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Newsletter: Trading Times

Issue 3 (June 2002)

Poetry Corner
Nightmare
A-Day-in- The-Life-of?
Dig For Victory!
Trading News
Trading Times - what Next?
Open Forum

 

Poetry Corner

Inspired by Arvo Part

Last night I dreamed of dancing through a golden rain,
Of leaping passionate, surging high
Then hanging
For a moment
Motionless
Until spinning slowly,
Arms raised, brushing the yellow leaves
Dancing around me,
Like me, featherlight
I came to earth.

 

time lasts
(by Andy Saxton)

time passes
it lasts
for ages
forward
and past

time takes forever
to pass

it lasts
and lasts

time passes
slowly
and fast
forward
and past

for a long
time I read
this poem
and then it
was at the
end
and now
it is gone

only time
lasts forever

it passes
slowly
sometimes fast
forward
and past.

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Nightmare

I have suffered from depression for the last twenty one years. For the last seven I've lived in this house.

About a year ago, my neighbours started being noisy with their doors. There's nothing worse when you're sitting watching television than something suddenly going "BANG !" I'm sensitised to noise because of previous experiences, so it affects me really badly. And my neighbours ignored my complaints -they believe they have the right to live as noisily as they want.

For weeks my anxiety has been terrific. All day long it gnaws at my stomach, my bowels, my chest and head. I can't eat because of the anxiety in my stomach. I've thought about suicide -how to end my life rather than putting up with the pain.

And no-one can, or seems to want to do anything. I've registered with the Environmental Health Noise Pollution Monitoring team, but they won't come out to door noise because it's difficult to catch, and they seem to think that it doesn't matter because people have to go through doors.

I went to see my psychiatrist. She didn't take long to get on to the central operative idea which characterises psychology and psychiatry.

She asked me, "Tell me what you are thinking. Do you feel that the people next door are banging the doors deliberately to annoy you." This question results from the discriminatory attitude within psychiatry that vulnerable people, people with mental health problems believe that people are getting at them for no particular reason. Yes, a person can make things worse for themselves by falsely believing that they are being got at but these are few and far between. And psychiatry ignores the truth that many people bully people.with problems. Still, how can we expect abetter philosophy from doctors who never had to live in a flat, whom nobody ever bullies because of their position, who use their considerable moneys to simply move if there is any bother? Finally, the psychiatrist concluded that I didn't feel persecuted. She said she'd write to the Council.

I tried estate agents offices. It used to be possible to get detached properties through them, and if you had special circumstances, the Housing Benefit Office would pay the rent for it -the system used to be a life saver. But now they and the landlords no longer accept Housing Benefit. Some of them said that they had had problems with payment while others told me that the landlords had been forbidden by insurance companies and mortgage lenders to let to people on Housing Benefit.

I went to my solicitor. I knew what the outcome would be. There are, of course, no laws that can help people like me in my situation.

I went to Patricia Hewitt's office. I saw one of her helpers. I told him my circumstances and he wrote everything down. I then told him that I wasn't sure if I was going to survive, that I might kill myself. He moved to write this down and then stopped himself. Can't have anything bad reflecting on the MP!

He went on to tell me that everything that was wrong with the Housing Benefit system was the fault of the Tories! In the end, he said that they would write a letter to the Council, even though they don't have anything appropriate. So much for the 'Representative Process'. Now, after a life of hard times, being abused as a child, living lonely and penniless as a consequence during my adulthood, having to cope with depression, all I want is to live out my life in peace, but I'm not allowed to do so. The authorities, I find, are worse than useless, operating the most discriminatory ideas against suffering people and lacking in power and the will to do anything. How do I cope now? What do I do? What will tomorrow bring?

Name and address supplied.

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A-Day-in-The-Life-of... Kenton Taylor

(In no particular order)

Woke up.
Buttered the door hinges.
Kissed a potato.
Looked through a window.
Ate a bogey.
Walked up a hill.
Ran down a hill.
Found a penny.
Squeezed an orange.
Stood in a breeze.
Opened a door.
Closed a door.
Swallowed 12 bananas.
Woke up a cow.
Sat Down.
Stood up.
Licked a stamp.
Rang a bell.

Whistled a wish.
Crossed my legs.
Was chased by a cat.
Dreamt a dream.
Dug a hole.
Looked up.
Looked down.
Blubbered.
Walked up some steps.
Walked down some steps.
Read a label.
Turned left.
Turned right.
Put a plug in a hole.
Started a conversation.
Stopped a bus.
Bought a wheel barrow.
Painted the floor green.
Wandered in a figure of eight.
Spoke in a figure of speech.

Untangled a knot.
Bought a hat.
Washed a whistled wish.
Saw the sea in a woman's hair.
Jumped in.
Jumped out.
Went home.

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Dig For Victory! (and for organic spuds!)

The Trading Times Allotment

(by Kenton Taylor and Kala Subbuswamy)

Gardening can have a big effect on people's physical and mental health. Hospitals have been aware of that for a long time. Old-style psychiatric hospitals like the Towers had huge faults, but many did have farms and gardens -to provide food, but also calm, attractive environ- ments, and the chance for people to get involved in healthy and meaningful activity. And apparently it can help you get fit as well -according to the head of gardening charity Thrive, gardening is better exercise than going to the gym. Gardening has such a good effect that scientists at Loughborough University have decided to look at how exactly it improves your health.

And that's one of the reasons why Kenton Taylor came to a Core Group meeting and suggested that Trading Times get an allotment. So we did. It's on a beautiful site on Abbey Park Road -just over the road from the park, and just above the river. Even walking or cycling through the park to get there, with the cherry blossom out and moorhens building nests on the river, lifts your mood so much. When you get there, sitting on the step of the shed in the sun, chatting to each other, surrounded by things alive and growing, seeing a heron fly past or hearing the birdsong from the trees -well, there' s nothing like it. And digging a row, preparing a bed ready for seeds to go in, or planting a seedling and watching it grow over the weeks, is really satisfying work.

We've had the allotment since last autumn, so most of the work has been on preparing the soil. But we have got some garlic growing, and some strawberries and sage, and we've planted seed potatoes. We're doing things organically and we're very much learning as we're going along. So if you want to come down but are worried that you don't know anything about gardening, don't be -we're all beginners and all in the same boat. And if you do know something about it, we' d really welcome your expertise.

You can come and help out with digging, weeding, planting seeds, transplanting seedlings watering, mulching. Or you can just sit in the sun, drink cups of tea, and chat. We try to ge down there every Tuesday and at the weekend, but if you want to get involved at other times we can give you a key so you can get in whenever you want - just say the word.

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Trading News

Trading Times has been going for just over a year now. As a time bank, what we're about as members is trade - doing jobs for each other. Since we started up, over 500 jobs have been done on the scheme. We've helped each other out with gardening, careers advice, decorating, letter writing, computer tuition, pet-sitting, emotional support , website design, and many more.

What else have we done?

Well, this is the third edition of our newsletter -the first two impressed a lot of people with their style, variety and challenging look at mental health issues.

And our allotment is steadily developing -it's early days yet, and we're learning, but hopefully we should have some organic vegetables and fruit to trade on the scheme.

And we've established ourselves as an independent community group, run by mental health service users. We've got a constitution, elected Core Group members, managed to raise enough funds for a couple of years, and we've got our own office space.

So, we've done a lot. But to carryon doing well, and improve on what we're doing, we've got to all work together. Trading Times isn't a 'service' provided for us -it's about all of us coming together to help each other. When it works well, we can get so much from it -jobs done for us, friendship, a chance to work and help others, a chance to learn new things and to meet new people.

It's a time of change for us. We're moving from having a paid worker to organise all, our trades to having to connect with each other ourselves. Some of us are going to have our phone numbers in a directory, so any member can just phone us up to ask for a trade. Understandably, not everyone wants to do that, and the Core Group are prepared to organise some trades. But the best way to be involved is to come along to meetings, workshops, socials, or the allotment. Then you'll get to know others on the scheme, and can feel more confident about trading.

Time banks are about a vision where a community of people all reach out their hands to one another. That's the challenge for Trading Times and for all of us now - how we make that real. If you want to get more active and involved in Trading Times, just give us a call.

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Trading Times - The Future - What Next?
By Andy Saxton

In the last eighteen months - TT has become an established mental health orientated timebank style, Local Exchange Trading System, community. Helping people trade. Helping people build self-confidence and enrich each-others lives.

We are now at a stage to, both, move forward and to consolidate. To create further and more elastic, friendly, user-led ideas. In TT we not only have the ability to provide our primary service to our members ie. trading and sharing skills, but also to allow social outlets and confidence building schemes and events to develop. We also have the money (from funding) and resources (our members time and effort) to progress well beyond the initial reasons, aims and objectives for TT's existence.

The basic things we do to keep things moving are:

Create a list of members and maintain it

From time-to-time, we will ask members whether they are still interested in being part of TT.

Expand our membership

We will promote TT throughout Leicester and help people understand what we do and how to gain access to our skills base. This is dependant on our time and effort. That means the more people we have on the core group, helping run TT, the easier this will be.

Produce a directory of skills

Filling in the membership form is important -as this information is used in the skills directory -to advertise your offers and wants to the rest of the membership. If you need to revise your offers and wants - please let us know.

Trade Brokering

We help get trades done and to help people do trades where they may well find it hard to deal with people they don't know or place they haven't been before -to help break the ice. Although we will still provide this service -through members of the core group acting as Trade Brokers -we strongly encourage members to create their own trades with other members.

Keep records of trades

Our accounts are not just for show! They help us see if people are getting fair amount of benefit out of the scheme and to help them accordingly. For example -if someone had amassed a large amount of time credits, without spending any -then we would help them identify any possible exchanges they might want to make.

Regular Core Group meetings

The very heart of TT is it's Core Group which helps keep things running and comes up with new ideas and organises events and publicity. We are always looking for new Core Group members as we could offer so much more if we had more people helping out. If you would like to take part in the Core Group just either contact TT or turn up at one of our meetings.

 

Projects and ideas we are working on at the moment:

The allotment

We grow our own vegetables. Which helps us grow as people. It's also a good excuse to get out in the open air and do a bit of digging. This summer we are having a barbecue up there - all members are welcome!

Skills workshops

These were very popular last year and we hope to run a number of them this year. These will be at Voluntary Action Leicester at the old Magazine Workspace building on Newarke Street, Leicester (opposite Phoenix Arts). The first is on Celtic Knot Designs - and will run over several sessions.

Chat & Chill

This is a new idea for a trade. Members get together and organise a meeting -say for a coffee in the City Centre. It passes some time and helps people relax and talk -and chill-out- something we all need from time-to-time!

Trips – out and about

Especially during the summertime and even the rest of the year -getting out and visiting places is good for most people. Some of our members are organising day trips around Leicestershire. We may well be able to afford our own transport and hire a minibus to take us even further afield.

 

Things we have plans for:

Development Worker

Although we did really well in having two excellent job-share co-ordinators - it was felt that we needed someone to maintain the momentum and the enthusiasm of the scheme for another twelve months. This is still in the planning stage -we will keep you informed as to developments.

Office space

Voluntary Action Leicester has agreed to let us have some office space. We will be moving our services there over the next few weeks. Don't worry if you are not sure of the address as we will have any post re-directed to VAL from 108 Narborough Road for the next couple of months.

Promotional video

If we can get anyone interested in working on this -we will be creating our very own video of TT in action. This will help us get further funding and help other prospective organisations around the world do similar things.

Web site

Creating a web site is a priority as it will allow us to reach members much more interactively and let people know what's happening in the world of mental ill health and LETS schemes with links and information.

Further social events

Lots more contact opportunities for people to meet up and chat and trade and relax.

Presentation events

This is perhaps one of the things I don't like doing so much. Selling TT to potential members and letting people know we exist and what we do. This covers everything from contacting the Leicester Mercury from time-to-time, to recording interviews for the local radio stations and -doing presentations and out reach type contacts. This means going to a lot of open days, forums, seminars, etc. and plugging TT to people who will go away to talk to potential members about what we have to say.

Hospital contacts

These are very rewarding potentially. We had couple last year -namely at Glenfield General and at Leicester General. Although this deserves a mention by itself I've run out of time and space in this newsletter. However both contacts were very rewarding in helping people understand what's possible -even though the people we did get to meet were perhaps not well enough to get immediate benefit out of contacts with them. Hopefully over the course of the next twelve month we will make further contacts and promotions.

Newsletter - 'Speak Your Mind'

We need your support and help to make our newsletter, helpful, useful and interesting.

To help make Speak You Mind. say what You want!

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Article - re: Open Forum

I was pretty excited by the opportunity to go to this -a forum for anyone interested in mental health issues to get together and exchange views, experiences and ideas. Around 100 people met in Melton on the day -survivors of mental health problems, workers from health, social services and voluntary organisations, and members of the local community. The day was very open, with hardly anything structured or planned, so that people could bring up any issues that they felt to be important. It was the first event like this that I've ever heard about, and there were a lot of things to talk about.

In the morning, the whole group were together, in a free discussion to bring up any issues. Survivors were very vocal and assertive, and made the strongest contributions -saying that mental illness can be overcome; asking why so much money is spent just on drugs when more could be spent on other approaches -e.g. safe retreats, counselling, alternative therapies; challenging the 'us' and 'them' attitudes between survivors and workers; expressing anger at feeling used as 'guinea pigs' to test every new drug; talking of the frustration at not having a say in your own treatment.

Then we did an exercise to look more deeply at some of the attitudes and prejudices in mental health services -attitudes like 'Some people don't want to be helped -they reject services', and 'Some people want a sick role'. That led to some really positive responses -that people reject services sometimes because what's on offer is so limited; that workers often try to get 'service users' to do what they think is right, but it's not actually what's needed; and that service planners and workers don't really listen to what 'users' say they want and need.

The afternoon gave us the chance to get into smaller groups and focus on specific issues. As a worker and a survivor of mental health problems, I joined the group talking about the relation- ship between 'service providers' and 'service users' -the whole 'us' and 'them' issue. One thing was very clear -it's not only 'service users' who feel frustrated. Workers from lots of different backgrounds were unhappy about the barriers to communication, the lack of time to listen to what people really want, the power imbalances, the lack of flexibility allowed, and the fear of being accused of being 'unprofessional' if they try to break some of these barriers.

I felt that the day was an excellent first step to creating change. It was good to get different people together to air the problems. But we need to go so much further. I think that mental health services should be about the way a community supports those of its members who are dealing with times of pain and crisis -after all, it can happen to any of us, and will happen to one in four. That's a long way from the current reality, though.

On its own, the Open Forum won't change much. There didn't seem to be anyone present involved in making the big decisions about services. Still, it's positive that workers, including a few psychiatrists, are being openly critical of the way things work (or rather, don't work) now. Some of us workers want to carry that process on. Maybe in the not too distant future, we can get together with user groups like the People's Forum and Open Assembly, to help us make changes in the way we work, and to start working together to create far-reaching changes in the ways our communities support and help those of us who struggle with mental health problems. Now that would be really exciting!

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