Skipton man encouraging people to talk about their mental health
Ben Ogden spent the day in Leeds station with a sign that said "My name is Ben and I get depressed sometimes"
A man from Skipton has been inundated with messages of support for sharing his personal experiences with his mental health at Leeds train station.
On World Mental Health Day, Ben Ogden stood with a sign reading 'My name is Ben and I get depressed sometimes' to remove the stigma about opening up and to encourage people to share their own stories. His friend Matt recorded all the interactions he had.
The two were "overwhelmed" with people sharing their experiences.
Ben, said:
"I haven't really opened up about my mental health to anyone but my family and my girlfriend but then when me and Matt thought about making a YouTube channel by pushing ourselves mentally and physically and we spoke about our own mental health and realised we weren't 100% and decided we needed to do something about it.
"We've been brought up in a society where emotion is quite taboo with men when it shouldn't be like that. We're told to put on a tough exterior but that's not right.
"I had loads of people coming up saying well done, keep it up that kind of thing. I had others saying they have felt like it too and they really opened up to me about their experiences with their own mental health.
"It took the whole day to build up the courage and it was half an hour before our train was due to leave that I just thought 'I need to do this' because it's not just for me it's for other people."