Sarah Murray

About My Challenge

In memory of my brother-in-law Phil Verk and for my sister Karen and my nephew Parker I'm completing 2,000 push-ups in 23 days to raise awareness and funds for the Canadian Mental Health Association. Please support me by joining the team, donating, or sharing. 

The following was written by my sister Karen  

When a mental health crisis - a life-threatening health crisis hits your family, what do you do?

If someone is diagnosed with a life-threatening physical illness, an entire medical team mobilizes. Tests are run. Specialists are called. Treatment begins immediately. No one questions whether the suffering is real or urgent.

Yet we treat mental illness like a personal struggle instead of what it is: a medical crisis that can become fatal. When the body is sick, care is immediate, coordinated, and urgent. When the brain is sick, people are given phone numbers, waitlists, and very little hope.

In 2023, Phil did what we tell people to do - he reached out. He called help lines. He asked for support. He was fortunate: he could afford intensive therapy and had a psychiatrist. Even with those advantages, the system fell short. Because he wasn’t deemed in “immediate danger,” there was no public facility, no treatment program, no safety net. That gap is where people fall through.

It’s where families watch, terrified and powerless. It’s where loved ones become full-time caregivers without training or support. It’s where financial barriers decide who gets care and who doesn’t.

On July 6, 2025, Phil’s life was lost. I can’t say for certain that a better-funded, more responsive mental health system would have saved him. But I do know this: families should never be left to manage a life-threatening illness on their own simply because that illness lives in the brain. The current system fails people every day, and families are left to carry the consequences.