Claire Curran

I am a family member bereaved by suicide and have also had family and friends who have attempted suicide.

I have been involved with suicide prevention and postvention for 20 years.

I am Head of services with Survivors of suicide, Advisory officer of the Families voices forum, I work with toward s zero suicide, trusts and PHA, I sit on a number of strategic groups helping to implement and raise awareness around suicide prevention.

I am also a carer and support members of my family.

I deliver other training around suicide prevention and self-care.

I am passionate about my family, my pets, Suicide prevention and postvention, creating change and being a voice for those who can’t speak for themselves, supporting and mentoring others to reach their potential.

I love the Connections training as it is NI based and the messages are easy to remember. Also, because it can be delivered online, we can deliver to more people across the country.

I also love Operations link life as I come from a family with lots of veterans from across police, army, navy and Raf and there is not enough support for the difficulties they encounter when they retire from duty.

My motivation is to support people to support themselves, to understand themselves and to know that help and support are available and how to reach them. I am passionate about creating change and ensuring better services for those who need them no matter where they live without long waiting lists.

Ideally, I would like to put myself out of a job as services like ours would not be needed.

I love the work and ethos of Fresh minds education, I love the training they have developed, the people who work there inspire me.

Come and join us in raising awareness and education around suicide prevention, learn new skills to help your loved ones and self-care for yourself and make some lifelong friends who will help and support you on your Connections link life journey.

For my self care spending time with my family and friends always energises me, cooking and baking is a great stress reliever, I love to read books and spend time with my dog and cat as they help reduce stress, I also have regular complimentary therapy, reflective practice and supervision and my all-time favourite thing is motorbike racing, it’s my escape and driving in my car with music playing with no destination just because I can.

I am hopeful that when we work together, we can reduce the numbers of people affected by suicide, that we can provide world class services that fit the need of those that need them without waiting lists or postcode lotteries and that there is no longer stigma around suicide.

I am grateful for the love support guidance and knowledge I received from my nanny and granda and my uncles, for the opportunities I have been given to further my learning and experience, for the amazing people I have worked with and what they have taught me and my friends who keep me grounded and real.