the struggle for some is very real and being able to talk to someone more important than ever. We took some time to talk to Tom about Migos Men and his own battle with mental health issues.

So tom tell us more about yourself

My name is Tom Sims, I am 28 years old and come from Yeovil.

How long have you been involved with YRC ?

I have been at Yeovil rugby club for about 10 years. I had a year off in my first few years to focus on training for the Everest base camp charity trek. The charity raise funds for bowel cancer, which  after my grandad was diagnosed became a topic close to my heart. I have also recently had a year away from rugby due to my own mental health declining. It wasn't until I opened up and told the guys at the rugby about my issues that anyone reslised how hard I had been fighting. When I returned to the club, they couldn't of been any more helpful, and they are a second family to me. It is not just my fellow players that form this bond but everyone involved as club members.

Tom, you yourself have struggle with Mental Health issues, would you tell us a little more about what its been like for you?

I struggled on and off with my own mental health struggles, it hit hard probably December 2019. I cannot tell you why, nothing changed in my life and I had alot of things going for me. But for some reason it slowly spiraled out of control. I stopped going to the gym, I stopped playing or attending rugby training. I stopped speaking to friends, family and my partner and locked myself away. I couldn't make jokes, hold a conversation or even smile. I couldn't see that I was struggling and wouldn't admit I was because nothing traumatic had brought it on, I had no reason to be struggling. It wasn't until about 6 months in to it that I realized I needed to go get professional help from a counsellor. Seeing an expert helped me to learn what was going on in my head, once I knew that I changed the counselling sessions and got a life coach to give me some direction and purpose again. Without the help of the counselling, the life coach and my amazing friends, family and of course Migo, my four legged best friend, I would still be struggling now. Migo gave me a reason to get up and get outside and I knew I had to look after him and he's become my best friend and the best thing I have ever done.

So why have you started Migos Men ?

The idea of migos men come to me during a dog walk, I was thinking to myself how much I loved being with my dog and how he pulled me out of my depression and I wanted to try give something back to anyone that had helped me. I knew from experience that being outside, talking and exercising was the key to my mental well-being. Initially it was just open to close friends of mine but it blew up on Facebook and ended up having 15 men from all backgrounds turn up to the first walk. The idea is just to get men outside for a no pressured dog walk and chat if they want to, they can either just listen to others, be outside or open up their selves. I made it clear from the beginning I have no professional qualifications and it's just a chat amongst men but can point in right directions of professional help if needed.

15 men turned out for Toms First Migos Men Walk 

Why do you find Mental Health so important to yourself and others?

It's important to me because I don't feel like men talk enough, although it is getting better and better and the stigma is slowly fading. It's always good to have a community to go to for help, so providing an informal, no pressure group like Migos Men I hope that together we can help others that are or have been in the same state of mind as I have been.

So when and where is the next Migos Men walk ?

You can find Migos men on Facebook. The group is open to all men within the local community. As yet, and unfortunately due to the current lock down the date of our next walk is to be confirmed because of social distancing and the restrictions on people to meet up but the aim to is have one once a month along side other things like water sports, boot camps and quiz nights.

Check out Migos Men on facebook for more details.

Tom and his best friend Migo