Experiences of The Dragon Cafe

The Dragon Cafe takes place on Mondays in the crypt of St Georges Church in Borough. I first went to the Dragon Cafe over a year ago. It’s a place where I eat well, relax and have gained a great confidence.  I wanted to share this with other people but thought, is this just my experience? What do others think of their experience of the cafe? So I asked if I could film there and, with support of my SHP blogging support assistant and some other SHP clients, we went to the cafe to find out what others felt. I hope everyone who reads this has a place like the Dragon Cafe to go to.

Louise Goodison

The Mental Health Forms

Being a service user in the mental health system, I have to fill out forms. Forms most users get another person to help them with. They are long, and very detailed.

The first one you fill in you understand it being long and detailed. This is how they get to know you, to make their decision.  When you get your second, third and so on, they send the same form, the same length, the same amount detail. It made me wonder.

Have they lost all the details I sent the first time? Why is there not a follow up form for long term ill people? Do they think I have been cured in-between forms? Do they think I and my team of professionals, who help, would be dishonest?

I have been given professionals to help me, I didn’t hire them myself. They also write to back up the forms, so they know who they are.  So if they all agree (because it is a team, not an individual who helps.) Why do the people who pay me, show such doubt? 

To fill in the book they send I need someone to give me some time. It takes a few hours, sometimes more if my head is in a bad state. Then I have to remember to get letters from others. Then I worry and fret. Then I fret and worry. If I’m in a bad mental health state, than I can close off from the world. Why don’t they believe me? Why are they checking again? Why is this happening to me? Paranoia starts to run rampant.

So my mental health at the beginning has fallen as I fill the form. I’m stressed. Now I’m wondering; why they just couldn’t be bothered to write a follow up form? Why can’t they be bothered to understand people with mental health conditions?

For Information and help on any mental health issues go to Mind.

©Louise Goodson/Magicmayflower.

Important Advice for the Atos Medical Examination: Beware the warm smile and the gentle voice!

I was at the SHP blog workshop on Friday when a conversation began about the Atos medical examination and about the assessment procedure. One of the participants in the conversation had recently been for a medical examination she had taken a friend to observe the procedure. Her friend began taking notes at which point the examiner told the person to stop as it is not allowed.

That was wrong.

My Medical

"Come for a work capability assessment", said the form from somewhere in Wembley. "Don't be late and you must turn up or we could dock your ESA benefit." The assessment was on a Saturday afternoon in March in a very clinical government building in Marylebone. So far, so same old.

What they don't tell you in the letter is what to really expect and so I'm really grateful to my fellow SHP service users (or friends as I'd prefer to call them) for giving me the SP on what goes on at these medicals and what paperwork and tablets to take with me. Thanks guys...

I last worked last August. I wish I could work. I wish I didn't have a diagnosis for PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder to the uninitiated) but I do. It means I can work until something upsets me or triggers a flashback to the powerlessness of being abused as a small child and then all bets are off. The flight or fight mechanism turns itself up to full volume and I either walk out of the workplace or tell someone (usually a boss and always a man) to go f*** themselves. This is not the best way to stay in a job and so the cycle of losing jobs continues. But enough of that old story.

Currently I'm getting better with the help of a top psychotherapist with Solace Woman's Aid in Islington, medication from my GP, lots of learning new skills like shutting up when I'd rather swear, saying "no" nicely at SHP, CAST, CRI, and some hard core academic theory with a teacher at City Lit called Christiane Sanderson who explains the science behind the often 'random' behaviour that stems from being sexually abused as a kid. 

I see the Iraqi doctor at Marylebone and once he's checked that I'm physically OK he asks about my mental health, so I hand him the psychiatrist's copious notes on the background to my mental diagnosis. As he reads I can see he wished he hadn't asked. He assured me he's a GP and not an expert in 'These Things'. Whatever mate? He's in a hurry to get rid of me after that and so I dissociate at the dehumanising of this awkward medical history. Basically what I do is shut up and leave my body. It seems easier than explaining to the nice doctor that I'd rather not be living alone in a less than ideal bedsit because I'm incapable of being in a relationship. I can't be arsed to tell him that looking at my past is not my pastime of choice. That it's not self-indulgent time-wasting and opening a can of worms just for the fun of it. That it's painful to feel you drowned in booze for your adult life. And that I'm committed, not to an institution, but to getting better. I want to tell him I do this 'feeling feelings' work because I want to live; not die by hurting myself because of what someone else did to me when I was too young to understand that I wasn't to blame.

Now I've left my body and am on the ceiling (not literally). I can hear him saying something about photocopying the report. Whatever. I used to cope with the self loathing of being abused by wearing my addict and an alcoholic hat at a jaunty angle. When I took that off 15 months ago the flashbacks came back like devils from hell. And guess what? So did the dissociation. So I say goodbye and leave the building. I know I'm in danger because I'm only partly conscious. I buy chips, chocolate, and fags to help me feel comforted. I'm very disorientated and need to get away from traffic fast. So my medical ends with me getting on the first bus I see and ending up in Edgeware. What can I say? It beats getting drunk.

Kate Grace   

A long road travelled

Photo by Bern J. Altman.
Photo taken from http://www.sxc.hu/ 

I was in the army for four years. I was based in Catterick, Durham, Dorset and Germany where my regiment were. The army was one big laugh. It was the best time of my life. I got out before the regiment saw any action. My first time in prison was a week after I came out of the army in 2002 and it’s been non stop since then. I don’t think I’ve had a full year out since then.

I was medically discharged because of my mental health. Since then I have been diagnosed with schizophrenia and severe depression. My life’s been a bit messed up. I have had counselling but it doesn’t seem to work. I have only just got my medication and really hope that will change things. I can’t even go out on my own most of the time.

I met my ex partner in 2002 whilst I was still in the army, based in Dorset. We got together after I spent a week’s holiday in Cornwall. Straight after that, everything happened at once; I was discharged from the army and my Mum died of cancer shortly after. I ended up doing a bit of time in prison and then went to live with my ex’s family when I came out. They are like my family.

I started working on the fishing boats in 2003. I was making good money. I stopped when my daughter was born because it wasn’t a safe life when you have got a little girl. It was a hard job to give up because it meant we had to change our lifestyle. I’ve only ever had one trip where we came home with nothing but other times we would get 4 grand.  When I had to give it up, that’s when the crime started. I regret it. I wish I could apologise to everyone and I could give everything back to the people I took it from. Sometimes I think I just want to get my head fixed and get back on the boats.

I separated from my ex partner in 2008 and ended up back in London where I am from originally. I came to SHP in 2011. I want to give London a go because all I know of it has been drugs. I’m living in the best place ever now. I like the cafés on Upper Street. It’s a nice city and I should be proud of where I’m from. Now that I’m not on the drugs I want to see the nice things.

My goal is in five years to become a Drug’s Worker. When I was in prison, I used to have loads of people in my cell saying to me “I’m stressed with this or that”. They would send people in to talk to me. Now I want to put something back into the community.

I speak to my daughter Kelsey on the phone every day. I haven’t seen her since 2008 I plan to go to Cornwall for her birthday. Now I’m back in touch with my daughter I don’t want to go back to jail. Once I’ve seen Kelsey I might not even want to come back to London. I could move down to Penzance where the fishing boats are.


Paul Stedman

Music as a healing power

What makes people love music so much?

“In all the world in all the gin joints you had to walk into mine.” Sam did play it again. Mainly music makes people decide to move to it in accordance as to how they feel.

Music can cost a lot to enjoy, but it’s just a normal part of life, of the system of things. Nothing initiates music but its own starch. Like at the football, songs can be heard by all. It’s part of the system. ‘Knees up mother brown’ and ‘Gee me the ol’ piano’ is decorously in the past. But how does music come about? Nobody in my opinion can resist music. Everybody can love it. So what makes you sing, play, gong, pong etc? 'Love I’m all shook up'. All the songs of the past come from life experience. 'Are your pants on fire'? Setting an example within society as a musical parody is badly missed as a stage. So come on, give us a round of ‘love is a splendid thing’ and then you will know music better than you did before.

I used to be a jazz singer for a group called Jasmine. Singing for them I felt spoilt because I never expected them to take me on really and it was a real treat. I sang in a pub called the Old Dog and Dumpling. There were drums, oboe and sax. It made me feel well. When I am feeling unwell, it’s like a full stop. A straight line of thought is gone.  You don’t realise what is happening or whether you can get up or talk or even speak. My life has been compromised by not coping. But, when I am leading or listening  to the music, it lifts my spirit. It just makes me want to move. It coordinates me between one reality and another. Music gives all realities. It helps me to know where I am.

E.M.