NEWS & EVENTS
7 Recommendations our New Mental Hea W
e all want to lead happy, healthy lives and to have the support we need for our mental health whenever we need it. This is the world our members want to see for all Care Experienced people, who can face greater need for mental health support. For several years, Care Experienced members of our organisation have been calling for changes to how their mental health is supported. Members also told us through our National Membership Survey and Members’ Assembly in 2021 that they want to influence change around mental health policy and practice. To build on this, we’ve worked with Care Experienced people across Scotland – from Ayrshire to Shetland – to ensure their thoughts and feelings get heard. After consulting 60+ members, we’ve created our new report ‘Tend our Light’ Mental Health Findings from our Annual Participation Programme. Care Experienced people told us how they describe and understand mental health, if their care experience has impacted their mental health, and what their views are around different services and supports. Importantly, we also wanted to know what changes they would specifically like to see. From the views shared with us, we’ve offered seven ways for Scotland to understand how to ‘Tend the Light’ for Care Experienced people:
1. Dedicated mental health services for Care Experienced people 2. Lifelong mental health support for Care Experienced people 3. Every child in care pro-actively offered mental health support 4. Supporting loving relationships for Care Experienced people 5. Tailored and specialist mental health training about care experience 6. Mental health education for Care Experienced people 7. The right to choose mental health support and access it quickly
16
Why is it important to focus on mental health?
When asked how care experience had affected their mental health, our members spoke about trauma and adversity, challenges with feeling loved and belonging, and the impact of being stigmatised due to their care experience. Every child has the right to grow up feeling safe in a family environment, free from discrimination, and around happiness, love and understanding. Through the experiences our members have shared, Care Experienced people’s rights have not always been fully realised – taking a toll on their mental health.
Every person we spoke to felt their care experience had impacted upon their mental health in some way. 79% of online survey respondents said that poor mental health impacted how they make and keep friends. Being Care Experienced has meant many young people have been less likely to experience loving relationships, and experiences lean more to being unsupported, isolated, and lonely. There were some positive experiences of the impact of care on members’ mental health, with a few participants finding care to be an escape from a negative situation and supporting them towards positive achievements, and that they had mental strength from going through tough experiences.
“We can see that Care Experienced mental health is endemic and we feel we have taken too many steps backwards. Now is the time to move forward” Lynda Greig, NRB Member
