Walking hundreds of kilometres and raising more than $10,000 was enough to earn Justin Chester the Northern Grampians Shire Council Local Hero award.
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The 40-year-old walked from Horsham to Naracoorte in October to raise awareness about mental health and funds for Beyond Blue.
The abattoir employee finished the walk in four days, raising just over $10,200.
Mr Chester decided to make the walk due to a personal connection to mental health, losing to two nephews to suicide.
“I started thinking about ways I could raise awareness in the community and what things I could do to reduce the suicide numbers. I like to walk and thought that it would be a good way to involve the community,” Mr Chester said back in October.
Mr Chester was emotional when collecting his award on Australia Day, delivering a speech that left its mark on those in attendance.
He said he never imagined his campaign taking off as much as it did.
“It’s not something you expect to get recognition for,” he said.
“It's not the reason I did it – the main reason was to raise awareness and any money I raised on top of that was a bonus.
“I think this has gone bigger and better and further than I could ever imagine.”
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Mr Chester said the money donated to Beyond Blue will help save lives.
“To be able to donate to Beyond Blue to strengthen their support tools for people that need help is great,” he said.
“An example is keeping open a 24 hour hotline in that time of need.
“People can be in that dark place for a short period of time, it might only be an hour or two, might be early hours of the morning, but to be able to ring someone that has the knowledge and tools to help them through that hard patch is so important.
“It does save lives.”
Mr Chester said he hopes mental health awareness rose through winning his award as well as his original campaign.
“At the end of the day I always said if I could save just one life by doing this I could make a difference,” he said.
“We have let people know it is ok to stand up and speak and that it is ok not to be ok.
“Together we can make a difference and help lower the stats because they are just far too high at the moment.”
If this story has brought up any issues for you, please contact Lifeline on 13 11 14.
