Eating Disorders

The term 'eating disorders' covers a range of conditions including Anorexia nervosa, Bullimia nervosa, binge eating and compulsive overeating - and to a certain extent, obesity.

Our panel consisted of:

Dr Caroline Reynolds from the Richardson Eating Disorder Service at the RVI

Sharon Cox, Counsellor and NLP practitioner

Maria Lavelle from Them Wifies

Helen Allott of NIWE and Getting a Grip

Maureen McGrath of NIWE

It was made abundantly clear that eating distress affects people in all social classes and communities in the UK. There can be a misperception that it only affects young, white, middle class girls but this is far from the case and many of the women coming to NIWE and other help organisations are in the older age groups.

There are also many ways of getting help and we attempt to give a list of phone numbers and websites here.

Do listen to the show, which is the best way of seeing that if you or a family member or friend are going through these problems - help is close at hand.

NIWE Eating distress service  NIWE aims to provide support to all those in North East England whose lives are affected by eating distress, or eating disorders. We do this by providing a range of services including a telephone help line, group support, introductory meetings, information and training. We also work to increase knowledge and awareness of eating distress and its effects.

 http://www.niwe.org.uk/

NIWE Eating Distress Service, Unit 5/6 1 Pink Lane, Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 5DW
Tel: 0191 221 0233   E–mail: enquiries@niwe.org.uk

NHS Information on eating disorders: NHS

Beat National Helpline - very accessible for young people http://www.b-eat.co.uk/

Beat has a helpline for carers and sufferers  0845 634 1414 Mon-Fri 10.30 - 8-30, Saturday 1pm-4.30

Beat youthline 0845 634 7650 Mon-Fri 4.30-8pm, Saturday 1pm-4.30

there is also a forum on the website where people offer very sympathetic help to each other.

The phone lines are principally listening posts and will give signposts to help organisations

Sharon Cox www.sharoncoxcounselling.co.uk

0191 257 9234 07751 722744     sharon.cox@live.com

Among other things, Sharon can give information in schools and colleges.

REDS   website

When you log on to the site, make sure your speakers are turned on - there is a short film detailing the services offered by REDS

REDS@ntw.nhs.uk   0191 282 5259

Getting a Grip   Personal Development  http://www.gettingagrip.co.uk/

01670 737985

Them Wifies  www.themwifies.org.uk

maria.lavelle@themwifies.org.uk     0191 257 9234    077 517 22744

 

podcast here

Homelessness

On Tuesday evening, February 21, we skipped the pancakes and instead went down to the Crisis Skylight cafe for a live discussion on homelessness.

The panel consisted of  Neil Munslow Housing and Welfare Rights Services Manager, Newcastle city council

 

 Catherine Hattam, Housing Options Manager, Gateshead Council

 

June Grimes, Director of Crisis Skylight Newcastle

Ted Dickenson, People’s Kitchen

Lindsay Cross Project Director West End Refugee Service 

and Kim McMaster Young Peoples Service manager, Your Homes Newcastle

Diane Stewart of the Cyrenians chaired the discussion

The questions - some put by the audience others which had been sent in covered topics such as

*Statistics on rough sleepers including whether there is a higher proportion of ex- service men and women ending up homeless / how we can help? / why aren’t there more agencies that can verify people as rough sleeping? / what more can be done?

*Welfare reform and its effects / the localism bill / single room rate effects etc

*Statistics on destitute asylum seekers

*How to help young people more – why aren’t there more jobs / support for first time buyers etc.

*Generally what changes are needed to end homelessness

Podcast here 

 

 

Teenage Runaways

A few facts....
Every five minutes a child in the UK runs away from home.
Between 1 April 2009 - 31 March 2010:
• 613 young people were reported missing to Northumbria Police
in the Newcastle area.
• Some of these young people went missing more than once, meaning there were
946 reported incidents involving young people going missing from
Newcastle.
• On average 3 in 4 young people who went missing were missing from
home, with 1 in 4 young people missing from a care placement.
• 182 young people went missing more than once.

Kirsten Hall from SCARPA came to tell us about the support they can offer to young people who leave home.

SCARPA aims to help young people:

• be 'safe from harm'
• stop going missing
• reduce risky behaviour
• exit situations of exploitation.

SCARPA supports young people by providing:

• help with any immediate needs that young people have
• a safe place in the city centre
• ongoing support – we aim to be in contact with young people at least twice a week or  more if needed 
• support in accessing, negotiating and maintaining relationships with other service providers.

We heard recordings of a number of young people speaking about their experiences of running away, of risky situations they had been in and of the help and support they had received.

Wendy Wallace from Your Homes Newcastle (YHN) came along with Kayleigh and Michael from Youth Voice.

Kayleigh and Michael had both become homeless as young people and spoke about their experiences and the help they had received. As peer educators at Youth Voice, they go to schools to speak to young people about issues around homelessness

and how to deal with them.

Our guests spoke about the hazards young people can meet online, issues of trust - who do you trust? Problems that can arise if you have your own apartment and suddenly everyone wants to come and party...

Some useful information:

SCARPA, Brunswick Methodist Church, Brunswick Place, Newcastle, NE1 7BJ

Tel: 0191 221 0836 Text: 07715 122 759 Email: sca@childsoc.org.uk

Young people’s FREEPHONE number: 0808 178 9185 

Housing Advice Centre: 0191 277 1711

YHN Young People's Service: 0191 277 1190 

Youth Voice website

Outpost - Advice centre for young people between 16 and 25 who are gay (or who think they may be gay) and need help with housing  email: admin@outpostproject.org  
www.outpostproject.org

Childline - 24 hours a day, 7 days a week if you need someone to talk to: 0800 1111

Childline website

CEOP - Child Exploitation Online Protection  - this website is full of advice about how to stay safe online

We were saddened when doing the research for this programme to hear how many people said we needed to speak to the young offenders units in various places. Young people may have many reasons for leaving home and being in that situation does not automatically mean that they are or will become offenders. Most of all they need help, support and someone to talk to.

We do plan, however to make a programme later in the year about young offenders, and invite organisations or individuals to contact us if they are interested in taking part.

PODCAST

Year end round-up

The production team discusses how we first came up with the idea for the programme and how we would like to develop it in the future.

The high points have been those times when a new area of research has been pinpointed - such as the awareness of same-sex relationships amongst people entering retirement homes and what provisions are made for them - or to what extent staff may be aware of  the family lives of residents.

We include clips from a selection of broadcasts from this year - ending with several very heartening sound bites from survivors of domestic abuse.
As well as a few appropriate songs, we include the two songs sung live by Simma in the November edition of No Excuse. Simma plays regularly in various venues around Newcastle and Gateshead - to see what he's up to go to http://www.simmaworld.com/

Amongst the subjects we plan to cover in 2012 are Teenage Runaways, Homelessness, Eating Disorders, Safe Sex and Online Gambling.

PODCAST

No Excuse for Alcohol Abuse

For the November edition of No Excuse the 'experts' were three former heavy drinkers and the partner of a man whose drinking had led to his premature death. We heard an interview with NECA - the North East Council on Addictions outlining the services they provide.

Each drinker had had a different reason for drinking - whether it was escaping difficult experiences, or simply enjoying the drink and its effects more than was good for them.In each case they had faced pivotal moments when they realized the seriousness of their drinking problems - either the effect it was having on family, or on their own physical health. All three have remained sober for differing lengths of time from one year to 15 years - and all intend to remain that way.

One of our guests was Simma, a local singer/songwriter who makes no secret of the fact that he used to be a heavy drinker until his doctor pointed out that his liver was in a terrible state. He gave us two live songs during the programme.

Here we list a variety of places in the area which offer help to problem drinkers:

Obviously - your first port of call should be your GP - the NHS has a huge amount of experience in working with problem drinkers. The rate of alcoholism at present is so high that there are not enough donor organs available for people needing a liver transplant.

NECA  http://www.neca.co.uk/
 Derwent Point, Clasper Way, Swalwell, Newcastle Upon Tyne NE16 3BE
 info@neca.co.uk   tel: 0191 414 6446

The Cyrenians, Oaktrees, 1a Walker Terrace, Gateshead NE8 1EB
Telephone: 0191 477 2205

Tyneside Residential Service, Phoenix Futures, Westoe Drive, South Shields NE33 3EW
Telephone: 0191 425 5548

Help for carers of problem drinkers:

Gateshead Family Support
11 Regent Terrace, Gateshead, NE8 1LU

NECA / Jigsaw, Cookson House, Suite 19, River Drive, South Shields, NE33 1TL
southtyne@necca.co.uk   tel: 0191 456 9999

CASA, Jackson House, Suite 207, Jackson Street, Gateshead NE8 1ED
casa@talktalkbusiness.net   tel: 0191 447 6488

PODCAST

No Excuse for Disability Discrimination

In this programme Vicky Harris from Arch stepped in at the last minute and chatted with Billy Richardson, who has learning difficulties and is involved in a number of projects including Better Days.

They spoke about many different aspects including the difficulties people with a disability may have in being allocated independent living, problems of bullying and name-calling. At what point do things like stone-throwing or bullying become hate crimes and what should they do about it.  Billy also spoke about the uncertainty around the new benefits and the march he recently took part in for the 'Hardest Hit' in Newcastle - a protest which took place in many cities around the country.

We also heard an interview with Nick Hedley who acquired a brain injury which caused his speech to be slurred so that he was sometimes thought to be drunk when he actually took no alcohol and also suffered discrimination in the work-place.

ARCH - Newcastle - 08000 32 32 88.   arch@newcastle.gov.uk
Victim Support 0191 274 4274

Better Days www.better-days.org.uk

PODCAST

No Excuse for Domestic Abuse

Domestic abuse doesn't just mean men beating up their wives or girlfriends; women abuse their partners almost as frequently and it happens with same-sex couples as well as heterosexual couples. It happens to young and old, the poorly educated and the highly academic, people without work and people in positions of trust in the community. It can happen to people of any belief or religion and in any culture.
The chances are that if it's happening to you, you do NOT deserve it - no matter what you are being told, and you do NOT have to put up with it. - It may be hard to admit that what's happening to you is really 'domestic abuse' - but once you do, you have gained the power to be able to put an end to it. And domestic abuse has so much to do with power.

In this programme we heard from a young man who put up with his wife's abuse for over ten years before his friends finally helped him to move out of the situation and from a woman who finally went to a women's refuge, but felt she didn't really have the right to a place there in spite of the treatment she was receiving.
Abusers will go down on their knees and beg for forgiveness and promise solemnly never to do it again... and next day, perhaps a few beers further down the line, the story will repeat itself.

BUT there are many many organisations there who can help you and these are listed below, but first a few facts and figures:

• In Gateshead alone, the cost of domestic abuse is £91 per year
• Nationally the cost is £1.2 BILLION! (imagine if that was invested in education...)
• One in 4 women encounters domestic or sexual abuse at some point in their lives
• In any one year, there are 13 million separate incidents of physical violence or threats of violence against women from partners or former partners.
• 45% women and 26% men experience at least one incident of inter-personal violence in their lifetimes. (Walby and Allen, 2004) ) – however when there were more than 4 incidents (i.e. ongoing domestic or
  sexual abuse) 89% of victims were women
•  54% of UK rapes are committed by a woman’s current or former partner.
•  On average 2 women a week are killed by a male partner or former partner: this constitutes around one-third of all female homicide victims.

 http://www.womensaid.org.uk     this site has a huge amount of information - including how to hide the fact you've been looking at this website
 0808 2000 247   freephone national 24 hour domestic violence helpline

http://www.mesmacnortheast.com/    for gay and bisexual men

http://www.broken-rainbow.org.uk/     help for LGBT men and women suffering abuse
telephone: 0300 999 5428 (LGBT) Mon 2-8pm, Wed. 10-5pm, thur 2-8pm - Immediate danger call 999

http://www.nedap.org.uk/   Victim Support North East Domestic Abuse Project
0845 30 30 900. Typetalk users should dial 18001 0845 30 30 900. To hide your number, press 141 before dialing the number.

 http://refuge.org.uk/    For women and children suffering domestic abuse

0808 2000 247

Gateshead Women's Service
For women in the Gateshead area needing a refuge from domestic abuse


Panah Women's Service
PO Box 27
Newcastle upon Tyne
NE3 1EU

Tel: 0191 284 6998
Tel (Outreach): 07590 851908
Fax: 0191 285 6075

Panah is a black women's refuge providing safe and secure temporary accommodation for women and their dependant children, fleeing from or threatened with domestic violence.

 

PODCAST

*******

25 November  International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women

 26 November

Reclaim the Night

http://www.reclaimthenight.org/

 

There will be a march in Newcastle, gathering at 18.30 (6.30pm) at Haymarket.

Speakers: Chi Onwurah, MP for Newcastle Central and Clare Williams, Chair of the TUC Women’s Group and Unison Regional Convenor

In Britain there are an estimated 47,000 rapes every year. Each year an estimated 300,000 women are sexually assaulted (British Crime Survey 2001), yet Britain’s conviction rate is the lowest ever at just 5.3%. When Reclaim the Night marches were first started in the 1970s, women were appalled that only 1 in 3 rapists were ever convicted; today that figure is 1 in 20. This is why the Northern TUC have revived the tradition of Reclaim the Night. All women have the right to use public spaces both in the daytime and after dark without the fear of sexual harassment and assault. Join with women around the world to mark the United Nations International Day to End Violence Against Women and take back your night.

 

 and while we're on the subject of rape, please check out the Justice for Jane campaign to get a bill through Parliament to stop allowing rapists to be granted bail after murdering the sole witness.