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Here’s your sign to explore a topic your soul is passionate about and take a Californian road trip at the same time! I manifested it. I did it. If your dreams don’t scare you, they aren’t big enough✨

Post Scholarship blues are a familiar friend tonight after hearing Leah’s updates 😭😍

ImROC's 8 core values guide peer support workers towards respecting and uplifting others in their work. A safe and progressive environment utilising personal strengths without judgement #imroc #peersupport

We are part of a global movement towards recovery. 🌍We're partnering with leaders worldwide to promote a recovery-focused approach. Find out how through the link below 🙌 imroc.org/locations/

About time I stopped using this account to like Taylor Swift posts and do what it was intended for… Soooo this week is the Refocus on Recovery Conference and I have the pleasure of joining @ImROC_comms for the two days 🤓

THIS IS GOING VIRAL SO I WANTED TO SHARE IT HERE TOO: A bit from my past: My first job after getting my PhD was working as a therapist for people from low socioeconomic backgrounds. Almost all of them were diagnosed with depression, GAD, bipolar, or BPD. Most were highly medicated— some to a point that still sticks with me years later. As I got to know their background and lives 3 things were very clear: 1. A vast majority had been emotionally neglected, emotionally abused, or physically abused as children. 2. A vast majority had experienced domestic violence or were currently living in it. 3. Basic needs were never met. Life was an hour by hour struggle. Treatment was an attempt to allow them to get to work in most cases. To just continue to surviving. It was the start of me questioning the field I had been trained in. One that diagnoses people with disorders without taking a look at the whole picture. It began my path of holistic understanding. A person cannot be well when one unexpected bill will have them fall behind on rent. When they lay their head on a pillow and all they can think about is expenses piling up. When a bill at the grocery store is almost double what they paid last year when their income has stayed the same. An entire family unit deeply struggles within survival mode. When a job is lost. When daycare needs to be paid, but so does the light bill— what do you choose? When parents can’t even think about the emotional needs of their children because they have to figure out where their next meal is going to come from. In 1942, 10 years before the diagnostic manual of mental illness was released Maslow knew what was once just common sense: we have a hierarchy of needs. At the bottom are basic needs food and shelter. Then safety (resources, security). Then belonging (connection, friendship, intimacy.) Without three things we *will* be sick, period. I get pushback for questioning the status quo. And I’ll continue to do it. The status quo is keeping people sick. It denies their experience. And it says we should bandage people’s symptoms so they can return to the environment that made them sick. May we wake up, heal ourselves, and build conscious communities to help each other. Retweet if you feel this is true in your body 🙏

What do Peer support relationships look like? 👀 They share power and responsibility. It is not a hierarchical or paternalistic relationship. It is a collaborative and reciprocal relationship, where both people have something to offer and something to gain 🫶 #mentalhealth

A Personal Reflection on Autism and Becoming an ImROC Trainer By Kellie Barker ImROC Autism Peer Support Trainer "My Rock and Me" 🩵 imroc.org/my-rock-and-me… #imroc #peersupport #autism Illustration by Kim Jinjoo

Okay so I made this account mainly for peer support/lived experience content and easily distracted me now has a feed full of Taylor Swift. I’m not mad but I was trying to separate from my personal accounts. Once a die hard Swiftie, always a die hard Swiftie 🫶🏻

Can’t lie. My brain gives me space more often than the allocated two days per week.

@NottsHealthcare Get Involved – Make a Difference – Involvement, Experience & Volunteering (nottshc.nhs.uk)

Gutted I missed @melanieanneball’s key note but looking forward to furthering conversations in the future! 🫶🏻

Had the best day at the CNWL Lived Experience Practice National Conference. What an honour to share space with some of the most inspirational people working around the Lived Experience/Peer Support Arena! 🫶🏻 #LXConference2023

It was a pleasure to be a part of this meeting! Exciting times ahead for career development opportunities for Peer Workers 👏🏻

Recovery-focused is at the heart of everything we do at ImROC. This means keeping to our values; hope, control and opportunity 🫶 #imroc #peersupport #mentalhealth #mentalhealthawareness #recovery #recoveryfocused #values

We really enjoyed watching the Nottingham Roosevelt Memorial Travelling Scholarship presentations last week. Great to see Peer Support and Race Equity high on the agenda! 🙌 #peersupport #mentalhealth #imroc

It’s me, hi 🫶🏻

I’m about to embark on a delayed update from America but right now I’m on cloud nine! @NottsRoosevelt was the best time of my life and I wouldn’t be where I am without @Nottshcpeersup1 and @ImROC_comms 🫶🏻

Had the most fantastic night feeding EVERYTHING back from my scholarship! Here’s to the future of Peer Support and true change🩷

An increase in Peer Support Workers outlined, fab! But failed to mention a need for career progression opportunities for PSW’s or even the acknowledgement that we need Peers in more senior positions. More PSW’s, but who is supervising? Who is maintaining integrity?