CAPS 30th Birthday!
We’d like to celebrate this special birthday at our AGM in November. If you have any ideas about how you think we should do this, please email our Communications Manager catherine@capsadvocacy.org
Website redevelopment coming soon
We have a new member of staff! Catherine Street joined us on the 5th of April as Communications Manager. It has been our ambition for some time to have someone on the staff team who is dedicated to communications. As part of her role Catherine will be working on a new website with the wonderful web designer Ben Usher Smith. Ben and Catherine will work together on a brand refresh and development of a new website in consultation with staff, members and the people we work with. Ben is not new to CAPS as he designed our Out of Sight Out of Mind website and we’re very glad that he is able to work with us again. Catherine will also be working on our social media development and will support our management committee. For any communications and website related inquiries you can contact her at catherine@capsadvocacy.org or 07971 951502.
CAPS Thrive work
Arts and Creativity
In November 2020, the Out of Sight Out of Mind (OOSOOM) exhibition took the form of a slightly smaller than usual, physical exhibition at Summerhall in Edinburgh and for the first time online, on a brand-new website. This means that the exhibition can still be viewed throughout the year: www.outofsightoutofmind.scot
Exhibitors, audiences and planners shared their thoughts about what the exhibition means to them via the website. Here are a few excerpts from what people said:
“OOSOOM is a wonderful opportunity for people to come together in a beautiful display of strength and solidarity. This exhibition raises awareness of mental illness, challenges stigma and offers a safe and supportive space for expression.”
“It’s my third time participating as an artist and OOSOOM is a great platform to speak up about our struggles in whatever form. The exhibition this year was even more significant to me with all this (Brexit/COVID-19) going on and affecting us all. Some beautiful, extraordinary personal and very relatable pieces there. The website is a great way to re-visit the exhibition”
Have a look for yourself. It will soon be time to start thinking about the 2021 exhibition and if you’d like to find out about how to get involved, contact pam@capsadvocacy.org
New Collective Advocacy projects –
We are delighted to to tell you about our two new Collective Advocacy groups in Edinburgh.
One group is for people from ethnic minority backgrounds with lived experience of mental health issues. To find out more, please contact Mohasin, the collective advocacy worker for this group,mohasin@capsadvocacy.org
The other group is for for LGBTQI+ people with lived experience of mental health issues. To find out more, please contact Jacob, the collective advocacy for this group, jacob@capsadvocacy.org
The people who get involved will shape this work. They will determine what is important to them and what needs to change. The project can give strength and power to their voices.
Thrive aims to create access to high quality mental health support for all and the views and needs of these communities will be able to inform service provision and design.
Experience Led research relating to Eating Disorders
CAPS has a collective advocacy project for people with experience of Eating Disorders – Seen But Not Heard. This group has been around for a few years and people in the group are really excited to be able to focus on specific topics where greater awareness and change are required.
The research topic is being finalised and contenders are
- Men and Eating Disorders
- Continuity of care and treatment for students moving to a different Health Board area.
The group will design the methods of gathering information and will analyse findings and present them along with recommendations. If you have experience of an Eating Disorder and would like to be involved in the research, and/or in the other activities of the group, contact Niamh Allen on niamh@capsadvocacy.org
CAPS’ other collective advocacy groups – Personality Disorder, Psychosis, Trauma, Oor Mad History, Arts as Advocacy and Lothian Voices are meeting regularly on Zoom. Please contact the relevant collective advocacy worker – go to the front page of our website for the contact details of our collective advocacy workers.
For general volunteering enquiries with any of CAPS projects, you can contact Victoria Jackson, Volunteer Co-ordinator, on victoria@capsadvocacy.org
New Children’s Hearing Advocacy service
21 September 2020: We are delighted to announce our Children’s Hearings Advocacy service. Lara and Rosie are our Children & Young People’s Individual Advocacy Workers. They provide individual advocacy to children and young people who are being supported by the Children’s Hearings System. See the webpage for more details including how to contact them.
COVID-19 AND EATING DISORDERS
5 May 2020 The current Coronavirus situation is unprecedented. It is causing a huge change in society, creating uncertainty, anxiety, and disruption to normal lives and normal routines. For people with an eating disorder, this disruption may bring about extra challenges that may be difficult to deal with on top of everything else. Quite often, living with an eating disorder already brings fear and panic, and the current situation has the potential to intensify this. The CAPS Eating Disorder collective advocacy group, Seen But Not Heard, have put together some information on their experience of living in these extraordinary times, and addressed some concerns that people living with an eating disorder may have.
Download Covid-19 – Eating Disorder Experiences CAPS 2020