The vision & background
It started by me thinking my actual garden could be a local healing garden, as I could see it was helping me, as was my separate shed space. But protective, sensible friends suggested this was *my* safe space & I heeded their advice & concerns that by opening it up I'd be depriving myself of a safe / sacred space for myself to "decompress".
I've worked in care settings of some description my entire working life since I was about 19 or 20. Over that time I gradually began to realise the difficulty some practitioners had in finding their own support. As that support needed separation from colleagues & services they worked for. Talking about & valuing Lived Experience is far more commonplace now but this has only really been the case for a few years. And still, the peer worker & peer worker roles usually very much wish to separate their own care, support & treatment from a work role in the industry. Also, in general health workers are so busy & we are not always the best at stopping to care for ourselves! There is now a recognised personality (sometimes called a Service Oriented Personality)& caring for others can be far easier than looking at our own needs. I wanted to offer an emotional wellbeing service for all who needed it, but also one that was gently pointing towards encouraging healthworkers to utilise it too. If someone needed an emergency psychiatric admission, a counselling session or just some general support & they worked in that field, the chances are they'd meet colleagues & clients & this brings up a lot of confidentiality & boundary & just personal privacy issues. So accessing services could be harder & involve so much checking & worrying - not what a person needs when all they want is to seek support. This is why you'll see the 20% discount for healthworkers & carers, as well as for those on means tested benefits. In my work history I've worked in a residential home for mental health clients in my Summer holidays in between studying for my Psychology degree which I graduated from in 1995. I got that job as my Dad alerted me to it as he was a care home manager (& went on to adopt a client & set up a registered care home in Cornwall with his wife & with one lovely, joyful client who was born with severe brain damage & could speak a total of approximately 7 words). My dad's specialist area was firstly teaching, then working with disadvantaged teenage boys & then a care home in the East End that cared for clients with severe learning difficulties).
When we work in these settings it really is so important to process distressing stories you may have heard & to have an array of hobbies, coping skills, supportive friends & essentially, support in the workplace.
The boundaries involved in working in care mean you give away very little about yourself at all on a daily basis. So your decompression time & understanding friends & colleagues #& work settings are crucial to maintain your own wellbeing. It is a balance we don't always get right.
Despite this, I always adored my jobs - residential settings, a medium secure forensic ward role, an East end of London acute unit role, a specialist Elderly day hospital role in Essex were my first tastes of support roles & I loved them all. I was an Occupational Therapy Assistant in most of those roles & collated hospital magazines, ran relaxation sessions, took people out & ran specialist workshops on stress management, drug awareness & ADL (Activities of Daily Living) groups such as cookery skills. The client groups were so inspiring & interesting & their personal stories & resilience always fascinated & amazed me. And I am just a "people person". Over my career I have helped set up three pilot services - and I believe all 3 are still operating to this day. The staff I have met along the way have been incredible too. It is true what they say - it's not a job it's a vocation, we don't do it to make a fortune, we do it because we love it & have an interst in it & hopefully pick up many appropriate skills along the way too.
I've completed a vast array of mandatory training as well as extraneous courses in my own time, because it lit me up, and kept me driven. I guess it's just how I'm wired. I've been so lucky to work with so many amazing people - staff & clients. I've worked with art & drama therapists, amazing psychiatric nurses, social workers, psychologists, occupational therapists, counsellors, therapists & Drs. I've had some fantastic managers & took every opportunity to further myself when funding was easier to come by in the earlier years of my career - a 1 year Rogerian counselling certificate, an Art Therapy Foundation course at Goldsmiths & a Solution Focused Brief therapy module to name but a few.
Many ex colleagues are still great friends 20 - 30 years on from when we met in various work settings. I feel lucky to know them & they inspire & support me along with other friendships & these ex colleagues & friends have cheer-leaded this new venture of mine. I feel if they hadn't shown me this encouragement I quite possibly wouldn't feel brave enough to put myself "out there". It also means in terms of advice & signposting (not my favourite word,but is used a lot these days) I know so many amazing practitioners who have their own unique specialities.
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