How to access support

As hard as it may be, remember that you are never on your own. Help is available. Your mental health is as important as your physical health: you will not be wasting anyone’s time.  

If you have seriously hurt yourself or are in immediate danger, call 999.  

If you need urgent help for your mental health but it is not an emergency, call 111 or get help online.

Often when finding support you will need to be referred to a service.  

A referral is when an adult contacts a service for you, that they think will be a good fit for your support. 

Often you will be referred by a professional, these could include your: 

• Doctor – often called a ‘GP’. 

• Social worker. 

• Teacher.  

• School counsellor. 

Once you get a referral, the process can be different depending on the service and the team. Usually the service will: 

• Review your referral and contact you to let you know they are looking at it. 

• Offer you a conversation about what is feeling difficult for you and talk about what support might be helpful. 

• Put you on a waiting list (if the support they offer is right for you).   

• Give you the help you need (the support will depend on what service you have been referred to). 

If the service isn’t right for you, they will often go back to chat with the professional who referred you at the start, to see if other types of support might be better for you. 

You can sometimes refer yourself to services too. 

Some services will have the option where you can refer yourself. This means you can speak to the service directly to ask for their support. You can search online for ‘children and young people’s mental health’ along with where you live to see if you can refer yourself.  

If you’ve found a service that accepts self-referrals, and it looks like support you could benefit from, you can get in touch with them.  

The process will look different depending on the service, but it could look like:  

• Referring yourself to the service - each service will have its own self-referral process, but it often will include completing and submitting a short form. This might ask you questions like; what mental health difficulties are you having, how does this affect your daily life, how long have you been feeling like this, has it gotten worse, what have you already tried, and what helps?

• Assessment with the service – after they have received your referral, the service may get in touch with you to ask for a few more details about the support you need and check if their service is right for you. This is often called an assessment.  

• Waiting list - if the service is right for you, they will recommend the support they can offer and put you on their waiting list. Waiting times will vary but the service should tell you what to expect when you speak to them.  

• Accessing support – once you reach the top of the waiting list you will be contacted to start with the service to access their services. 

If you are feeling a bit daunted by submitting self-referral, it’s worth speaking to a trusted adult, if you can, who may be able to help you. 

In school there may be mental health support that you might not be aware of. 

If you are at school, you could speak to your teacher or school nurse about the different mental health support available. If that sounds a bit scary, don’t worry, you can always ask another trusted adult working at your school, or any adult or family members that you trust to ask for you. 

Doctors are there to help you with your mental health just as much as they are your physical health. Your doctor will make sure you have a safe space to talk about anything you are struggling with. 

To make an appointment to talk with your doctor about your mental health, get in contact with your doctor's surgery.  

It's not always easy to talk about your mental health, and you may feel nervous before speaking to your doctor. The mental health charity ‘Mind’ have put together tips for talking to your doctor about your mental health including what you might want to ask, and what might happen afterwards. 

Talking to your friends and family about your mental health can be a really great way to get support. Lots of young people say that talking to trusted friends and family helps them to feel better.

Speaking to a trusted adult or friend can:

• Give you space to talk about your thoughts, feelings, mental health and things you might be struggling with.

• Help you feel listened to.

• Help you ask for help finding other support if you need it, like speaking with your doctor or school.

Speaking to the people in your life about your mental health can feel difficult. For more tips and advice on speaking to friends and family, you can visit Mind’s website here.

All of the information on this page was created with practising health professionals. This page was reviewed in April 2025. We will next review the page in 2028.