World Suicide Prevention Day – Peer support: a harbour in a storm
Peer support is not an optional extra but an essential part of our response to mental health challenges and suicide.
Peer support is often mis-represented as an optional add-on or inferior to clinical approaches to support. What the third sector is showing us, is that peer support is an essential part of our response to mental health challenges and suicide. Christine Muir, Communications Lead at Scottish Recovery Network tells us more in this TFN Magazine feature
- Read the feature from page 24 in TFN Magazine
…I do not believe that people in positions of power and in general are aware of the impact peer support has in all of our communities and the pressure taken off from the statutory services by people with lived experience. People who set up charities and groups to fill the gaps in support that they needed that are just not there.
The impact of peer support on my life has been huge, I have always surrounded myself with people who understand what I am going through because it means I do not have to continually explain as they already understand. Now the charity set up in my son Neil’s memory offer lots of peer support as I know it works, not always on its own but as part of healing and surviving. Peer support gives hope and saves lives.
Donna Paterson-Harvie, CEO / Founder, Neil’s Hugs Foundation
