student, continually learning, but that’s okay with me. These are not ordinary lives we are living.
Note This article is an extract from a longer
paper that will be published in the International Journal of Narrative Therapy and Community Work and explore in more detail the possibilities and complexities of bringing together Intentional Peer Support (2018; Mead, 2014) and narrative therapy.
References Denborough, D. (2014) Retelling the Stories of our Lives: Everyday Narrative Therapy to Draw Inspiration and Transform Experience. New York: Norton. Halberstam, J. (2011) The Queer Art of Failure. Durham, NC: Duke University Press. Intentional Peer Support (2018) What is IPS?
https://www.intentionalpeersupport.org/what- is-ips/ [Accessed 10/06/19]. Mead, S. (2014) Intentional Peer Support: An Alternative Approach. Vermont: Intentional Peer Support. White, M. (2002) Addressing personal failure. International Journal of Narrative Therapy and Community Work, 3, 33–76. Republished 2004 in M. White, Narrative Practice and Exotic Lives: Resurrecting Diversity in Everyday Life. Adelaide, Australia: Dulwich Centre Publications.
‘Going out towards Hac
Walking and talking togethe Jacqui Henry, Bruce Edwards, Anita Finch, Stephanie Mon
Walk and Talk is a peer-led initiative that is part of Hackney-based Shoreditch Trust Peace of Mind project. The group have been walking on a weekly basis for over seven years. We present the context and history of the group and members’ accounts of its impact.
Walk and Talk began as a collaboration
between Shoreditch Trust and the Black and Minority Ethnic Access Service of the East London NHS Foundation Trust. It grew out of listening to people’s needs and finding ways to maintain levels of support in the context of reduction in public services. Whilst funding prioritised minimal, light-touch support and ‘moving on’; initiatives like Walk and Talk provided consistency, continuity and a trusted space to meet and develop long-term relationships with peers. An atomistic, market-driven political approach to care has shaped increasingly short-term and individualised mental health services that negate the social isolation central to many experiences of emotional distress. Services have been constrained by neoliberal approaches that view recovery from mental health problems as the achievement of a set of individual goals, with an emphasis on employability and therapeutic interventions as time-limited. In contrast, Walk and Talk highlights the importance of sustained, meaningful relationships with people and place. Walk and Talk was one of the
Hamilton Kennedy is a peer support worker, narrative practitioner and member of the Dulwich Centre teaching faculty. He can be contacted c/o
hken8118@outlook.com
18
‘psychology in the real world’ groups developed by Guy Holmes and colleagues in Shropshire (Holmes, 2010). They hoped to help people connect with nature and each other, walking weekly by the River Severn. Shoreditch Trust’s Walk and Talk takes place far from this tranquil countryside, in Hackney, a densely-populated multicultural East London borough. Previously one of the most deprived boroughs, Hackney has undergone rapid gentrification, a process researchers have linked to displacement, loss and impacts on mental health (for example, Lees, 2018).
Shoreditch Trust runs a Healthy Living
Centre focused on supporting people to improve their health, wellbeing, social networks and opportunities. Walk and Talk was introduced as part of their ‘Peace of Mind’ project which promotes emotional wellbeing and recovery. The first walk took place in August 2011 and has continued weekly since that time. The group was initially facilitated by a community development worker from Shoreditch Trust and a clinical psychology trainee, leading walks along the canal and to local parks. Initial attempts to introduce approaches such as mindfulness were quickly dropped in favour of enabling the group to develop its own direction. The most significant development occurred after about a year, when the running of the group was taken on by participants themselves, facilitated by group members Bruce Edwards and Anita Finch, with ongoing support from Shoreditch Trust. Bruce draws on his local knowledge to design different routes and he describes how the group operates in Box 1. Often, the connections forged between group members extended beyond Walk and Talk. Anita describes a mutually- supportive friendship that went beyond the life of the group in Box 2. Following research on the impact of
Walk and Talk (Muir & McGrath, 2018), we would like to highlight two major aspects related to its success.
Collective connections A core aspect of Walk and Talk that
members value and view as therapeutic is the sustained sociality it facilitates. It is considered a supportive environment in which friendships can be formed as refl ected in interviews with group members:
Context 164, August 2019
‘Going out towards Hackney by coach for the ayre’: Walking and talking together
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