Our Wellbeing Coaches cover many aspects of day-to-day life that people in our communities may need support with, including managing Chronic Pain. Here is just a small snippet of what one of our Wellbeing Coaches has been up to recently.
I took a group out to Stoneface Woodland last week; they did two rounds of the walk, created fantastic pieces of art using clay and hung them around the woodland, and created bird feeders. They had a fantastic day. It was cold but they wrapped up and had access to a warm room for lunch, praying and clay modelling. The group enjoyed the woodland, took lots of photos, socialised, participated in all activities and felt a sense of achievement!
I am still handing out pain packs and making adjustments based on client feedback.
We recently started chronic pain group sessions at Concord. Each session has different activities and the clients attend for eight sessions before deciding which activity they would like to continue participating in. Activities include seated exercise, low impact circuits, nutrition advice, diabetes talk, mental health talk, chronic pain tools, holistic approaches and services they can use to help them manage pain.
To accommodate both men and women, I have decided to alternate between women only and men only sessions. I planned to use Concord as they have lots of facilities and can use the sports hall for badminton and circuit training, but the group that attend have very low mobility. I assess the clients that turn up on the day and make changes to the session plans accordingly.
Today we did a small circuit, consisting of walking, body weight exercises, relaxation, massage balls, and dietary advice. All clients participated and had lots of fun!
Walking groups are now lead by three volunteers that used to attend the walks. We are in the process of sending them on the walk leaders training. It's great to see the community come together, sustain activities and motivate each other.
I've had lots of fantastic feedback from both clients and colleagues, but there is always room for improvements. I'm currently looking into how I can get a volunteer Slovak speaker to translate in my chronic pain sessions. At the moment Roma clients follow me, but to get them to understand the information I give out, it is important I have a Slovak interpreter that can speak fluently in both English and Slovak.
Whilst there are always things to improve on and we can always learn more, it sounds like our Wellbeing Coach is doing a top job with their Chronic Pain Clients. It sounds like a fab day was had by all on the Stoneface Woodland outing, including the local birds!
A walk in nature can do wonders for both your physical and mental wellbeing, and creating some lovely art can be good for the soul as well. That on top of the fantastic facilities and services on at Concord, just goes to show the great work happening in our communities. All we need now is a Slovak Interpreter and there will be no stopping them!