A Quiet Call for Strength: Honouring My Brother This Men’s Mental Health Month

A Quiet Call for Strength: Honouring My Brother This Men’s Mental Health Month

A Quiet Call for Strength: Honouring My Brother This Men’s Mental Health Month

June is Men’s Mental Health Month.

For many, it might pass by as just another awareness campaign — but for me, it’s personal. It’s heavy. It’s deeply rooted in love and loss.

In my first blog, I shared how Camrhisa Designs came to life from a place of heartbreak and healing. What I didn’t fully explore was the heart of that loss — my eldest brother.

He was a soldier. Brave, proud, and always the one you’d turn to in a crisis. But behind the uniform and the steady presence was someone fighting a battle no one could see. My brother took his own life, and not a day goes by that I don’t feel that absence like a cold shadow at my back.

It’s taken me time to find the words, and honestly, some days I still don’t have them. But I know one thing for sure: we need to talk more about men’s mental health.

The Strength No One Talks About

We live in a world where men are taught to "man up," to "stay strong," to keep it all in. Vulnerability is seen as weakness, especially in environments like the military where survival often depends on emotional armour.

But that silence can be deadly.

My brother struggled with depression, anxiety, and PTSD — not that he ever really said so. He carried it in quiet ways. You learn to notice the shifts when you love someone deeply. The things they stop doing. The way their smile doesn’t quite reach their eyes anymore.

And yet he still showed up. For us. For his comrades. For the world.

Until he couldn’t anymore.

Creating from Grief, Speaking Through Craft

Camrhisa Designs became my way of coping — a creative lifeline born from grief. It gave me space to process, to breathe, to build something beautiful out of something that broke me.

But more than that, it became a platform for purpose.

I want my business to carry a message that runs deeper than fragrance and design. I want it to whisper what so many men need to hear:

🕊 You are allowed to struggle.
🕊 You are not a burden.
🕊 There is no shame in asking for help.

This month, I’ll be sharing a photo of my brother each week on social media — because mental health has a face. It looks like him. It looks like your brother, your dad, your best mate. Sometimes it even looks like the person in the mirror.

This Is for Him — and for You

To those quietly carrying the weight: I see you. I’m walking this journey with you. And I’m speaking now, because I wish my brother had felt safe enough to speak then.

Let’s start asking, really asking, how the men in our lives are doing.

Let’s hold space. Let’s challenge stigma. Let’s do better.

Because I’ll never stop wishing he was still here — but I’ll keep speaking so that maybe, someone else will be.

With love and purpose,
Jamie
Founder of Camrhisa Designs
In memory of my brother — a soldier, a soul worth saving.

💬 If You or Someone You Love Needs Support:

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