T2CM Walk

Thursday, 22 May 2014 05:51

Rachelle, Greg, Liane and Tyler Maskell (submitted photo)

Tyler Maskell was only 20 years old when he took his own life after suffering from mental illness.

WOODSTOCK -- Their goal is to change minds, one step at a time.

The family of Tyler Maskell are hosting the 2nd Annual Time 2 Change Minds fundraising and awareness walk Sunday afternoon.

Tyler, who was diagnosed with schizophrenia took his own life in January 2013 at the age of 20. His family says Tyler started to show signs of mental illness in his mid-teens, around 15 or 16 years-old but they battled with differentiating this from teen angst. Tyler would stay up all hours of the night, wouldn't get out of bed in the morning and was suffering in school.

His mother, Liane Maskell says mental illness is so prevalent today and many youth are suffering with the disease. She says it is time for mental illness to be treated like any other disease. "As a whole, I don't think we view mental illness as a physical illness, which it is. The same as diabetes, diabetes -- a hormone in the liver is gone awry, mental illnesses there's chemicals in the brain that have gone awry. It's basically the same thing." Liane says like all other physical diseases, it needs to be treated immediately. She points out that in a recent article, stats indicated that more youth are dying from suicide than any other illness.

Last year's walk brought out roughly 500 participants, raising $26,000. CMHA-Oxford (Canadian Mental Health Association) Executive Director, Mike McMahon says last year's funds were used in a number of areas including stimulating peer-to-peer mental health programs in high schools. "We have now been able to certify mental health first-aid trainers in Oxford County so that we can provide mental health first-aid training similar to first-aid training that everybody would remember but focused on mental health. We can deliver that to ourselves in the county, we'll have three or maybe four certified trainers and we need to grow from there."

Tyler's father, Greg Maskell says raising awareness is just as important as raising funds. "To try and breakdown some of the stigmatism and the walls that are put up around the illness and the people that are suffering with it. There's just so many people that are mentally ill and so many people that are surrounded by it that are trying to deal with it on a daily basis, a lot of times they just don't know where to turn. So to raise awareness and also to bring it more mainstream."

The Time 2 Change Minds (T2CM) walk honouring Tyler Charles Maskell will be held Sunday May 25th at College Avenue Secondary School (CASS) from 12:00 pm - 4:00 pm. Click here for a link to online donations.