Announcing #3Day
Well that was fast.
May has come and gone. We saw the beginning of the new normal as we all transition from old Covid rules into new Covid rules. At H3H, we saw so many new UNIT3D podcasts with our dear friend, Dr. Nicholson, hosting some of our brightest LMHD’s, coaches, and students discussing a wide variety of topics.
With help from our amazing team - David, Chloé, Chrissy, Tamarah and Dave at DKC, and Russell and Jen at ESPN - we were able to launch our inaugural initiative “3Day”. We are so excited to announce this to honor Tyler’s legacy and help those suffering in silence. We are grateful for all the positive responses and partnership from so many Athletic Directors here in the SEC. Thank you all for joining with us to declare Mental Health Awareness Week for College Football, October 3-10 2020.
With this quick start, we are encouraging all the teams in all the conferences and all divisions to support their mental health initiatives by joining us by adding the ribbon sticker to their helmets that week, raising three fingers and the start of the first offensive play in the third quarter, and/or partnering with H3H to bring additional resources to campus for mental health awareness. We hope to eventually include everyone - we simply need to start somewhere, and our somewhere is College Football. Everyone is invited.
Our amazing 3Day video was created by Noah Whalen. Noah is a 17-year-old, awesome young man from Toronto Canada. He is a smart, knowledgeable, College Football fan and one of our biggest Gamecock fans. To say Noah is shockingly talented is only missing the bigger point - he loves College Football and the coaches and athletes that compete in a way that’s humbling to those of us that count ourselves as CFB fans. He really gets it. He wanted to help us get our message out, and he certainly did that. We can’t thank Noah enough for sharing his thoughts, ideas, and abilities getting 3Day to this point publicly. Please join me in thanking Noah for his ongoing contributions to H3H and CFB…Tyler would have simply said, “he’s a good kid Dad.” For those that know Tyler, that is the biggest compliment you can get.
And yes, it would have been Tyler’s 24th birthday May 26, 2020. Ivan was right. It just doesn’t get any easier, it just gets slightly different. We are doing all of this to help replace the light we all lost when Tyler left. It’s never enough; it does little to hold off the grief we wake up to every morning, and race we enter each night to try to sleep. I miss Tyler’s laugh, his voice, his hugs, and his presence around us all as much today as any other.
We keep pushing H3H to be the voice for all those suffering in silence. Thank you for helping us to do that. May was Mental Health month. Do what you can to make every day the best you can. June is here, and so are we…
This Moment in Time
We want to take a moment to say that during this fight against systemic racism, we stand by the Black community and believe in inclusion and equity for all. You are seen, and you are loved.
The trauma associated with intergenerational racism has vast mental health implications, and we continue our mission to make resources and community available to all of our beloved athletes.
If you're looking for immediate resources for you or a friend that is struggling during this time, the National Institute on Mental Health has compiled some first steps to take.
With love and hope,
Mark and Kym Hilinski
