The students gathered on a three-hour “five ways to improve your wellbeing” course in south London are about to have a powerful realisation.
One of the group is asked to think about how many hours a week she spends seeing healthcare professionals, such as health visitors or psychiatrists, about her mental health condition.
She tots up the amount of hours each week and multiplies it by 52. It comes to just under two full days. Stella Williams, the course’s peer trainer, points out that for 363 days she has managed her condition all by herself.
For the group of students, who are all either current or former patients at the South West London and St George’s mental health NHS trust and now taking courses at the onsite Recovery College, this realisation that they look after themselves for such a large part of the year, makes them smile with pride.
I can’t talk to my son or husband because they don’t know what I’m talking about but people here do
Launched in 2010, there are now over 50 courses in the shiny prospectus belonging to the Recovery College situated in the grounds of Springfield University hospital that are attended by around 150 people a week. They range from providing information about specific diagnoses (for example, understanding personality disorder), to teaching coping tools such as journaling or mindfulness. There are also courses specifically for carers, families and friends.
Clara Jones, a mother of one, has severe anxiety and depression and admits that being at the college is the very last place she really wants to be. “If I had my way, I’d be at home in my bedroom with the curtains drawn and the door closed. But I make myself come because it gives me the feeling of not being alone and that helps. It took a lot of courage for me to come to the first class,” she says.
Each course is co-produced and co-facilitated by a peer trainer who is someone with lived experience of a mental health issue, and a practitioner trainer, who is a mental health professional.
For Jones, who is one of the 2,700 people to have attended since the Recovery College opened, one of the best things about coming to the college, is knowing she isn’t alone. “People say wise things without even knowing and no one cares if I’m not saying anything. I can’t talk to my son or husband because they don’t know what I’m talking about, but people here do.”
Last week the students learned about how staying active can improve their mental health. One student, Steph Bates, an artist who has obsessive compulsive disorder, tells the group about how she had braved going swimming for the first time in years and how much it had lifted her mood.
Peer trainer Peter Wilson says watching his students build confidence like this is the best thing about his job. “We were running a course about being assertive and in the second week a girl had had a conversation with her partner that she’d wanted to have for years but hadn’t been able to. It’s the nature of the college.”
Wilson has been a peer trainer for a year. “I was sitting on the other side of the table just two years ago, that’s how recent it is. I had my own business but I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder and I lost it all. I then went through the learning curve and it took a while to get to where I am now.
“In class, I draw on my raw experiences of bipolar and how I manage it. I bring that to the room so hopefully students will be inspired.”
One of his colleagues is Kevin Howell, a practitioner trainer, whose background is in psychiatric nursing. Working so closely with peer trainers is one of the most unique things about his role. “I’ll be honest, I was nervous about what experience they’d have in a classroom environment,” he says. “It was quite daunting being involved in a new concept and realising that I couldn’t make any assumptions about my co-trainer’s experience.”
“We had some teething problems at first, one of which was realising we needed a formal process to bring peer trainers on board so that we had confidence in their training and ability.”
A trainee peer trainer programme was developed. Now, Howell says he knows that his co-trainers have both the training and the experience to be a true partner in the classroom. “What’s wonderful about working with a peer trainer is that student can relate directly to them, and this brings out information in the class that I would never hear otherwise.”
Howell believes the college is so successful because they put participants at the centre of what they do. He says: “Students don’t feel they’re on a conveyor belt and are valued for the whole person they are. When the focus is on the individual as a whole rather than their diagnosis you see a much fuller picture.”
For Bates, who enrolled just two weeks ago, the course is already helping her manage her OCD while she waits for a bed in a residential unit. She says: “It’s helpful in so many ways. For me it’s like a float in the sea of being alone.”
* Some names have been changed.
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The mental health college that"s a lifeline in "a sea of being alone"
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