PEER SUPPORT GROUP

Take the first step to a happier future

My name is Andrea Taylor-Burke. I run The Life Support Group. It welcomes anybody who is struggling with any kind of life problem from depression to anxiety to people who are being bullied or feel unworthy or are just fed up with day to day life. This is a project I feel very passionate about having struggled with depression for 17years now. Feeling like your alone is hard and this group offers the support and friendship of people who suffer the same and understand what your going through. We have been running now since August 2017, the group is doing well and has helped numerous people and continues to do so. No one in the group has any professional qualifications to help the members only life experience which does help a lot, however we can guide the members to the right channels if they need professional help for example the Samaritans or other organisations.

We run a Group session every Wednesday evening from 7:30pm-9:30pm. In this session we all talk about how we are doing and how our weeks have been and support each other where necessary. We have free tea and coffee and biscuits for the members. We do not charge for the service although we ask for a small donation for the church but this is not compulsory. We do have guest speakers who come in some weeks to talk about things that may help the members ie yoga, knitting. This has been very successful. We have a meditation night the first week of every month which is run but Heather Berry a yoga teacher from the area. She comes in to teach the group to meditate and brings along some of her students. Again this is free of charge.

Our aim is to help people who are suffering alone. We hope that we can reach out to people who are sat at home feeling depressed and not knowing where to turn. Having somewhere to go has been a lifeline to so many of our members. The change in people who attend has been amazing. A lot of people who suffer just need to know they matter and their not alone.

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