Imagine This: Actors Sarah Parish & James Murray On Their Charity Rebrand

With mental health among the young at crisis point, actors Sarah Parish and James Murray are on a mission to make sure seriously ill children are not forgotten. Margaret Hussey reports on their charity’s rebrand.

Sarah Parish & James Murray On Imagine This

‘In this day and age where the mental health of children is at the forefront of everything, especially since Covid, we have a real crisis on our hands,’ says actor Sarah Parish. ‘Seriously ill children are 80 percent more likely to suffer from mental health problems. We think that’s a hole that needs to be plugged.’

Husband and fellow actor James Murray agrees. ‘If you walk into any local hospital and go to the neonatal or the Paediatric Intensive Care Unit, you will see lots of sick children, lots of families suffering, a lot of them in silence, without any support.’

In 2014 the couple set up The Murray Parish Trust in memory of their daughter Ella-Jayne, who died from a congenital heart defect in 2009 aged eight months. The charity helped seriously ill children, predominantly in England and around Hampshire, where they live, as well as University Hospital Southampton, where Ella-Jayne was treated in the Paediatric Intensive Care Unit.

Jim and Sarah visiting a child in hospital

To date it has raised more than £5 million and now the pair are rebranding the charity to Imagine This, with the ambitious aim to help every seriously ill child with their mental health and emotional needs nationwide by 2035.

The charity has already worked with Great Ormond Street Hospital and Evelina London Children’s Hospital with a Positivity in Motion scheme of dance, music and yoga.

Other projects include Bags of Sunshine in the North West, packs for bereaved families to help them get through the tough first few weeks; counselling services for children across the UK; special training for children’s mental health nurses across the UK and sensory and distraction kits for children who are about to go in for an operation or who are struggling.

They also fund drama therapy sessions at Noah’s Ark Hospice in Barnet, London, and in Bristol have helped redecorate the bereavement room at St Michael’s Hospital.

Now they are looking to expand further with music therapy for the neonatal intensive care units in Wales plus they are looking at art therapy at a children’s hospice in Northern Ireland. While in Scotland they are planning to trial mental health support for siblings and grandparents, who often get overlooked when a child is ill.

W1A star Sarah says: ‘We’ve been The Murray Parish Trust for 11 years and have learnt an awful lot. We’ve got a lot more to give and felt ready to go nationwide.’

The actors, who were awarded MBEs by King Charles in the New Year’s Honours List for their charity work, value the importance of the arts and understand how it can help seriously ill children.

Sarah continues: ‘It’s proven that children who are creatively fulfilled, who get to do a little bit of movement, who get to use their imagination get better much quicker. And it helps get them out of hospital sooner.

‘We want people to imagine what the system could look like. Imagine how much better they would be if they had the support that they needed, imagine what a difference that could make. There is something childlike and hopeful about imagination.’

According to Imagine This, nearly one in five seriously ill children suffer from anxiety, while around one in seven live with depression, rates far higher than those in the general child population.

Behind these statistics are children missing school, withdrawing from their friends or struggling to cope with overwhelming diagnoses and medical trauma. The emotional toll extends to parents, who are often expected to cope alone. Mothers of seriously ill children are particularly vulnerable, with one in four experiencing anxiety or depression. While fathers too suffer in silence.

Sarah and James, who have another daughter Nell, 15, know this only too well as losing Ella-Jayne changed their lives completely.

‘It’s so important to try and try and dig out the light, however dim it is,’ says The Crown actor James. ‘Thankfully most people won’t have to ever understand what that feels like but for those of us who do, the unfortunate few that do, we want to remind them that there is a future and there is some positivity to be found. You’ve got to dig deep and start getting imaginative.

‘You are grieving a future that you thought and that you are no longer going to have,’ James says. ‘It’s about reframing that and trying to get a different perspective on life and we are trying to help with that.’

Jim & Sarah

Imagine This is funded by donations, sponsorship and corporate partnerships. In December the couple are hosting a Christmas concert at London’s St Marylebone Parish Church with fellow actors and friends including Hugh Bonneville, Dame Imelda Staunton, David Tennant, Olivia Coleman and Amanda Holden. The couple say they are hugely appreciative of all support, emotional, practical and financial.

So how do they manage to make it work juggling their careers with the charity’s demands?

‘I came back from filming last night and will go straight into charity work,’ says Sarah. ‘Jim then goes off filming and I will hold the fort. I think the rebrand is hard work, it’s tough to go national but our hearts are in it. We see the need and we want to be there.’

James agrees. ‘We’ve got a grand plan in terms of our ambition. It’s a lot of work but absolutely necessary.’

To donate or learn more, visit imaginethis.org.uk