By Claire With doing volunteering with the #HealthNow with Crisis I did learn a bit about it. And for me, basically, if they can get everyone in a time of crisis like this with the Covid – and they can basically pull out all the stops and make sure that people have got a roof […]

“Never mind the homeless, lets get a new football ground”. This report came about from a random conversation I had with a support worker. A borough councils football club had an outdated football ground and were facing going into administration. The local council had the bright idea to give them £10.25m loan to buy a […]

Hello everyone. It’s John Chico here with you again. So today I will be starting a new series called Those Who Help, in which I will write about people, groups, and organisations that provide social services in some type of way shape or form. I certainly believe that groups such as this need more exposure […]

As I start to write this, I have to check myself with the theme of the piece – who……… 🤔 For context, I live with two voices, one called ‘temptation’, the other I refer to as ‘magpie’ and they both chat at every/any opportunity they get, depending on what is happening for me, right there […]

In this piece Paul talks about the effectiveness of the arts as a means of communicating the stories and experiences of people with lived experience of homelessness, creating a visceral connection with the audience that is immediately visible.   Transcription of audio: It is bank holiday, Monday 31st 2021. It’s been an interesting week, a theatrical […]

Content warning: this report discusses addiction to alcohol I start this by saying each person’s recovery is different, yet has the same common aim, to stop the desperation we experienced, yet what works for one doesn’t mean it’s right for everyone. I spent years lying…….to family, drugs and alcohol services, the GP’s, the A&E staff […]

Hi, it’s Karen here. I just want to share how I’m feeling at this moment in time with everything that’s going on. These riots, these marches, whatever you want to call them, it’s making me feel quite depressed, anxious, and I’m quite frightened, to be honest. I’m quite frightened to go out, and I’m frightened […]

By Steve Please note: The following report talks about substance use It’s the 27th of November, my name is Steve. And I wanna talk about a little analogy of addiction. So over three decades of addiction have led me to this understanding, retrospectively like you know. So when I was 17 I started to construct […]

This winter will be a difficult time for many households. Many will be forced into an incredibly difficult decision, do they heat their homes, or do they feed their family? But spare a thought for those that do not have a choice. For those that are sleeping rough, food is their fuel!  Photo by Mat […]

By Steve It’s the 5th of August. About five-ish. I just want to briefly talk about something that’s been happening quite a lot, actually, recently. So I live in recovery housing, and have done on and off for the last five years. Different associations, I’ve moved about a lot because of relapse, which for me […]

This picture sums up my most important recovery gift – connection 🤜🤛 Now, I make no apology for the team colours, proud black and white, but as a dad who took his eldest to his first game, excited, nervous yet safe with his dad, further games became more distant or fraught, as the grip of […]

This post mentions addiction ‘Connection and Connectivity’ was the first major theme reporters agreed to write upon in the Listen Up! phase of this reporter project.   Connection refers to the struggle to connect during the lockdown and the loneliness that many of us have faced over the past few years. I was going to […]

So, the day finally arrived, I’m nervous, excited and scared to unlock my new front door, it’s happening…… finally 🤫 To give you some context, in the last few years of my life, I’d spent fifteen months existing in a homeless hostel in my city, weaving my way through a complicated, disjointed resettlement pathway which […]

This is my first contribution for Groundswell for 2022. As requested, this is all about homelessness, health & digital connectivity. I focused on needing a device for everything, which means mental health & physical health is incorporated in that. I know Groundswell like to labour the specifics of a health issue, but I take it as […]