Recovery workshop: Inspiring Hope
Our session was aimed at offering encouragement, refreshment, reassurance and hope in their work to the twenty or so social care workers who joined us to reflect on recovery and what it might mean for their work supporting people experiencing severe distress and mental health problems.
For this we drew heavily on two user-led research projects with which Vicky had been involved: SPN’s work linking across various recovery-oriented initiatives; editing work for a forthcoming book on spirituality and mental health; and work by Thurstine Basset and colleagues to develop ‘Psychosis Revisited’ training
In what was an all-too-brief workshop (45 minutes only), Vicky gave a brief presentation running through eight key themes, with input from Raza. The themes were:
o Loss and crisis;
o The search for meaning;
o What helps / hanging on in there;
o Life as a journey;
o Turning points;
o Fragmentation and reconnection;
o Connection and acceptance; and
o Hope and recovery.
These began with one definition of recovery:
‘Recovery refers to the individual’s unique journey to a meaningful, satisfying and contributing life following the catastrophic life event of experiencing a serious mental health problem.’
From presentation by Dr A Quinn December 2004.
Loss
The role of loss was highlighted, both in triggering and accompanying the development of a serious mental health problem. This often includes a profound sense of loss of identity and low self-esteem, as well as some sense of not having a self, or a fragmented self, or a fragile sense of self. This loss of self is another part of people’s everyday experience of living with mental health problems.
The value to service users of having someone who is able to hang on in there alongside them when they are experiencing such loss of anchorage is enormous, and reported as such time and time again by mental health service users.
The search for meaning
The importance of finding, or rediscovering, some sense of meaning and purpose in life was acknowledged as being central to a journey towards recovery (see for example views from the recent Parental Mental Health and Child Welfare Network Study Day and the critical importance of having supportive worker(s) around who would create or allow space for understanding to be sought and nurtured was also underlined.
What helps
‘What helps’ included the largely counter-mainstream-cultural idea of just being alongside someone ‘with a warm and loving attitude but no specific agenda to fill or box to tick… (this) may allow for some tiny shift in that person, a space to open that may allow them to see some hope or possibility, to re-connect with a better time.’
Life as a journey
The Somerset Project, one of the user-led research projects referred to, heard from many people whose madness had come to make some kind of sense to them:
“The psychosis was to bring those memories back into consciousness and at last things made sense. It reminds me, chronic depression made sense... There were so many things that offered me a way forward... I’m happier, more content on my own and more alive than I can ever remember being...and of course having been through it gives you a kind of strength... you’ve been there.”
Hope
Thurstine Basset recently described hope – the belief that things can be different – as lying at the heart of the willingness and ability of people experiencing distress to take on the challenge of rebuilding their lives. The talk at Sleaford concluded with reiterating Thurstine’s assertion that hope counteracts depression and diminishes the risk of someone giving up. It is therefore essential for mental health workers to have hope as well as service users.
One way for workers to put more spring in their step is by creating hope-inspiring relationships. Repper and Perkins have drawn on service users’ own accounts to suggest some ways in which this can happen:
o valuing the person for who they are;
o believing in their worth
o seeing and having confidence in their skills, abilities and potential;
o listening to and heeding what they say;
o believing in the authenticity of their experiences;
o accepting and actively exploring their experiences;
o tolerating uncertainty about the future;
o seeing problems and setbacks as part of he recovery process and helping the person to learn from and build on them.
To be able to create and sustain these sorts of relationships, workers need support and regular supervision themselves. Adopting a recovery orientation will mean judging success by people’s engagement in appropriate services, by their access to community facilities and activities, and by their inclusion in work, education and leisure – and them gaining some sense, no matter how small, of hope in the future.
Participants then talked in small groups about how they thought they could encourage hope in their clients, and how they thought their own sense of hope could be encouraged by their workplace or organisation. The following key points on what was important were fed back:
o going back to basics – holistic approach
o celebrating achievements / our organisation
o making time to just ‘be’ with someone important – very quick throughput
o resisting organisational pressures
o idea of journey and scary step
o summoning up the courage to continue the journey
o we need support from colleagues / organisations for our own journeys and to give us a fresh perspective
o celebrating person’s progress with steps – may look small but be very important to them
o importance of appraisal, saying to someone about their positive steps.
Truly an inspiring day all round.
SPN is continuing to focus on recovery in its 2007/8 workplan, and welcomes input and suggestions from members. We are available for training sessions: however, we may now need to levy a small fee for such sessions. Please contact us for further information.
Report and Picture by Anna Miners, General Manager Social Inclusion and Professional Social Care Lead
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