Greetings to another one of our podcasts aiming to give greater understanding to Mental health.
Today in the studio we had the lovely Amy Everatt from HUG, help us grieve. HUG is an organisation that aims to help and support those people who have experienced baby loss. The title baby loss covers many different areas of baby loss, HUGS details can be found on face book.
During the podcast myself and Amy talk about the HUG choir. A choir brought together to help create a space where people can be with like-minded people without feeling the need to talk, the hug choir has now been opened up the those living with mental health problems. We know through evidence-based experiments that singing is good for us, we know it lifts the spirts and can make us feel happier. I wonder if part of this is about the sense of community, being in a space with others and enjoying human connection. We are biologically wired for human connection. Although some people deny this and some people choose to ignore this, it is true that we are strongest and more alive whilst around others.
I think the other reason singing has such a strong effect on us is something to do with the physiological affects it has on the body. When we consider some of the best meditations, they contain noises or chanting, the vibrations it sends through the body send signals of clam and peace to the mind, so if you fancy a singsong and feeling better in the process, join a choir. Details of the HUG choir can be found, again, on Facebook.
Amy and I also talked about those moments when someone has experienced loss, thosemoments when we don’t really know what to say, so often we retreat into saying nothing.For me this is much worse, for me it feels like my loss hasn’t been recognised. Consider formoment how you might feel if you have been through something quite traumatic, or experienced loss, what would you want to hear? Just think about that for a few seconds.
If it were me, I would just want some form of acknowledgement, maybe the words “how are you” but not in the usual sense, look the person in the eyes and mean what you are saying, if they answer “I’m fine” then my response might be “I’m right here if you need me”a nice balance between checking in and not being to forceful or over bearing.
It was such a pleasure recording this podcast with Amy, it was a pleasure spending time with someone who is so driven in making a change to others lives. If you see HUG out and about, if you see one of their evets then pleased support them, they do some great work.
If you feel this podcast would benefit someone you know then please like and pass it on. We do these podcasts for you, so if we are not covering subjects you want to hear about then let us know. If you have any questions, feel free to ask. My contact details are on Guthrietherpy facebook page, or you can email at k.guthrie@guthrietherapy.com
Thank you for reading.
Please be very kind to yourself. Peace
Kevin x
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