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Author: stacey

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How Do You Get Through Tricky Times? 

Here comes September, and I find myself curling into the brace position, breathing laboured, knuckles white.

I have found September tricky for a long time. Partly due to the anniversary of a traumatic time in my life, but also because of the change in pace. I love the leisurely stroll of summer, with time off work, holidays, trips to the beach and salad for tea. (And if we are fortunate, some sunshine!) I flourish in the slowness of it all. When summer slips into September, I feel a sense of loss, knowing that summer is gone for another year and the next one seems so far away.

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Rubble Rumbles: How do you cope with overwhelm?

by Stacey Marriott Night Light Café Manager

This week I woke one morning to find myself crushed and depleted beneath a mounting heap of overwhelm. I could hear the screech of brakes and the tumble of rubble as the tipper trucks approached and let down their load.

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What’s New with the Night Light Cafes?

by Stacey Marriott – Night Light Cafe Manager

The Night Light Cafes continues to be part of the NHS Community Mental Health Transformation Programme, which is being rolled out throughout England and Acts Trust. The project has seen a lot of change over recent months, including the launch of new cafes and the welcoming of new team members, so here is a whistle stop update!

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A Lesson from my Cheese Plant

by Stacey Marriott – Night Light Cafe Manager

I recently googled the pointy things that are growing out of my cheese plant and discovered that they are called ‘aerial roots’ and grow to latch on to other plants to give support to the cheese plant as it grows. Wow! The cheese plant by design develops its own support structure. How cleverly created.

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Interview with the New Night Light Cafe Assistant Coordinator?

by Stacey Marriott – Night Light Cafe Coordinator

The Night Light Cafe staff team has recently grown as we welcomed Kerry to the team at the start of August in the role of Assistant Night Light Cafe Coordinator. We thought an interview with Kerry would provide a great opportunity for you all to get to know her a little better!

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NHS Mental Health Transformation: What does it look like?

by Stacey Marriott – Night Light Cafe Coordinator

The Night Light Cafes are part of the NHS Transformation programme for Lincolnshire. But what does that mean?

In the Night Light cafes, and indeed in my everyday life, I often have conversations with people who have felt let down by ‘the system’ when it comes to their mental health. They may have been told they are not poorly enough to receive support, or even too poorly to receive the support they have tried to access. With long waiting lists and overstretched staff teams, the NHS have received a lot of bad press over the years and when people feel let down by the organisation who is meant to be helping them this can be detrimental to their already diminished mental health. 

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An Interview with a Night Light Café Guest

by Stacey Marriott – Night Light Café Coordinator

We value all our guests who come to our Night Light cafes, whether this is for a one off visit or to come to find a weekly safe haven. I recently met up with one of our guests, Anastasia for a chat and this is what she had to tell me:

Q What’s your favourite animal and why?

I love cows, I really love a big ginger cow! I also love sloths because they are sleepy and slow like me.

Q I notice you have blue hair, tell us about that?

I thought that everyone was staring at me, so I thought I would make them stare! I dyed my hair blue and got lots of piercings.

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An interview with a Night Light volunteer

I recently had a chat with Michelle who has been a very active part of our volunteer team since we first began, serving on a team and also making regular befriending calls from home. Michelle has been an enormous asset to our team and has given so generously of her time, so it was good to hear a little more about what motivates her.

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Night Light Cafe: What is the value of what we do?

The Night Light Cafe recently had the pleasure of working with LORIC (Lincolnshire Open Research and Innovation Centre) in the production of a report compiled to demonstrate the value of the service offered. The findings portrayed in the report have been an immense encouragement to all the team, who have worked tirelessly to build this project over the past 20 months, through the unforeseen covid climate which posed many obstacles we would never have anticipated having to overcome when we set out on this journey. 

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