Supporting individuals affected by prescribed drugs associated with dependence and withdrawal

We wish to circulate this important article from the British Medical Association (BMA) www.bma.org.uk/collective-voice/policy-and-research/public-and-population-health/prescribed-drugs-dependence-and-withdrawal and the letter from Professor Parveen Kumar to Nicola Blackwood MP highlighting the devastating health problems caused by dependence on prescribed drugs.
These are the type of Doctors we might feel safe when our health is being taken care of.

Nicola Blackwood MP
Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Public Health and Innovation
Department of Health
Richmond House
79 Whitehall
SW1A 2NS

24 October 2016

Dear Minister

Supporting patients affected by prescribed drugs associated with dependence and withdrawal

The British Medical Association (BMA) has taken a leading role in trying to identify what positive action is needed to support patients with dependency and withdrawal due to prescribed drugs. These patients suffer devastating health problems caused by prescribed drugs, such as benzodiazepines, z-drugs, opioids and antidepressants. We would like the government to play its part in providing this much needed support.

Antidepressant prescribing in the UK has more than doubled over the last decade, with over 70 million prescriptions dispensed in 2015 at a cost of over £340 million- this is a major public health issue. The provision of services for these patients is inconsistent across the country and it is clear that a national approach for services and guidance is needed.

Over the last three years, we have been working collaboratively with a wide range of stakeholders including the medical royal colleges, professional organisations and patient groups, to identify three key measures which we believe are vital to supporting affected individuals. These are:

1. A national 24 hour helpline for prescribed drug dependence The introduction of a national 24 hour helpline for prescribed drug dependence would provide vital, real time support and could be implemented in a relatively short time frame. This national helpline would sit alongside a website and act as a single trusted resource for patients themselves to manage their drug dependence and also for doctors to signpost patients when they need crucial support.

2. A national approach to specialised services for those patients suffering with dependence on prescribed drugs There are currently a small number of charity groups providing support but they cannot meet the vast demand. In the absence of specialist services, patients are often referred to general drug and alcohol services, which again have few resources or indeed the training or skills to manage prescribed dependence.

3. Robust guidance on tapering and withdrawal management for psychoactive medications There is currently inadequate guidance in this area. NICE have recognised this is an issue and is considering the development of guidance on managing prescription medicines associated with dependence and withdrawal. It is vital that this guidance is developed and we would welcome any support you could offer in this area.

We fully acknowledge there is much more the medical profession could do to support these patients. To this end, we are working with key stakeholders to ensure doctors and medical students are adequately trained in managing the risks associated with prescribing psychoactive medications.

I would very much welcome the opportunity to meet with you to discuss our work, and to look ahead to plan what needs to be done next to support these patients. I attach a copy of the BMA’s analysis report ‘Prescribed drugs associated with dependence and withdrawal - building a consensus for action’, which provides more information on the work we have done so far on this important issue.

I would be grateful if your PA could kindly contact Susan Bahl, Senior Public Affairs Officer at the BMA on 020 3058 7457 to arrange an early meeting at your convenience.

With best wishes

Professor Parveen Kumar CBE
Chair, BMA Board of Science

Read the letter (PDF)

R.I.P. Robert Dellar

From the Mental Health Resistance Network
Devastating news. Robert Dellar, an integral member of MHRN has died today. We are in deep shock. Robert was one of the founders of Mad Pride in the UK, has been both a worker in mental health and an on and off survivor. His knowledge was extensive, his integrity impeccable, his politics were based on compassion and justice. How will we survive without this great man? We are at a loss this evening. Robert organised a protest late in 2010 which was held in Hyde Park and from this some of us were inspired to set up MHRN. Recently he has been very active in MHRN and was one of the people who took part in some iconic banner drops. He was a stabling force in MHRN, unrestricted by convention, but always rational and reasonable. He was also a talented writer, a great friend to us and to everyone who lived with mental health issues and those who lived on the margins of society. Whether you knew him or not, he was a friend. We loved him very much.

December FEEL meeting

The next FEEL meeting is Monday 19 Dec at 6.30 pm in LARC at 62 Fieldgate Street, E1 1ES.

There will be mince pies!  
(Other seasonal goodies welcome from any generous hands.)

We might have a couple of items of business, as well.  
Hope to see lots of you on the 19th.  

Depression Research Engagement Event

​Dear​ ​All​,

​

There are 2 events which I am organising in January at the Tavistock Clinic. The flyer is attached and below. The events aim to engage people who have experience of mental health conditions and carers in discussing a recent research study carried out at the Tavistock looking at the effectiveness of psychoanalytic psychotherapy for treatment resistant depression. The event also seeks to engage service users in considering what sorts of research should be carried out in future by the Tavistock. I would be most grateful if there was any way you could help to circulate information about these events so that any service users and carers who might be interested in coming can find out about them and decide whether to come along. Registration details are on the flyer. Please let me know if there is any more information you would like about the events, I am very happy to be contacted to answer any questions.

Many thanks and best wishes,

Dr Susan McPherson

School of Health and Human Sciences

University of Essex

Colchester CO4 3SQ

​

​

Depression Research Engagement Event

for: service users, carers, public, GPs and commissioners

at: Tavistock Clinic, 120 Belsize Lane, London NW3 5BA

Dates: 10th January 2017 9.30am-12.30 or

27th January 2017 4.30pm-7.30pm

***RSVP***places limited***

Speakers:

 Dr Susan McPherson: An overview of findings from the Tavistock randomized controlled

trial of psychodynamic psychotherapy for treatment resistant depression

 Dr Anita Berlin: A GP perspective

 Birgit Kleeberg: A psychotherapist perspective

 TBC: A client perspective

Share your views, comment, critique

The events will involve taking part in a focus group to discuss your thoughts about the

research, how it might or might not influence you as a practitioner, service user, carer or

​ ​

commissioner; and what type of research you think would be useful in this area in the future.

We welcome the sharing of all opinions and comments. We will also ask you to complete a

​ 

brief online survey when you register as well as after the event and 3 months later.

​Service users and carers taking part in the event and completing the surveys will receive a £20 high-street voucher to thank you for your time and can be reimbursed for up to £10 in travel expenses. 

Any questions?

If you have any questions about the event before you register, please contact:

Dr Susan McPherson T: 01206 874143 E: smcpher@essex.ac.uk

Register

​ 

http://bit.ly/2f9kRhS

MHTN presents: A Celebration of WOMEN Survivors' Performance

This month's Mental Health Resistance "social" on Friday, is CELEBRATION OF WOMEN SURVIVORS' PERFORMANCE starring MC C-T, VOODOO CiTi, DOLLY SEN, TARA FLEUR "woman of bones," MICHELLE BAHARIER, Cinarama, MADELEINE SMITH and WENDY YOUNG treating us to an eclectic mix of live music and spoken word! Floor spots for early arrivals only. Free entry and refreshments, meet old and new friends, all of our friends welcome!

The Field, New Cross385 Queens Road, SE14 5HD London  November 25 at 6 PM - 10 PM

Next FEEL meeting is 21 November, 6.30pm at LARC

Please join us on Monday, 21 Nov 6.30pm at LARC 62 Fieldgate Street,  E1 1ES for our monthly FEEL meeting.

We were joined by 2 researchers from Joanna Moncrief's team at the last meeting, as they are working on the RADAR project, looking at whether stopping or reducing antipsychotic medication could  make life better for people.  It looks like we could have one of our Kingsley Hall events with the research team at some point soon.

People at the Knowing Our Rights event in Sept wanted another session on this topic.  There was considerable interest in the subject of advocacy and how to get it.  We need to decide how to take this forward.  So there is plenty for us to be working on and we need your ideas how to do this. So, please join us on the 21st.  All the best Myra.

PS: Today, 15th November, marks the 9th Anniversary since the group met for the first time, back in 2007.

Happy Birthday FEEL

October FEEL meeting Monday 17th October

It's time for the monthly FEEL meeting reminder.

Join us at LARC next Monday 17 October from 6.30pm. Thanks.

​​FEEL meets the third Monday of each month between 6.30 - 8.30 pm @ LARC Centre ​62, Fieldgate Street, Whitechapel E1 1ES​

FEEL event 23 September, 7pm Kingsley Hall

Knowing Our Rights is the theme for the next FEEL event, taking place on Friday 23 September at the Kingsley Hall, Bow. Doors open at 6.30pm. Prompt start at 7pm.

Please distribute the information about this meeting as widely as you can. Thank you.

Blake's 189th Deathday.

All are invited to Blake Rising this Friday 12th August to celebrate Blake's 189th Deathday. From 1pm at Bunhill fields, Old St tube, London EC1.

Bring poetry,music,picnic. Hope to see you there. The William Blake Congregation

www.bl.uk/romantics-and-victorians/videos/william-blake-spiritual-visions

Next FEEL meeting is on Monday 15 August, 6.30 at LARC.

This is our last chance to make plans for our next event on 23 September at Kingsley​ Hall.

We have a speaker who works in a mental health trust law department as part of the Patients Rights - Our Responsibility campaign. We need to confirm speakers on advocacy, welfare rights, etc. Then we need to make a leaflet and distribute it.

The Mudlarks band is on holiday so we are lining up some of our poets. Please come and help get everything confirmed. See you there.

FEEL meets the third Monday of each month 6.30 - 8.30 pm
@ LARC Centre 62, Fieldgate Street, Whitechapel E1 1ES
https://www.facebook.com/feel.campaign
https://twitter.com/EastEndLoonies

Next FEEL meeting 18 July

W​e are busy planning the next FEEL event to take place on 23 September, 7 pm at Kingsley Hall, Powis Road, E3 3HJ. The topic will be Knowing Our Rights. We have asked ​for a speaker from the East London Foundation Trust Mental Health Law Team, a representative from the National Association of Welfare Rights Advisers, an expert in advocacy and Disabled People Against the Cuts (DPAC) speaker.

We have discovered some really useful resources about mental health rights - Mental Health Act Code of Practice and Mental Health Big Book of Benefits. We think more people ought to know about these books and how to use them to secure our rights. There will be copies of these books at the meeting, along with some ideas how you can get access to them (they are expensive!).

There will be the usual wonderful music from the Mudlarks and refreshments, of course.

Please come along to the next FEEL meeting on Monday 18 July to help us finalise these plans. We want to know about other resources and suggestions for Knowing Our Rights. See you at LARC.

Call for papers

Eleusinian Press is a small publishing company working in an interzone, a space that is part of and separate from, on the edgelands of; academia, music writing, mental health activism and left-wing politics. We are looking to curate a new collected volume on unrecovery. 

What is unrecovery? It is the practice of living with one’s distress, one’s mental health history in a time of austerity, where ‘choice that is no choice’ is rammed down our throats on a daily basis. Whe new are asked for support and given CBT. When we are told that we ‘can recover’ and rather than a ‘personal journey’, it is a pre-navigated outcome measure. When the possibility of recovery fought for against the bio-medical model has turned around and bitten us on the arse and become a means to explain why we failed the WCA whilst our housing situation turned shit because of the bedroom tax and the subsequent homelessness is a lifestyle choice. It is being sanctioned because you missed your appointment because your voices made you agoraphobic five minutes before you were due to leave the house. When the constant nudge unit in charge of nudging units makes our inner worlds a shit shower of dystonic buzzing. Unrecovery is a reaction to this. It is practices, like making noise, walking an erratic path to escape the microfascist nomos police, cooking up a Storm, researching the hex-files, scatting back at the top down semio-therapies, unflagging the behaviourist order word semaphore, rewriting the signing in-book. It is about solidarity, building mad unions, it is about training up the activist community to help with ever more punitive benefit forms, it is looking at housing, it is looking at protesting policy. It is looking beyond individualist psychology that is designed to turn us into efficient working subjects for capital. It is about biopolitics, it is about Das Swamp Dog Ding, it is about eluding control. It is about making a stand. It is about fighting back. It is about respecting our concrete situations. It is about the lay of the land. The map not just not the territory, the territory is not the terrain. Territory is about capture. It is no longer the fish getting off the hook from the Mental Patients’ Union, it is escaping the trawler’s net. As Daedalus said, as Nemo said, keep swimming down, down, down. And wrestle the Minotaur to the ground. The Minotaur is the language of profit, and its stench has saturated the ideological labyrinth. It has saturated the language of mental health recovery. And in the crisis of capitalism that is intentional, permanent austerity, the Minotaur is fascist. 

The Eleusinian Press is looking for stories and articles from 4,000 words up. The pay is 4p a word based on work published in the volume. We will be having a kickstarter next year, but we are looking for articles from now. 
Please email alastair@eleusinianpress.co.uk

June FEEL meeting

The next FEEL meeting is this Monday, 20 June, 6.30 pm. LARC, 62 Fieldgate Street, E1 1ES. Please join us to help plan our next Friday evening event in September on the topic of knowing our rights. 

We have been unable to contact a new project to be running sessions on rights for service users as part of the Patient Rights: Our Responsibity Campaign. We want to invite her to come to a FEEL meeting, but can't seem to find her. 

Maybe someone out there knows about this project, or how to find it. We now have a copy of the Mental Health Act 1983: Code of Practice, Revised 2015, thanks to HealthWatch. Our rights are spelled out very clearly and one of our members has downloaded it to his iphone for speedy reference. It is on line if other people want to have a look. Do join us Monday evening to get on with planning our event.

World Thyroid Day

It's World Thyroid Day today. Are you suffering mental health difficulties or are these psychological symptoms due to a thyroid disorders? Find out more here 

Source: Hypothyroid Mom

 

Unofficial advice if you are threatened with being sectioned while sleeping rough. By Alex White

There have been reports of a number of people being sectioned to get them off the street. If you find yourself in this situation, knowing what the law is may help you to resist it. As we all know too well, the homeless agencies will break any rule in the book if they can get away with it, but quoting the law to them may make them play things slightly more by the book as well as demonstrating that you are more together than they are making out.

The main sections which concern us are Section 2 and 3 of the 1983 Mental Health Act, but you may find you are initially sectioned under one of the emergency sections, (4 or 136) to get you off the street initially. But I'll start with 2 and 3 anyway, and come back to the others. Section 2 is for assessment and you can be held for up to 28 days. Section 3 is for treatment (although you can also be treated under Section 2) and is up to 6 months, which can then be renewed.

Both Section 2 and Section 3 must be authorised by 3 people to be legal. One must be a section 12 approved doctor (usually a psychiatrist), another can be any other doctor and the third must be an AMHP - approved mental health professional (who can be a nurse, social worker etc but must have been officially approved by Social Services i.e. not any bloody outreach worker)

You should ask each of these which one they are and if possible write down their names. Whatever state your head's in - and who wouldn't have a screwed up head after time on the streets) try to snap out of it and pretend to be boringly normal - unless you plan to go down fighting - in which case be my guest!

Ask them for documentation of what they are doing.

Emergency Sections

One doctor and an AMHP can use Section 4 to force you to go to hospital they can then process you for Section 2 or 3. Also the police can bring you in under Section 136. Always ask questions about your assessment - what and why.

Voluntary patients

All the above assumes that you go to psychiatric hospital against your will, but the majority of psychiatric patients are technically voluntary. I say technically because it doesn't mean they can just walk out - if they try to they are told they will be sectioned. I'm not sure whether to advise you to go in voluntarily, or if it makes much difference - they will let you out when they choose to, not when you choose to.

Treatment

Many people imagine that when they go into psychiatric hospital that they will be talking about their problems to mental health staff. You will get a structured assessment interview to begin with but that is just to fit you into a diagnostic category, but thereafter you will usually only see your psychiatrist for 15 minutes once a week at a strange ritual called a ward round. The staff you will mostly be dealing with are nurses, who have no interest in interaction with their patients except to give them drugs or order them around - they are basically warders - they spend most of their time chatting to each other. Being a psychopath is not a condition of employment of being a psychiatric nurse but it certainly appeals to people who want unaccountable power over vulnerable people. Treatment (if you're sectioned you have no right to refuse - but argue, and make them document your oppostion!) consists of ECT (Electro-convulsive therapy) or drugs. There's not much psychotherapy and what there is is useless. Drugs are not good for you but don't let them use electroshock on you. Any sane being can work out what electroshock does to your brain; don't let anyone tell you anything different. If you want the in depth details about electroshock, this is one of the best articles to read: breggin.com/index.php?option=com_docman&task=doc_download&gid=6

You are allowed to refuse electroshock, but you have to have the capacity to do so. Capacity means how together you are. As you can guess, it's very easy for them to claim you have no capacity and need your brain fried. A very limited way to oppose this is to make something called an Advance Decision.

The Mental Capacity Act (2005) gives legal recognition to advance decisions, which are statements you draw up with witnesses about how you want to be treated when you are what they consider to be sane. Make sure your doctor or any other relevant mental health professionals have a copy. However, unfortunately they are allowed to override it. One very important exception to that is Electro Convulsive Therapy (electroshock) I have told by a solicitor that an advance decision opposing electroshock is legally binding.

Something else worth considering is that when they section you they can effectively disappear you. But there is a way to prevent them doing this: Write a statement authorising a friend to be informed of your whereabouts and give signed copies to your friend, GP and the mental health team (do the same with an advance decision) If you disappear without warning, the GP and the mental health team will probably ignore requests from your friend to tell them your whereabouts. What they then have to do is to go to the County Court and get an injunction (this is free if they are on benefits). This orders them to comply - I've seen one - they order the psychiatrists to comply within 48 hours or face prison - they really freak them out.

The statement should say: "This is to advise you that I am giving my consent and authority to (the name and address of the friend) to act on my behalf with regard to my health and medical and social welfare. This is to remain in force until actively revoked by myself" (signed by the potential patient)

To enforce it you contact the county court to book a case - it costs £280 but that can be remitted if you fill in a form saying you are on benefits. The case I know about sets a legal precedent: it was granted this year (2016) in Willesden County Court case no c00w1435

One argument you could use against them is to say that there are mental health professionals opposed to all this shit and you agree with them. For example Joanna Moncrieff, Jonathan Bindman and Duncan Double (psychiatrists), Professor Richard Benthall, Dorothy Rowe, Lucy Johnstone, Dave Harper (clinical psychologists) all working in the NHS are all opposed to ECT and drugging.

lt place to do that and it is only likely to bring you to the attention of the thought police. There are such things as crisis houses, but there aren't very many and they're not very accessible to people on the street. Maybe try going to a bothy (a little hut in the mountains) - plenty in Wales, Northern England or Scotland

You have the right to a mental health advocate to defend your rights and represent your views on treatment. Twenty years ago advocates were radical, but my impression now is that they are pretty crap, but demand one anyway. They should at least be able to put you in touch with friends.

If you're a friend of a 'binliner' (someone banged up in a loony bin) go and visit them, because the bastards can get away with less shit.

Some background

There is a division of opinion about how to understand madness and depression. Most doctors adhere to the biomedical model and classify crazy behaviour as 'mental illnesses' like schizophrenia or bipolar disorder. This kind of classification has recently been exposed as having no scientific basis by people like Richard Bentall, but psychiatrists do not take seriously anybody who challenges their power or social status.

The alternative view, which would make sense to most of us, is that people lose it because their lives get screwed up in a totally fucked up world. Sometimes people need to lose it, let go, let everything go to pieces as a means of finding themselves. I've seen people go completely crazy and come through it with the support of their friends, but the street is a bloody difficult.

Good luck!


Photo source

FEEL May Meeting

Join us to finalise plans for a meeting on OUR RIGHTS. We need to fix a date in late September or October. Recovery in the Bin is organising a 2 day training programme on welfare benefits for service users and it would be great if one or two of you attended and share what you learned. Get details from their website.

East London Mental Health Trust (ELFT) has a new programme on service users rights. They say they want all service users to understand their rights under the revised Code of Conduct. We will ask the person running this programme,

​Jo Turner, to come to the FEEL meeting and tell us about ​it. I suppose we could be partners in the OUR RIGHTS meeting?!?

It would be good to see you on the 16th May at LARC from 6:30 pm.

Remembering Sarah Wheeler (Thomas Tobias)

It is with deep sorrow that we found out that the amazing Sarah Wheeler (Thomas Tobias) has sadly passed away last Tuesday 19th April. Sarah is the brilliant Founder and Creative Director of the Dragon Cafe and the Mental Fight Club.

She has inspired and motivated many of us and will be deeply missed. Rest in peace Sarah heart emoticon
(Sarah, a fond Blakeanian, reading at the William Blake burial site in Bunhill Fields on the annual recurring gathering, celebrating Blake's deadday on 12th August 2014)

To follow we share the announcement from the Mental Fight Club.

Sad News from Mental Fight Club
An inspiraton to us all, Sarah Wheeler

It is with deep sadness that we share the news that our friend and colleague Sarah Wheeler passed away in the early hours of Tuesday 19th April. As you may know Sarah was diagnosed with cancer in 2013 and it was only recently that she moved into a hospice. Throughout her illness she remained engaged in many activities and continued to speak up for those with lived experience of mental illness.

Sarah has been an inspirational figure to many of us personally and also across the mental health sector and wider community. Sarah was that rarest of human beings, a visionary. Sarah’s friendship, her vision and her ability to create and communicate will always be remembered, and she will be greatly missed. Mental Fight Club (MFC) and the pioneering Dragon Café are her legacy to us all, and we will be continuing to develop and expand the important work that MFC does.

Funeral details will be announced in the next few days, and we ask people to respect the family's privacy at this upsetting time.

We hope that in Sarah's spirit you come along to The Dragon Café soon and celebrate her life through the many creative interactions available.




Sarah’s love of poetry and the inspiration she took from Ben Okri’s poem 'Mental Fight' is evident in many of her creative endeavours. Here is an extract from the epic poem called


‘Turn on The Light’

The new era is already here:
Here the new time begins anew.
The new era happens every day,
Every day is a new world,
A new calendar.
All great moments, all great eras,
Are just every moment
And every day writ large.
Thousands of years of loving, failing, killing,
Creating, surprising, oppressing,
And thinking ought now to start
To bear fruit, to deliver their rich harvest.

Will you be at the harvest,
Among the gatherers of new fruits?
Then you must begin today to remake
Your mental and spiritual world,
And join the warriors and celebrants
Of freedom, realisers of great dreams.

You can't remake the world
Without remaking yourself.
Each new era begins within.
It is an inward event,
With unsuspected possibilities
For inner liberation.
We could use it to turn on
Our inward lights.
We could use it to use even the dark
And negative things positively.
We could use the new era
To clean our eyes,
To see the world differently,
To see ourselves more clearly.
Only free people can make a free world.
Infect the world with your light.
Help fulfill the golden prophecies.
Press forward the human genius.
Our future is greater than our past.

Mental Health Resistance Network needs help please.

Mental Health Resistance Network needs help please - On May 3rd a 'non-debate' featuring Mind's Paul Farmer, Simon Wellesley from the Royal College of Psychiatrists, Shadow MH Minister Luciana Berger and an artist and service user Alice Evans, will be held at the Old Vic discussing the question:

"Are we failing those suffering from mental ill health in the UK? It is estimated that around three-quarters of people with mental health problems in the UK receive no care at all. While the government has committed to a £1 billion spend by 2020, is this enough, or does something more fundamental need to change in our attitude, and soon? "

- we want to hand out a zine afterwards with voices of the people whose lives are affected by the failing/useless services that are on offer and which will provoke more thought than the 'non debate; which is likely to conclude that soon things will be better - they always say this and services always seem to deteriorate.

If you can write your thoughts/experiences, draw a pic or write a poem to address the question, please email it to admin[at]mentalhealthresistance.org by Wednesday 6pm - add you voice to the debate please

FEEL meeting Monday 18 April

Next FEEL meeting is Monday 18 April, 6.30 - 8.30 pm, at London Action Resource Centre (LARC), 62 Fieldgate Street, E2 1ES.
At our March meeting lots of concerns about benefit changes and cuts were voiced. We think most people don't know that there is any help about benefits and how to get and keep them, and we felt we should try to make information about benefits advice more widely available. Would it be a good idea to have one of our evening events at Kingsley Hall highlight benefits advice and how to find it? We had a very good presentation from Disabled People Against the Cuts gave an excellent presentation at our November meeting and maybe it would be useful to hear from them again.. If you think it would be a good idea for us to do something about benefits advice, do come to the FEEL meeting on the 18th.

In November, we also heard about the human rights handbook for people with mental health issues produced in Chile. We do not know if it has been translated from Spanish into English, but one of our Spanish speaking members offered to translate it if that has not been done. It could be a really useful resource for the community. Join us on the 18th to discuss this and more.

FEEL Meeting Monday 21 March

​Dear Friends,

A gentle reminder that next FEEL meeting is taking place next Monday as usual at LARC 6.30-8.30 pm.

​Last Saturday 5 March the Mental Health Resistance Network (MHRN), Disabled People Against Cuts and Alliance for Psychotherapy organised the conference “Welfare Reforms and Mental Health – Resisting Sanctions, Assessments and Psychological Coercion”. Here you can find the speech by Denise McKenna from MHRN Welfare Reforms and Mental Health

Seen this video yet? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFrqTFRy-LU

FEEL meeting next Monday 15 Feb

Dear FEEL Friends,

We have had a break from meeting for a few months. Let’s get together to think about what we want to do in 2016.

What ideas do you have for FEEL? Is there still energy out there to do our Friday evening events? Is there and issue you are fired up about? Come along and share your hopes and ideas.

Gather at LARC as usual – 62 Fieldgate Street, E1 1ES – at 6.30 on 15 Feb. I will do tea and coffee and if you want to bring snacks to share, that would be welcome. More important is to share your thoughts about FEEL.

Hope to see you Monday 15 Feb at LARC, Myra