Recognise.
Care.
Act.

Ben

Advisor to the Board

Ben joins Manly Together as an advisor to the board, helping Troy bring the program to life. He has called Manly home for 21 years, is a dad of two kids at local schools, and cares deeply about this community and the people in it. His connection to mental health started on the rugby field. Like many sportspeople, Ben found the transition from rugby into everyday working life harder than expected, and that experience stayed with him. He went on to study psychology and spent ten years working with young people living with cancer, including several years at Canteen supporting young people and their families through palliative care. That work showed him up close how tightly physical and mental wellbeing are linked, and how much it matters that nobody goes through the hard stuff alone. Today Ben runs a technology business. It's a long way from palliative care, but it keeps him close to the pressures most people carry every day: work, relationships, being a dad and trying to hold it all together.

Ben's why

"Every day in Australia, around seven men take their own lives. Three in every four suicides here are men, and the rate for Australian men sits above the global average. The men most affected are in their 40s. They're dads, partners, mates and the blokes we work alongside. We don't talk about that nearly enough. We've come a long way in how we think about mental health, and there are some great initiatives out there, but I honestly believe the hardest part is still breaking down that first wall of vulnerability. Ask a man if he's okay and nine times out of ten he'll tell you he is. Part of that comes down to how we were raised. Our parents grew up in the shadow of the war and were taught to get on with it: keep your head down, deal with hard times and don't make a fuss. We were raised by that generation. There was real good in that, the resilience, the work ethic, the loyalty. But I'm aware enough now to see what it cost. A lot of us learned to carry things alone, and isolation creeps in quietly. You can be surrounded by people at work, at home and on the sideline, and still have no one you'd actually tell when things aren't right. That's why Manly Together matters to me. It gives young men, and all men, a place to say 'I'm not okay.' There's real power in that. I've seen it in my own life too. Every morning at 5:15, rain or shine, I meet my mates at South Steyne Surf Club. We call ourselves the Sunrise Slashers: ten blokes in Speedos who walk Manly Beach, have a yarn, then get in the ocean and finish with a coffee and a laugh. It sets me up for the day and it's a panacea for the noise we all hear every day. But honestly, it's the connection that invigorates me more than the August surf. Troy has been a mate for a while now. His story moved me, and his passion for this has stayed with me. It's a privilege to back him and to bring everything I've learned, through psychology, as a business owner and as a man, to help deliver this message to our community."