Back in 2021 educational psychologists Dr Maddi Popoola and Dr Orlaith Green launched NottAlone: a website aggregating mental health resources across the city and county in the most compassionate, clear and accessible way possible. Initially just a resource for young people, the website has since expanded to encompass adults’ mental health needs and linked live events with schools across Nottinghamshire, seeing huge traffic the whole time. With even more on the horizon for NottAlone, we spoke to Maddi and Orlaith about its inception and their outlook on tackling mental health issues.
It was the COVID-19 lockdown when Dr Maddi Popoola and Dr Orlaith Green: two friends who met at the Uni of Nottingham and Educational Psychologists at the City Council and the County Council respectively, realised that new measures were needed to handle the changing landscape of young people’s mental health.
“The government had released a pot of funding and given it to local authorities for focusing on children’s mental health,” says Maddi. “We’d also done some research on how children were feeling during that period, and what they wanted to come back to and what their worries were about coming back. We decided to build something long lasting and meaningful, based on evidence we’d seen from MH:2K.”
“They’re a youth research organization,” adds Orlaith. “They’d looked at mental health services in Nottingham. Their big recommendation was that, if you’re a person who needs mental health help in Nottingham it’s really hard to find the information - loads of it’s not online, and it’s quite complicated and technical when you find it.”
With view to other research on mental health in COVID, which had revealed to them that the lack of peer and adult support in hard times was the greatest source of adversity for young people, their route was clear. In 2021 they created NottAlone: a website that aggregates pretty much all necessary information about mental health conditions, with resources, clear and compassionate advice plus links to free local support services.
We want to raise the profile of some of these more unusual situations, sharing that message that you’re not alone, even if it feels like you’re experiencing something that’s quite unusual and unique
Via their roles at City and County Council, the pair also enlisted groups of young people to have a say in the website’s creation - facilitating everything from the language used, to the branding and video content.
“One of the things we were really keen not to do, was use diagnostic language,” says Maddi. “We didn’t want people going through our process and self-diagnosing, so we made sure we kept the language about feelings - ‘I feel like this’.”
“I think that made it more accessible too,” adds Orlaith. “Take schizophrenia - some people hear voices, but don’t necessarily have that diagnosis. But there are things you can do to get help if you hear voices. You don’t have to get a diagnosis, you can go on the website and access the support services.”
As a partnership between the County Council, the City Council, NHS Nottingham and the Nottinghamshire Integrated Care Board, NottAlone saw fast growing traffic and popularity since its founding, leading to a grand relaunch in 2024 as a website not just for young people but for folks of all ages.
“When it started, I think it was more professionals who were using it - people from the NHS, Council or schools,” says Orlaith. “Then, as it developed, we heard more about parents using it, about kids using it for themselves or about adults accessing mental health services.
Rather than it being ‘more’, we saw a broader range of user profiles becoming embedded.”
Leading up to that relaunch, another element of NottAlone was starting to emerge: live events. For Maddi and Orlaith, ‘NottAlone live’ has added a whole other dimension to the project, well-and-truly bringing it to life.
“It was so exciting for us, because we developed it in COVID, to do in-person events,” says Orlaith. “We get all of the services who have a link on the website to come and set up a market stall at the event and tell young people about their services. There’s also workshops and performances from young people throughout the day.”
“The idea is that young people will come from different schools, talk to people from different services and then, as mental health ambassadors, go back to their schools and share that information with peers,” adds Maddi.
“And we’ve had local artists come too!” adds Orlaith. “This year we had Romy, a sixteen year old singer songwriter from Nottingham. She writes songs about mental health, and has worked with a local charity called Harmless. She’s doing as much work as qualified councillors to get messages out there. Because for some people, I suppose, talking therapy isn’t enough; you need to hear about others’ experiences.”
The community-led element of the website is one of the most fulfilling parts of running it for Orlaith and Maddi. Despite the fact that it’s a project facilitated by large organisations like the Councils and NHS Nottingham, it still has the duo at the heart of it, and they continue to involve local people in what they do, especially during the live events.
“Local people in Nottingham are really keen to help, and that’s what I love about it,” says Maddi. “They want to be involved because it's the children's mental health. Year on year people have wanted to come back because they feel like it’s a great cause to support.”
And what’s next for NottAlone? Well the main event this month, it turns out, is a podcast, set to be launched in time for Mental Health Week: 12 - 18 May. They hope that the new format will provide a space where they engage in the hard conversations about mental health: those that are sometimes skirted around because of what can be uncomfortable about them.
“There’s a lot of content out there about anxiety,” says Orlaith. “There’s not a lot about things like self-harm, schizophrenia or the young carer experience. We want to raise the profile of some of these more unusual situations, sharing that message that you’re not alone, even if it feels like you’re experiencing something that’s quite unusual and unique.”
There is certainly lots of discussion about mental health today, with resources in schools and workplaces much more available than they used to be. However, what stands out about Maddi and Orlaith’s mission is their foregrounding of community; their belief that shared emotions, words and experiences, and not just ‘professional help’, will heal people facing so many different kinds of problems.
“There was language about children’s mental health being on the decline before COVID but when you think about the narrative around mental health, it’s always about what’s around you, and COVID took away relationships,” says Maddi, adding, “when you’re going through anything the key thing is having other people in life.” Long may that outlook inform how we try to make each other feel better.
To keep up with news about NottAlone, or hear about their upcoming podcast and events, head to their website below.
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