They said it couldn’t be done: Sam Jenkin reports further on our last 5 Quid for Life meeting
Unfortunately the date originally proposed for our next meeting and a meetup with you, our friends and supporters, hasn’t proved viable. We are now looking at Saturday Feb 11th, venue yet to be finalised. Please watch this space for updates and your inbox for an invitation…
THEY SAID IT COULDN’T BE DONE — so we did it. Held a meeting that is. Using new Google+ meeting room technology. Except we didn’t because actually I, Sam, needed a web cam and a mic and not all of us could get on: we eventually resorted to Johnathon diligently setting up a private facebook chat thingie (okay, I am rather technologically impaired, so bite me).
But after a shaky start, with Phil and Jonathon bellowing, “Hello, hello, can you hear me?” at each other and the rest of us, Paula and I, texting in to say yes, but you can’t hear us, general chaos as Kate got online and couldn’t find us (being somewhere else from where we had agreed did not help), it worked fine and we started on a lengthy and challenging agenda.
At times it felt like we were all in the same room, debating, discussing, referring, deferring, disagreeing, agreeing and joyfully being part of something rather awesome we had all stepped up to do 10 months earlier. At other times, we felt the separateness of each other keenly — mainly when it came time for coffee and meal breaks, because what we really wanted to do was be sitting round Paula’s dining table again, eating her wonderful meals and doing what we seem to do best: laugh, cry, support and create.
But despite the distance and the electronic communication, we still shared and loved and talked; oh, how we talked. We talked about all the things mentioned in Phil’s blog post but we also agreed our Constitution, an important step on the way to becoming a fully fledged charity. Talk of meeting up in person in January developed into plans to hold a MadUp #2, combining meeting and meet-up to celebrate our first birthday. [See above for an update - Ed.]
We also finalised the criteria, the process and the forms for application, so that we are now in a position to help people, something that is going to become more and more critical as people’s benefits are denied them.
Fore wot I am about to reck, may the Lord mayke me trooly fankful...
The cats (mine) interfered several times, demanding food, clean litter and cuddles with menaces and some of us (okay, mostly me) had to reboot ageing computer equipment.
We broke several times to put on kettles round the country, we drank copious amounts of tea, had litter tray breaks and after 5 hours that felt like 50 minutes, we were done.
What had we done? Taken a few giant steps forward to be able to support those with mental health problems whose much needed benefits are slowly but surely being removed from them. Without those benefits, they face hardship, homelessness and despair.
Mental illness will affect 1 in 4 people in the UK over their lifetimes. This statistic does not mean 1 in 4 of us will know of someone who is mentally ill: it means 1 in 4 people will become mentally ill. That’s 25% of the population.
Some of us will be lucky enough to be able to take time off work to heal, some of us will get better quickly. Some of us won’t. Some of us will need benefits to survive, to keep a roof over our heads and to eat. And they won’t be there. Just as they are not there for those who face such challenges right now.
Mental ill-health is not something to be ashamed of, to be tucked away and not talked about. And needing benefits to survive is not something to be ashamed of either. It is what they are supposed to be there for. Or were.
Our dream is to be able to help everyone who faces such hardship, to help keep the bailiffs from the door, to keep food in bellies and to help those already facing the fight of their lives to keep on going, to find a place of peace and happiness and to have the resources available to them to do this.
Just £5 a month will pay a bill, put food in an empty cupboard, keep debt collectors from the door, change despair into triumph. Please – help us help them.
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Challenges and Changes
MY APOLOGIES, first of all, for the long gap between posts: life, as they say, and life’s challenges don’t go away, as we all know only too well. Last month — on October 15th, to be precise, exactly one month ago today — the 5 Quid for Life Committee held our second meeting, this time in cyberspace rather than face-to-face in a physical space. We had hoped to meet via a Google+ hangout, but the technology defeated us and we reconvened via facebook chat, typing rather than talking, and it worked remarkably well for a meeting that stretched over some 5 hours.
Those present were Sam Jenkin, Johnathon Tinsley, Paula Ann Walker, Kate White and myself, Phil Groom, with apologies from David Edwards. I guess I should also make honorable mention of Sam’s cats, who periodically interrupted the meeting with demands for attention and fresh cat litter, but that’s another story that I’ll allow Sam to elaborate on if she so chooses. My personal thanks to one and all — humans and cats alike — for taking the time out of their otherwise busy lives for this meeting.
Finances
Paula, whose gentle persistence over the summer led to the meeting, kicked the meeting off with a brief financial report: we now have a number of supporters committed to regular giving of £5 per month and as of the date of our meeting, our bank balance stood at a total of £1,883.55, now increased to £1,953.94. A huge thank you to everyone who has contributed to this; though I’ve said it before, I think it’s worth saying again: without your support, 5 Quid for Life simply would not exist.
Paula writes:
We thank you all again for your continued donations because your support and encouragement is what kept us all at our PCs and Macs for 5 hours; and what inspires us to keep going and indeed go further in terms of growth, marketing and advertising so that we may indeed be able to offer real help to those who find themselves in need of it.
Sadly, however, due to personal circumstances, after giving her report Paula then handed in her resignation as Finance Officer, and the Committee agreed that I would take on the role on an interim basis until a replacement can be found. I am therefore now 5 Quid for Life’s Interim Finance Officer, but if you, gentle reader, are suitably experienced, have a head for the world of high finance and book keeping, and are willing to volunteer your services, then I (or any other member of the Committee) would be very happy to hear from you and to discuss what’s involved (bankers implicated in the current economic crisis need not apply). Another huge thank you, then, this time to Paula, through whose efforts we have both bank and PayPal accounts up and running: Paula, you have been a rock and I salute you.
Paula remains a member of 5 Quid for Life but will no longer serve on the Board or as a Trustee.
Communications and Fundraising
Communications and fundraising were the next topics under the spotlight, with a lively discussion during which Kate put forward ideas for a new logo, Sam suggested a video promotion, and it was agreed by all that we need to be rather more proactive in liaising with other mental health groups and organisations — such as Mind — as well as making better use of our own facebook page, the original 200 People facebook group and twitter. If you come across a news story or blog post that you think we should be aware of or respond to, please do feel free to give us a shout-out on twitter or post a link on our facebook wall; and please help us to spread the word about 5 Quid for Life — the risk of suicide amongst the mentally ill is real, as this recent Mind blog post illustrates all too painfully: Why MoneySupermarket ran for Mind.
I guess we’ll never know quite what tipped Mark Hanson over the edge, but we do know that one of the big issues affecting and destabilising those struggling with mental health issues is money worries — Mind have an entire section of their site dedicated to the topic, Money and Mental Health — and 5 Quid for Life exists specifically to help those whose financial security is threatened by the DWP’s changes to the UK benefits system. We are not alone in voicing these concerns, of course, and we stand in solidarity with other campaign groups seeking to raise awareness of the impact these changes are already having on vulnerable people, even before they’re finalised.
An important change on the communications front is that Karita Razzell, who was one of our spokespeople, has stepped down from that role due to other commitments. Karita remains as a member of the team behind the scenes in admin support, and in her place as spokesperson we’re delighted to welcome Carrie Holroyd. Carrie will be no stranger to readers of One in Four magazine, to which she is a regular contributor, but for the benefit of those who don’t know her, I’ve invited her to write a brief introduction as part of our ‘Meet the Team‘ series: watch this space! Thank you to both Karita and Carrie for all their encouragement, help and support.
What Next? MadUp #2…
Inevitably we found ourselves asking what next for 5 Quid for Life — and where? The plan — very much in its early stages as I write — is to hold our next meeting on the last Saturday of January at a venue in London; but rather than just another meeting of t’Committee, we thought we should make it a celebration: 5 Quid for Life will be one year old in January 2011! So, subject to our identifying and booking a suitable location, you, gentle reader, as a friend/supporter of 5 Quid for Life, are invited to MadUp #2.
Unfortunately a meetup on January 28th hasn’t proved viable. We are now looking at Saturday Feb 11th, venue yet to be finalised. Please watch our homepage for updates and your inbox for an invitation…
We hope to send out invitations with full details of precisely where and when nearer the time. For the group’s safety and security, however, these details will not be published but kept confidential to those attending. In the meantime, if you’ve got your 2012 diary handy, please pencil in the date now: Saturday 28th Jan 2012. We look forward to seeing you then!
And finally: for those who missed it, here’s my account of MadUp #1 … which, if the truth be told, is where the original seed for 5 Quid for Life was sown:
Some twitter follow suggestions…
- Follow @5QuidForLife
- Follow @BrokenOfBritain
- Follow @MarkOneinFour
- Follow @Mental_Healthy
- Follow @MindCharity
- Follow @Rethink_
- Follow @TWIM_Blog
- Follow @WellFairSystem
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PayPal Donations Update
Important Update, 4/3/2012
Unfortunately we are temporarily unable to accept donations via PayPal: we have therefore removed the PayPal Donate Button from this post and the sidebar. Please accept our apologies for any inconvenience this may cause and watch this space for further updates.
Bank: HSBC Woodbridge
Sort Code: 40 47 42
Account No: 2146 8928
Donations may still be made direct into our bank account, details shown opposite.
Thank you for your patience and understanding whilst we sort out this problem.
ORIGINAL POST
THANK YOU, first of all, to everyone who has donated to 5 Quid for Life so far, and thanks especially to those who have set up standing orders direct into our bank account: without your support, 5 Quid for Life simply would not exist.
I’m pleased to be able to say that we now have our own PayPal account, set up by Paula, our Finance Officer, so another thank you to her. We have therefore stopped taking donations via the UK Christian Bookshops Directory and have replaced that PayPal donate button in the sidebar with our own:
PayPal Donate Button
temporarily unavailable
Please do feel free to try it out — and thank you once again for your support.
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EDIT: After all the fanfare below, on Facebook and Twitter, unfortunately the fundraiser has hit a rather serious snag; we can’t run it on the date organised. Unfortunately the venue accidentally double-booked itself after a mix-up. The staff have sent their apologies, and I would like to express mine here too.
I’m liasing with the bands to see what date we can re-arrange for, and as soon as I know, I’ll advice everyone here and on the social networks.
Once again, I am really sorry. Please, please do stick with us though – this is still going to happen, it’s still going to rock, and we’re still in a good cause!
Thanks all, and best wishes
Karen (Press and Social Media Officer)
—
After much faffing about in the background, I’ve finally got round to officially organising our first fundraiser!
I wish I could claim all the credit for this, but that would be fibbing ever so slightly. On a night out a few months ago, my good mate Tony mentioned that he had seen on Facebook that I was involved with 5 Quid. Straight then and there, he offered to have his band – and others that he knows – perform at a charity gig for us. So, let me publicly thank you Tony – your generosity is very, very much appreciated.
The current line up involves two bands, as sadly a third we had hoped to have is not available on the date we’ve organised. However, we are hoping to get someone else to slot into that set. We’ll also have a DJ there who is, I understand, under instructions to play whatever guests wish. Well, as long as it’s within the rock genre 
On that note, we can expect to hear soft rock, classic rock, pop rock, glam rock, blues rock, punk, metal, alternative – the list goes on. As well as that, we’re looking into prizes for a raffle (if I can’t get any local businesses on-board with this, I’ll donate them myself) and there will be drinks promotions if you like a good tipple (plus you’ll have the dubious pleasure of seeing me make an eejit of myself over the PA system). So it promises to be a great night!
The details are as follows:
Venue:
Ma Nelson’s Rock Bar
149 Lisburn Road
Belfast
BT9 7AJ
Date:
30 July 2011Time:
TBC, but probably at starting either 9pm/10pm – going on until the wee small hours!
Now, I know many 5 Quid supporters are not in Northern Ireland, but if there is any possibility that you could come, please do. Belfast is a great city these days; there’s plenty to see and do in it itself, and there are some stunning places within no more than an hour away from us, such as the Giant’s Causeway, the Glens of Antrim (a personal favourite place of mine) to the North and the beautiful Mourne Mountains to the South. So any traveling contingent could easily make a weekend or a short break out of it! Give me a shout if you want any further details on this.
For anyone in Northern Ireland – or even Ireland as a whole, it’s not such a big place these days, is it? – please, please make the effort to attend if you possibly can. This is our first fundraiser and we really need it to be a success. Tell you friends and family too!
You can find out more about our venue, Ma Nelson’s, on their Facebook site at www.facebook.com/manelsons. Huge thanks are also due to the bar’s owner, Tina, for all her hard work in accommodating everything for us, and for her generosity vis a vis our non-profit status! Cheers Tina 
I’ve set up a Facebook ‘event’ page for the gig: please click here. Please go ahead and invite yourself and all your mates! [I'll create a new event page as soon as the new date is confirmed.]
I hope to see many of you there!
—
On another note, there have been a few pieces in The Guardian lately that we thought you may be interested in. First, if I may be narcissistic enough to raise this, I had a small bit published myself on 3 June. I, and three other users of the paper’s Comment is Free pags were discussing our experiences of mental illness and the treatment available for same. You can view the article, and the lively discussion that ensued, at www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2011/jun/03/mental-health-support-peoples-panel. It was also published in the print edition.
Secondly, Phil has spotted a very interesting but very worrying letter to the paper from the Chief Executives of a number of leading mental health charities such as Mind and Rethink, plus statutory bodies like the Royal College of Psychiatrists. The letter states that:
Reform of the welfare system is steaming ahead, and already we’re hearing about the devastating effects this is having on the mental health of hundreds of thousands of people across Great Britain. While much is made of the impact that changes to benefits will have on people with physical disabilities, it is vital that those with “invisible” issues such as mental health problems are not forgotten…
…We’ve found that the prospect of IB reassessment is causing huge amounts of distress, and tragically there have already been cases where people have taken their own life following problems with changes to their benefits…
You can read the letter in full here.
Obviously, 5 Quid for Life shares the concerns raised; it is the very reason that we even exist. We are alarmed to hear that individuals are already dying because of the cuts – though sadly, we are not entirely surprised. Don’t forget what first brought our organisation into fruition.
The letter highlights the very real need for 5 Quid‘s services in this arena. So please, come to the fundraiser if you can, and either way please send us some doh. People’s lives, their welfare, their homes depend on it.
You can donate online here, or alternatively, here are our bank details:
Account Name: 5 Quid for Life
Bank: HSBC Woodbridge
Sort Code: 40 47 42
Account No: 2146 8928
Thank you so much for anything you can give – even better if it’s a regular £5 per month! But every penny really is appreciated.
We’re doing a lot of background work at the minute on practical issues such as eligibility criteria and how to apply; we know that the imminence with which our services are needed is grower greater by the day. Watch this space for full details over the next few weeks.
Thanks for reading folks, and I hope to see you on 30 July!
Best wishes
Kaz
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It isn’t suicide: it’s murder
BBC News, 01/06/2011: Campaigners warn over incapacity benefit changes
THE BBC NEWS have now picked up on the risk of suicide by those suffering from mental illness as they face the trauma of changes to the benefits system. Citing a letter published in the Guardian on May 31st from representatives of Mind, Rethink and a number of other mental health organisations, the BBC report notes that some claimants have already taken their own lives in response to the changes: Campaigners warn over incapacity benefit changes.
In the letter, the campaigners state:
We’ve found that the prospect of IB [incapacity benefit] reassessment is causing huge amounts of distress, and tragically there have already been cases where people have taken their own life following problems with changes to their benefits. We are hugely worried that the benefits system is heading in a direction which will put people with mental health problems under even more pressure and scrutiny, at a time when they are already being hit in other areas such as cuts to services.
The very reason 5 Quid for Life exists, of course, is to be there for such people: we are a mental health safety net. But for that net to be effective, we need funds and people need to know that we are here.
If you have already contributed to the fund, blogged, tweeted or written to help spread the word, thank you. The need for 5 Quid for Life remains as vital as when the 200 People to Save Ali Quant campaign was first launched, however — and what I said then remains true: these deaths are not suicide, they’re
murder, death by a thousand cuts from a knife wielded by the UK Government — the very people whose job it is to take care of the poor, the weak, the vulnerable on our behalf as taxpayers.
I now urge all who share these concerns, the concerns expressed in that letter to the Guardian, to raise your voices once again: write to the BBC, write to the Guardian, write to your own MP. Let them know that the risk is real and ask them to stand with us.
Thank you, and thanks in particular to The Madosphere for drawing attention to this and to us already.
- Guardian follow-up article: Mental health experts warn against pace of incapacity benefit cuts
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Article on Madosphere
I recently published an article over at The Madosphere on our current progress here at 5 Quid for Life. The aim of the article is to raise awareness of our organisation to the wider mental health blogging community, but I thought I’d add a quick note about it here too, in case anyone is interested. It gives an overview of where we are with things at present.
I am looking into other websites and publications that we could write for to raise awareness of 5 Quid. I have identified a few possiblities, but if you have any suggestions on any such places, I’d be very grateful to hear them! Thank you
Best wishes to all
Karen
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Thunderbirds – sorry, I mean 5 Quid for Life – are go!
TODAY IT GIVES ME GREAT PLEASURE, at long last, to present a summary of 5 Quid for Life’s inaugural meeting, held courtesy of Paula Ann Walker in the delightfully rural surroundings of Woodbridge, Suffolk, a short train journey from Ipswich, back on Saturday 19th March 2011. We used a cunningly devised hat-recognition-system to identify one another at Ipswich Station, where the guard urged us to slow down: “The train won’t go until we’re ready,” he assured us — and so Sam Jenkin, Kate White, Johnathon Tinsley and yours truly met face to face for the first time and boarded the train for the beginning of the journey of a lifetime…
Sam takes up the story:
The inaugural meeting of the 5 Quid For Life Council took place on Saturday, 19 March 2011. A great deal of laughter and work erupted in an environment of high excitement, laden with food, silly hats and Skype.
Present were Phil Groom (founder), Paula Ann Walker (Finance Officer), Johnathon Tinsley (IT Officer), Kate White (Compliance Officer), David Edwards, (Council Member/second IT brain) and Sam Jenkin (Project Manager, aka Chief Bossy Boots). Karita Razell and Karen Bester were sadly unable to make it and David appeared via Skype due to prior dog sitting commitments.
Phil, Paula, Johnathon and Sam were appointed as trustees, with Phil as Chairman. Kate delivered a superb summary of what we needed to agree regarding setup of the charity, which is just as well, as Sam tends to find legal business detail boring and her snoring is not to be experienced at close quarters. The core group of eight is now known as the Advisory Council and the trustees are now known as the Board (this is not an attempt to give ourselves fancy titles but to meet legal requirements).
Lunch is served! Paula presents a marvellous spread.
Given that geographical distances are so vast between us, we agreed that meeting attendance could take place via Skype and voting can take place via physical raising of hands at the meeting, email, Skype or any other method of communication where a member of the group may be considered present in that they can hear and be heard via communication equipment. Sadly, those on Skype, although having full voting rights, will not be able to partake of any food as it is still impossible to transmit food through wireless and we don’t think stuffing Paula’s marvellous food down Phil’s laptop would have helped communication. We are however hoping there will be an app for that soon.
We aim to raise between £5,000 and £10,000 in our first year, with fundraising activities including an Amazon affiliate, an Etsy shop where we will sell hand-made donated craft items, continuing to ask people to donate £5 a month to the charity and a proposed night of entertainment, dramatics and dancing, to follow in 2012.
Bank documents were perused again, a few small amendments were made and subsequent to the meeting, Paula opened the account, details of which are:
Bank: HSBC Woodbridge
Sort Code: 40 47 42
Account No: 2146 8928
Donations can be made over the counter at a local bank by:
Cash – you can pay with cash (notes and coins) which can exchange hands immediately.
Cheque – After clearing, the amount is debited from your bank account (usually within 5 working days.)
Electronic payments can also be made over the counter via Credit or Debit Card. The amount is normally debited from your bank account within 2 working days.
Regular donations can also be made here online, or by setting up an electronic payment via Standing Order or Direct Debit. We hope to have a 5 Quid for Life PayPal account set up shortly.
People who wish to volunteer to help us are asked to please contact Sam on volunteer@5quidforlife.org.uk.
At this point, a short break was taken in the sun and Paula modeled both Sam’s and Phil’s hats for David.
A media campaign is being put together and this was discussed at the meeting – more details to be announced shortly.
The process for people to apply for financial support has been agreed in broad terms and is being set up, as is the process for approving support applications. The support we offer will be in the form of a one-off payment to help people with mental health difficulties who have a) lost their benefits, or b) cannot apply for benefit, or c) are in danger of losing their benefit due to the changes being implemented to the benefits system. Documented evidence for this would need to be shown at application.
It was agreed that we are not, at this time, able to offer advocacy ourselves. However, at the Council’s discretion we may offer extra help and assistance in various and personal ways, including paying for advocacy. We will always bear in the mind the applicants’ situations in extremis and always consider Ali as the inspiration for us. Our scope is crisis support.
5 Quid for Life Inaugural Meeting: From left to right - Standing: Phil Groom, Paula Ann Walker, Kate White; Sitting: Johnathon Tinsley, Sam Jenkin
At this point, Sam was gagging for a ciggie, so we had a passive smoking break (everyone else) and took some photos.
We tucked into a superb trifle as we discussed the complex subject of IT, including data protection issues as this will be of paramount importance when managing sensitive information. It was agreed that no sensitive information will be held or shared online and anything that does contain sensitive information will be kept in a safe and cross-cut shredded when no longer required.
Phil will be responsible for keeping the blog up to date and will call on members of the Council for assistance when necessary. Johnathon will be communicating shortly with everyone on the 5 Quid for Life facebook page and the 200 People group on ways they can help us and he will also be setting up email addresses for Advisory Council members.
We finished up with Kate picking up on anything we had not yet discussed regarding the very necessary business bits and agreed two proposed dates for the next meeting. After narrowly avoiding booking the Royal wedding weekend (a decision was taken not to crash the wedding as both Phil and Sam would need new hats) it was decided that the next meeting would be held on either 16 April or 5 May (depending on which date the most Council members could attend) and the venue would be London. Sam will subject those present to her cooking skills which are not expected to come near Paula’s. This is called “expectation management”. Paula has set the bar so high that probably only professional board level caterers could be expected to surpass the feast she provided.
Full minutes are available to those who wish to see them and we look forward to communicating shortly and also to the next meeting!
Mental Health: Let’s Talk!
ANYONE BRAVE (OR FOOLHARDY) ENOUGH to follow my personal blog will know that I’m a bit of a Coldplay fan; and as I prepare this post I’m listening to one of my favourite tracks, Talk:
Are you lost or incomplete?
Do you feel like a puzzle,
you can’t find your missing piece?
Tell me how you feel
Well I feel like they’re talking in a language I don’t speak
And they’re talking it to me…So you don’t know where you’re going and you wanna talk
And you feel like you’re going where you’ve been before
You’ll tell anyone who’ll listen, but you feel ignored
Nothing’s really making any sense at allLet’s talk…
Mind Blog, 24/03/2011: It's time to talk, it's Time to Change
Talk is the subject of today’s Mind blog post by Kate Stringer: It’s time to talk, it’s Time to Change, part of the Time to Change campaign to end the stigma that surrounds mental illness — because the only way we’ll raise awareness, that we’ll ever achieve that aim, is by talking about it:
Our campaign Time to Change, is trying to break down the stigma attached to mental health problems, quite simply by getting people talking.
Research for Time to Change has consistently shown that people’s knowledge, attitudes and behaviour towards people with mental health problems are better when they have had the opportunity to hear first hand from someone who has experienced a mental health problem about what it’s like.
You might think that, with one in four of us affected by mental health problems at some point, all of us would have had this opportunity – all of us should know someone affected and have spoken to them about it.
But this isn’t the case. As a society, mental health isn’t a subject we’re open about. We feel afraid – either to talk about our own mental health problems (for fear of how people will react), or to talk to someone we know has been affected about it (maybe for fear of having an awkward conversation, or of not knowing quite the right thing to say)…
Kate concludes with an invitation:
What are your experiences of talking about mental health? Tell us in the comments below or join the conversation on the Time to Change Facebook page.
I’ve left my response, a brief summary of how I became involved with mental health issues myself — through conversation on twitter, thanks to @bourach and @serialinsomniac — and how things have worked out since, with conversations getting easier the more of them I’m involved in, and the more time I allow for them:
Hi – I’m the founder of the new mental health safety net organisation, 5 Quid for Life, just launched this year to raise funds to provide support for people with mental health difficulties facing possible loss of income, homes or — worst case scenario — even their lives as a consequence of the changes being imposed on the UK benefits system.
What I’ve found is simply this: the more I talk about mental health issues, the easier it becomes! At first I was hesitant: I’m not mentally ill, so who am I to talk about mental illness? But the fact is, a lot of my friends and some members of my own family do have / have had mental health difficulties — and I’ve found that all they need to start talking about their difficulties is an opportunity, a trigger. That’s all: like you say here, “How are you feeling?” — just those few words can unleash a torrent, like a dam bursting.
Trouble is, of course, that can be scary if the person asking the question isn’t ready for it, if you’re pushed for time; so the other thing that’s needed as well as the question is time: time to listen, time to take it in, maybe even time for a gentle hug where that’s appropriate. Time to comment on blog posts — time to tweet!
That’s actually how I got involved in mental health issues: through twitter. I can’t remember quite where it started: I was twittering away about something or other, @bourach replied, @serialinsomniac said something and before I knew it, a whole network opened up in front of me and suddenly here we are with this new project, 5 Quid for Life, already featured with a full page spread in One in Four magazine…
There’s a lot of talk about negative triggers in mental health circles, in the madosphere: warnings about triggery posts and so on; but what we need are more positive triggers — simple words to release words. I’d urge anyone who’s on the threshold of a conversation to take that next step, to take the risk of opening the door, even if you only open it a little crack, just enough to let a little light in — then watch the darkness scatter!
I don’t know where the conversations we’ve started will go next; but I’m very glad we started them and equally glad that I can be part of this conversation: thank you.
Now it’s your turn: why not head on over there and join the conversation? Let’s talk!
CIVITAS PRESS have issued a call for submissions for their second community project publication, Not Alone – Stories Of Living With Depression — and they’re not looking for easy answers or quick-fix solutions from people who’ve got it all together: they’re after authentic, no-holds-barred accounts from people who can tell it like it is:
Not Alone - Call for Submissions
We are looking for real, honest stories of people wrestling with the issue. We encourage you to let it all out on the page, and share in detail both the external circumstances and the internal conflicts that arise because of it. When at all possible show – don’t tell. Give us the gritty details, the emotions, the conflict, how you felt, how you responded (good and bad), and what you learned, if applicable to your story. Although we rarely censor graphic content or language if it serves the story, we ask that you use discretion. We are NOT looking for self-help essays on solutions, professional opinions, or agendas.
If the possibility of seeing your story in print alongside others appeals to you, head on over there, download the Project Submission Document, and get started on telling your story — but do it soon: the deadline for submissions is 24th May 2011 with a view to publishing in October this year.
There’s no guarantee that every submission will be accepted, of course, but if you don’t try you’ll never know…
Civitas Press are a USA based publisher which describe themselves as:
… a family of writers, editors, designers, and marketing experts committed to creating a new model for publishing. We believe the writer should profit from one’s work and we’re creating a platform to make that happen. When you join Civitas Press, you become part of that family.
This particular project emerged from a series of blogposts by Alise Wright, www.alise-write.com, who you can also follow on twitter @BigMama247.
Finally, please remember to come back here and tell us how you got on!
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One in Four Mag, Spring 2011, p.15 - Real Lives: Can you spare five quid?
A MASSIVE THANK YOU to Mark Brown, @MarkOneinFour, editor of One in Four magazine, for a superb and immensely encouraging write-up in issue 12, the Spring 2011 edition of the mag.
We’re on page 15, Real Lives, under the title ‘Can you spare five quid?’ and Mark introduces us with the observation that 2011 might well be the year of people doing things for themselves — and that, of course, is precisely what 5 Quid for Life is doing.
Mark kindly invited us to answer a few questions about 5 Quid for Life, so who better for that than Kate White, our Compliance Officer? To read the full article you’ll need to buy a copy of the mag or subscribe (great value at only £10 per year, 4 issues) but here’s an excerpt, with Kate explaining what we’re all about:
“5 Quid for Life is about more than just knocking on doors, waiting for answers,” says Kate White, 5 Quid for Life’s Compliance Officer. “The core team comprises 12 talented individuals, each with personal and/or professional experience with mental illness. Fronted by Karita Razzell and David Warriet Edwards, founded by Phil Groom, we are friends as well as skilled, stubborn advocates for people over pence.”
“Having received over £1500 in our first week there is every reason for optimism, and elbow grease,” she says. “February 2011 marks alterations to the benefits system which mean still fewer mental health service users are eligible for any government aid. It is an economic placebo, and a bitter pill for some of the most marginalised members of the ‘big society’. For too many it means imminent bankruptcy, putting them at risk of eviction, homelessness and suicide.”
… “Mental health services are not a luxury,” says Kate. “People with mental health difficulties cannot do without them, and no one should have to struggle to afford them. Our goal is to offer practical, available solutions to those for whom mental health problems are life problems — daily decisions over what is more important: therapy, medication, their child, shelter, warmth?
“For the price of a decent coffee and croissant each month we can save lives.”
Mark himself observes,
5 Quid for Life are finding out how to do things as they go along, drawing on advice and experience of others. They’re still working out exactly how the organisation will work.
This coming weekend will see that working-out taking shape as our core group meets face-to-face for the first time to hammer out the details of our governing document, which Kate and Karita have been working on behind the scenes, to formally appoint our trustees and — at long last! — finalise opening of the organisation’s bank account. Watch this space for more details.
To conclude, another quote from Kate, not in the article:
A true “big society” is one we can imagine. It starts with 5 quid.
THANK YOU to everyone who has contributed so far. Without your support, 5 Quid for Life would be nothing at all.
