Mental First Aid

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A little while ago someone came through our doors asking for some help. She looked like she’d been roughed up, but was adamant that she didn’t want us to phone anyone for her or get medical help. All she wanted was to use the bathroom to clean up and, if we had any spare, some cash so that she could catch the bus.

Nothing we offered made a difference. She went to the bathroom, came out looking a little less disheveled, took the cash we offered, thanked us and left.

It freaked me out. A lot.

I felt that I should have been able to offer more, do more, help in some way – but had no idea how. It troubled me for weeks – still does, really. What also troubled me was that I had no tools to deal with how I felt about the event or how other people present at the time did. It was awkward and uncomfortable and I found it difficult to understand why I felt slightly guilty about the whole thing.

So when the opportunity arose for me to sign up for a course that would provide an overview of mental health issues and how a non-mental health professional can respond, I jumped at it.

The course is called Mental Health First Aid and it’s effectively the mental health equivalent of a standard first aid course. It was run over two days by the WA Association of Mental Health (WAAMH), who offered it at a significantly reduced cost – which was also a great incentive.

The course objective is to equip participants with the skills and resources to recognise and respond appropriately to someone experiencing a mental health crisis – at least until professional help arrives!

We covered a lot of ground, including:

  • Understanding Mental Health, including diagnoses, prevalence and common misconceptions
  • Symptoms and causes of depression, anxiety, psychosis and substance misuse.
  • How to provide initial support to adults who are experiencing a mental health crisis.
  • Crisis First Aid for: suicidal behaviour, panic attacks, aggressive behaviour, self harm, acute psychosis
  • Responding to the effects of substance misuse

Some of it was heavy going, but it was made very real for all of us by the lived experience stories of people who came in to share those with us. Then there was the added dimension of about 60% of the course participants also having their own lived experiences of mental health issues, many of them still raw and relatively easily triggered. It made for some difficult situations and complicated conversations – but all of those served to inform each of us in different ways about how mental health can and does impact people’s lives.

I hadn’t realised that one in five Australians experience mental health issues, or that anxiety and depression are major players. And yet people don’t talk about it, don’t allow mental health to be just another health issue that can be managed. Why is that? 

Perhaps part of it is fear. But if we don’t talk about the size and shape of the black dog (and his friend the elephant in the room), we won’t ever learn how to recognise it and learn how to manage it.

Having completed this very basic mental health first aid course, I feel slightly better equipped to answer some of the questions. I have facts, stats, a manual, an action plan and a certificate. These all make me feel safer. But what really made a difference was talking to people, understanding a little better how to really listen, how best respond, what sort of help to offer,  and where to find resources that can make a difference in a crisis situation.

I very much hope that if that young woman came back asking for our help again, I might just be able to do something useful for her without being quite so terrified that I’d be doing the wrong thing. And if she still only wanted to use the bathroom and get some bus fare… well, that’s okay too. 

Buy Nothing

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We recently had some surplus equipment at work that I didn’t know what to do with. Someone suggested that I post it up on the local Buy Nothing group to see if we could find a home for it. My look of ‘Eh?‘ made it clear that I had absolutely no idea what she was talking about.

So she explained that the Buy Nothing Project  is a gift economy – there’s no bartering and no buying/selling. The system is based on random acts of kindness, providing a way for people to give away items they no longer want or use.

This enables you to declutter without wasting perfectly serviceable items / sending them to landfill. Instead they go to someone who actually does want them.

There’s no obligation attached to any of the items shared or given away – they’re a gift. And there’s the add-on benefit of being able to connect with people in your local community if you choose to.

I loved the idea – but since you can only join one group and I don’t work in my own suburb, someone who belongs to that group advertised the office equipment and found a home for it. Good outcome.

In dues course I got around to signing up to my local group (on social media) and this weekend finally had something to offer.

Although we’ve been picking grapefruit and limes and giving them away for a few weeks, yesterday we pruned the trees. This meant picking all the remaining fruit. We filled box after box, ending up with over 200 pink grapefruit and at least 100 limes surplus to our requirements.

So I posted the following picture and message on the my BN site late yesterday afternoon: Pink grapefruit galore and a whole lot of limes: pm me if you’re interested 

By lunchtime today all the fruit was gone. Four people responded to my message and they all turned up at our house this afternoon. Some people took just a few of each, others took a whole box – it was great! A couple of people even climbed the ladder I’d left out and picked themselves some cumquats – which was a bonus both for them and for me. One person brought me a dozen oranges because he has too many of those. A win all round.

The follow up messages were lovely too:

Thank you so much, Nik, for the beautiful fresh fruit you shared with us today and also for showing us your lovely garden & your good advice for my friend’s little dog o nice to meet you!

 Thank you very much for sharing! My kids loved the cumquats!

It was my pleasure folks. There was way too much fruit for us to use – and this is SO not a jam-making year! I’m really glad to have been able to share our surplus and look forward to doing so again the next time we have laden trees.

I heartily recommend that people connect with their local Buy Nothing groups. And if it turns out that there isn’t one in your area: start one!

 

Musical interlude

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I can’t remember exactly when I was introduced to the works of W.S. Gilbert and Arthur Sullivan. Looking back, it seems like they were always part of the landscape of my life. My mother had a complete set of the D’Oyly Carte Opera Company’s recordings of the G&S comic operas and these were played often enough to be seem like an always-already-there family tradition.

By the time I actually saw my first live production, the patter-songs were an accepted part of life. We all got to know the words and my older brother in particular could reel them off with remarkable accuracy and speed. One of the outcomes is that  ‘I am the very model of a modern major general…’ was where I first hear of quadratic equations and also where I learned the difference between a mauser and a javelin! 

Our family habit of making reference to G&S with comments such as ‘..a policeman’s lot is not a happy one...’ sometimes got us funny looks from more mundane individuals. This eventually alerted me to the fact that not all families sat around listening to – and singing along with – light opera 🙂

Much to my delight the G&S Society of WA  scheduled two productions for this year. The first of these was The Gondoliers – and  what a hoot it was! Although I’d heard a recording of the Gondoliers many times, I’d never seen it performed – and the two simply don’t compare. The costuming was spectacular (I want a dress like that!), the orchestra outstanding and the interplay between the characters hilarious – particularly the Trumpesque Duke of Plaza-Toro 🙂

All round it was a most entertaining evening and we’re all looking forward to the September production of Patience. Bookings open in June – don’t miss it!

Compost cockroaches and other things

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I’ve been interested in composting for some time, mostly so that we can recycle our kitchen/garden waste rather than send it to landfill. Last week I was lucky enough to attend a great workshop presented by Peg Davies and Anne Pettit from Mindarie Regional Council. They had a host of useful information to share about worm farms, composting and recycling.

For years we’ve used a two compost bin system at home. The one on the right is currently our active bin. Into that I dump kitchen scraps (no meat), garden clippings, shredded newspaper and, when I think of it, some straw. The one on the left is the ‘inactive’ bin. We filled that last year, but stopped using it at the end of winter and left the contents to their own devices. Soon I’ll be emptying out the fabulous compost it’s created and spreading that around our garden.  Then that bin will become the active bin.. and so on.

This system works really well, although I have had some rather surprising compost adventures along the way. These have included unusual (and very creepy) maggots, an abundance of cockroaches, an infestation by a bees and a surprise mouse. Not surprisingly at all, I rapidly learned to wear gloves and boots every time I play with the compost!

The reason I went along to this workshop was to try to find out how to deal with the compost cockroaches: do I need to zap them? Are they a problem… or just creepy?

I came away with an answer to that quandry and whole lot of other info too, including Anne’s recipe for the delicious pear cake she brought along for morning tea 🙂

  • Apparently compost cockroaches aren’t a big deal. It turns out that the big critters break down the food scraps and make it easier for the littler critters to do their jobs. So, basically, just fortify-the-hell-up and cope. If the cockroach numbers get a tad epic, then add more carbon (shredded newspaper, etc) or, in extreme cases, a chicken. Yup, a live chicken. That’ll sort the little darlings out in no time, they assured us. I may have to borrow one from DaughterDearest sometime soon…
  • Doggy-do worm farms are a thing – who knew?! Totally going to give that a go under our fig tree when we plant it out the back. This will reduce our plastic bag use considerably and hopefully make the fig tree happy.

  • I hadn’t realised that soft or flexible plastics shouldn’t go in the verge side bins. This includes any plastic that can easily scrumpled into a ball – like bread packets, biscuit packs, cereal bags and the like. They get caught in the sorting machines and jam up the works. And there I was thinking I was doing the right thing. Sigh. Upside is that redcycle (soft plastic) bins are now in place at various shopping centres, so I’ll be able to drop ours off each week when I shop.

  • Did you know that expanded polystyrene also can’t go into verge side recycling bins? I didn’t. Fortunately companies like Claw Environmental will accept it for processing, so next time we get a large appliance we’ll definitely be heading out to drop the packaging off there.

Overall it was a really informative morning. Peg and Anne had many more tips to share – and lots of resources to offer. Check out the MRC website for heaps of downloadable info sheets. And, if you get the opportunity, definitely attend one of their (free!) workshops.

Sharing a smile

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Last week I was presented with the choice of 20+ fridge magnets and an invitation to choose as many as I’d like. The magnets were created by a friend from original photographs that he took, in and around Perth. He combined the images with words to create positive messages for himself – and then decided to share them.

The art work is terrific and part of me wanted to grab all 20 and whack them up all over my fridge. But instead I showed some restraint and spent a bit of time sorting through to see if any of them really leapt out at me and said ‘take me home’.

What I discovered is that, although they’re all lovely, only two of them really resonated with me on that particular day. One because it’s who I am and the other because I need the reminder. 

I must have looked at those magnets dozens of times since I put them up. Whenever I open and close the fridge, there they are. They remind me to take a mental step back from rushing around and be present in the moment  – and they’ve made me smile. Every time.

So thanks, friend, for sharing your thoughts and smiles. They’re greatly appreciated. Smiles are huge and happy and lovely and can totally make someone’s day – especially if they’re shared.

So here are my smiles, dear tea leaf readers. I hope they work for you too – and that you share them around 🙂