Last week was Mental Health Awareness Week and this year’s theme is Loneliness; “Loneliness is affecting more and more of us in the UK and has had a huge impact on our physical and mental health during the pandemic.” – Mental Health Foundation
Many of the families we support are dealing with feelings of isolation and loneliness. Some don’t feel connected to their local community and others are far away from family or don’t have a strong support network.
One of our aims, is to help children and families feel more involved in school and community activities. This can help them feel apart of something, and go some way to tackling loneliness and isolation. We are pleased to see Loneliness as this year’s theme, especially after the hardships of the pandemic.
Read more to find out about what our projects have been doing during Mental Health Awareness Week:
FABI Project:
Therapeutic creative activities have been carried out with children and parents, around the framework of the Shanarri Wellbeing Indicators and this piece of work was drawn by two young boys supported by Circle’s FABI team. Following Covid and their dad’s bereavement, the boys were speaking about how they support themselves to stay healthy.
When discussing their emotions, they didn’t see any difference in ways to support physical and mental health, it was all one. “?’?? ??????? ???? ??? ???? ???? ??? ???? ?? ???? ???? ??, ??? ??? ?? ???? ????? ???, ?? ??? ??? ???? ??????? ???????. ??’? ????????? ???, ???? ??? ???? ???? ?? ?? ???????? ?? ??????’? ????? ?????????? ??? ??????? ?? ?? ?????????? ??? ???????!”- Family Support Worker

A description of his drawings include:

  • being with others and having support has helped
  • going to outdoor places like the heritage park (with the zipline, roundabout and ‘swingy circle thing’)
  • walking and being with friends had helped.
  • gaming helps him ‘zone out’ and he would maybe want to use computer designs to make a film
  • reading and having good sleep
This ties in well with Mental Health Awareness Week and shows how the activities we deliver can minimise the impact of loneliness, and the effect of overall mental health and wellbeing.
Find out more about how we use play based activities to help our children talk about difficult things they have experienced, such as loss and bereavement: https://circle.scot/circle-project-updates/
Parents Forum:
Our FABI Team also held a Parents Forum on Wednesday, facilitated by Aileen, Jan and Elaine. The Parent’s Forum is part of our ongoing work with the Women’s Outreach Team funded by The National Lottery Community Fund. The Parent’s Forum provides an opportunity for women to be involved in sharing with us their thoughts/views on service and supports and how this group could influence, shape and design our services.

The Parents Forum which took place on Wednesday was centred around the Shanarri indicator, Healthy, with a focus on experiences of loneliness as part of Mental Health Awareness Week. The Parents shared their own personal experiences, and how this impacted their mental health.

 

Healthy Indicator:

 

             Our Experiences of Loneliness                                     Steps to reducing  Loneliness                                  How Circle Can Help

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Groups such as the Parents Forum help reduce social isolation amongst our families, and provides coping mechanisms to help them build on our mental wellbeing and resilience. The group finished with a meditation from Jan, to support parents going forward.

Bob Bell- A Family Outreach Worker and singer
In support of Mental Health Awareness Week, one of our Family Support Workers in the East Lothian Team , Bob Bell, has written and produced a song around the theme of loneliness.
His song was inspired by the quote, “?? ???? ??? ???? ??? ??? ?????, ?? ?? ?????? ?????? ????? ?? ???? ?? ?? ????”, and encourages us to help others by talking less and listening more. We are so grateful to have such caring (and talented!) staff here at Circle. Thanks Bob for sharing!
You can listen to the song ‘Sit down next to me’ and Bob’s message here; https://youtu.be/Du7f70ADSkA

 

 

Family Holiday Charity:

 

Circle provides mental health support to our families in a number of ways. Alongside the direct mental health support we provide, our services aim to increase overall wellbeing amongst families, to help them deal with the effects of social exclusion, due to social injustice, health inequalities and poverty.
We have been working alongside Family Holiday Charity, who have awarded holidays to 13 of our families so far, which also includes a contribution to food and transport. Activities like this help us to address mental health, and have a positive impact, by giving families something to look forward to and the opportunity to have different experiences.
“Looking forward to taking my son on holiday, we have not been on one together. I’m excited to make new memories with him and let him experience new things. It will be my son’s first time on a train which I think he will love. Everything was easy in booking; the booking team were supportive and made me feel comfortable. “- Parent
Support Circle’s Work:

Without your support our projects could not deliver the innovative, and vital, work that you have just read about. Making a lasting difference to the lives of children, and families, affected by poverty and struggling with social inequality takes time, patience and high quality staff.

Please consider making a donation that will change a life here.

Or you could take on a Summer challenge to support our work, why not take a look at our DARED virtual challenge here.