A safe space for a new start: Sue’s Story
When Sue first met one of our Health and Wellbeing Coaches, she was at risk of losing her home. Rent arrears had led to Sue and her 2 young children being left with just 3 days to leave their house. After initial conversations where our Health and Wellbeing coach created a safe and supportive environment, Sue revealed that the issues facing her family ran deeper than just housing: she was planning to drop the kids off with her Mother and end her life that weekend. Our Health and Wellbeing Coach acted quickly to make sure that didn’t happen, immediately putting a safety plan in place and ensuring Sue couldn’t act on those urges.
Once we’d managed to avert the worst possible outcome, we could begin the work of making sure Sue had the tools to create a new life for herself and her children. We identified housing as one of the main barriers in Sue’s case, and began to connect with partners specialising in housing, with the aim of getting a safe roof over the family’s head. The biggest issue in this process was the rent arrears, and conversations turned to why the situation with rent had gotten so out of hand. Like in many of our cases, it turned out that behind that one initial issue lay some much bigger things from the past. Sue had suffered horrific violence from two previous romantic relationships, with both partners in prison when we started working with her. Part of the abuse had been financial, limiting her ability to get on top of her money troubles. Sue stated during this time that paying the rent, bills and other costs had fallen off her list of priorities when, in her own words, she was “just trying to stay alive and get through each day as it came.”
Through these conversations, and with previous knowledge of the case, the Health and Wellbeing Coach realised it was time for a more serious intervention. We referred Sue to a local mental health hospital, where through daily outpatient appointments she was diagnosed with Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, as well as Emotionally Unstable Personality Disorder. It took a lot for Sue to attend these appointments, engage with medical professionals so fully, and ultimately advocate for herself in getting a diagnosis and treatment. We watched with pride as she became the driving force behind her own recovery. This meant she was in a much better place when she found out that one of her ex-partners was due to be released in a month.
Before we started working with Sue, that news would have been devasting. However, this time around, she rolled her sleeves up and got on with the business of securing herself a place to live and protecting her mental health. She accepted a prescription for medication to stabilise her moods. She has moved home with her Mam, and is working with a local charity specialising in Domestic Abuse to find a place in a safe house for herself and her kids. She’s planning to volunteer with us, in order to help other women in a similar position to her. She recently found out she is pregnant with her third child, by her new partner. With our Health and Wellbeing Coach’s help, Sue has made sure she was the right tools in place to ensure her growing family are happy, healthy and ready to take any opportunities life throws their way.
“The change is Sue is plain to see when you talk to her. It’s a visible, emotional, change that makes me very proud.”
FAMILY GATEWAY HEALTH AND WELLBEING COACH
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