Proceed till apprehended!

On 14^th October, the Arts in Care conference was held in Perth Concert Hall. It was an excellent event, run jointly by Animate and Scottish Care and chaired with a light but efficient touch by Sally Magnusson. The keynote speeches were excellent and very heartening – with a general message that care homes should be ‘a creative place to live – not a place to be detained until you die’ (Ranald Mair). 

Anne Hendry from JIT spoke about the Active and Healthy Ageing Action Plan and the various well-known benefits of activity and participation for older people. It was gratifying that she referred to FiOP three or four times in her account of how JIT supports creative approaches to ageing!

During the question session, Sally Magnusson asked her what barriers might prevent a full adoption of arts in care homes, and without hesitation Anne Hendry replied ‘risk and the perception of risk’. As our followers will know, we recently organised a workshop on Risk and Resilience (see our earlier post), and clearly this was a subject which chimed with the audience. A debate ensued on the perils of risk-aversity (is that a word? I’ve just coined it!) with reference to ageism and disempowerment. The message from the Joint Improvement Team, I’m delighted to report, is ‘take the risk and proceed till apprehended! Seek absolution, not permission.’ Amen to that.

Up The Ladders And Down The Snakes

We recently held a small (but perfectly formed) seminar with colleagues from Edinburgh University, on ‘Risk and Resilience in Residential Care’. Charlotte Clark spoke on research into risk, and how the insidious creep of risk–aversity (my new word) is crippling staff and residents alike in denying them various life-affirming opportunities. Then Harriet Harris talked about Resilience – drawing on the habits and thought patterns developed through life and knowing that, even as we face the shortest and coldest days of the year – Spring will indeed come again. She quoted Paul in 2 Corinthians 4:16 -  ‘… so we do not lose heart. Even though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed day by day.’ And also, Deuteronomy 30:29 – ‘I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. CHOOSE LIFE, that you and your descendants may live.’

Later we played a game of snakes and ladders, in which participants had to give examples of resilience-affirming actions in residential care to be allowed to go up the ladder; and examples of resilience-depleting actions to go down a snake. (Thanks to Charlotte for dreaming this one up, it was a great way of developing the conversation). We had some wonderful stories as a result, as our participants remembered various poignant, passionate and privileged experiences they had shared with residents. We are all used to hearing about instances of poor practice and uncaring staff; but it was truly inspirational to sit and listen to our delegates talking with such love and conviction of their determination to enhance the in-care experience. Thank you all. May all your throws be double sixes.

The Art of Dying

THE ART OF DYING

A lot of our work involves helping clergy and lay people to develop their skills, confidence and sensitivity in issues relating to death and dying. This year, we invited Rabbi Julia Neuberger to give the Malcolm Goldsmith lecture, on ‘Dying Well.’ Although people in our society tend not to like talking about death, we had a huge response, and even had to book a bigger venue to accommodate all the attendees. Neuberger’s speech is available in full on our website (www.faithinolderpeople.org.uk) as she gave last-minute permission for us to record her in action.

There was a lively debate at the end, and again we were besieged by people wanting to take this further. So on 7^th May, in collaboration with Edinburgh University Chaplaincy Centre and Good Life Good Death Good Grief, we held a ‘conversation’ with 40 places – and again had to turn people away. This has now been written up and is available on our website (www.faithinolderpeople.org.uk) and we’re looking at ways of rolling it out.

Neuberger was very challenging on the subject of Living Wills, or Advance Directives. She asked for a show of hands as to how many people in the audience had prepared such a thing, and was appalled when less than 25% of the audience put their hands up. Myself, I’d have thought 25% was quite a good figure; maybe I need to be more ambitious. We’d love to hear your thoughts on this. Do you have a Living Will/Advance Directive? What was your experience of putting it together? Do you have advice for others thinking about this? Do get in touch.