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Guest speakers at the Ruralco Ladies Night, Tyler Langford and Anna Arrowsmith shared insights and information aimed at helping people to support others going through mental health challenges, recognising that it can be a difficult journey to help and support loved ones.

For Tyler the journey was personal as the wife of mental health advocate and Federated Farmers president, Wayne Langford, while local counsellor and Family Violence Co-ordinator, Anna Arrowsmith helped demystify the counselling process and offered practical tips to help the supporter.

The pair role-played a client-counsellor session and answered questions throughout their presentation. Tyler says it was great to see the level of participation and the conversations taking place during and after the presentation. The aim was for everyone to be able to take away something useful to add to their wellbeing toolkit.

Around 80 women attended the event at Ruralco’s Ashburton store with Ruralco Retail Manager, Tina Thompson saying the wellbeing event was a great way to collaborate with the Mid Canterbury Rural Support Trust to support our local women. “We’ve run a number of ladies only retail events over the years. It’s nice for our ladies to come off the farm, especially at this busy time of the year, and take some time out to relax and catch up with friends.”

She says collaborating with the Mid Canterbury Rural Support Trust has been fantastic and the event was really well received. “While we’ve had lots of Ladies Nights, this is the first time we have had a specific wellbeing theme. Local businesses also took that on board bringing goods and services especially selected to support the event. It was a great night.”

Ruralco CEO, Tony Aitken says connecting and supporting both the Mid Canterbury Rural Support Trust and the local farming community demonstrated Ruralco’s commitment to its local community.

“Our size and local focus gives us opportunities that many other companies don’t have – that is to be very connected and responsive to our farming community and we want to continue finding ways to strengthen those ties while also making farming life easier for our farmers.”

It’s a sentiment shared by Mid Canterbury Rural Support Trust. “It’s great to continue building our profile alongside Ruralco. Our values are well aligned, especially our commitment to ensuring our farmers, their families, and the wider rural community has the backing they need to thrive,” says Mid Canterbury Rural Support trustee, Rochelle Castle-Wilson.

Last night’s event was a wonderful opportunity for both organisations to support and help build resilience in our rural communities, she says. “In times of difficulty, unity and support are key to that resilience. Events like this are a great way to develop these skills and it is a good fit with the core work we carry out in our community.”

Rural Support Trust has built a strong relationship with Tyler Langford and Anna Arrowsmith, and the theme of supporting the support person was a perfect fit for the evening.

Following on from the success of last night’s event, both the Mid Canterbury Rural Support Trust and Ruralco are keen to be involved in more events like this in the future.