Inside the walls of his bedroom and the prison of his mind, Andy Ryley couldn’t see a way out. “Everything became too much and I decided it’d be easier to take my own life,” he says. Thankfully his family and emergency services came to his rescue before it was too late. “I’m so lucky they got to me in time,” he says. “I’m devastated that my family had to go through that, but it was then that I was able to start turning my life around.”
At 26 Andy was one of millions of young people whose education, careers and dreams were put on hold when the UK entered its first lockdown at the start of the Covid-19 pandemic in March 2020. “I was a sociable guy working in the US as a sports coach but I lost my job because of the pandemic and had to move back to the Midlands and live with my dad and sister,” says Andy. “I also went through a break up and really struggled not being able to socialise, I was in a really dark place.”
