A few words about our chosen charity #Place2Be

 Leo, my (almost 5 yrs old) asked me yesterday: "Mummy, what is a Place2Be? "

He's heard the name floating around as we're raising money for this charity, through some events and also through running the Berlin marathon. 

It's a charity that's located in schools, to support children's mental health, right? But that went over Leo's head, obviously, so he moved on. I went to him, and opened a conversation about it. The "You know when you sometimes feel/want/don't want something? Well, this thing Ima tell you about helps kids with that".

So, I told him it's a place that helps children that feel very worried, sad, with tricky problems that are hard to fix, to become happy again. That means that a special 'Teacher-person' will always be in the school, in a special room, and all that person will do is not phonics, maths, history, P.E. etc, but help children feel very safe, very important, very heard, and learn how to fix so many problems. 

Leo then counteracted that he doesn't like teachers. He only likes Miss X  and Miss Y and Miss Z, and after thinking some more, Miss A, and Miss B, and Miss C, but he 'hates' teachers. "Teachers are bossy and sometime shouty and sometime they are great. Teachers are great when they give stickers and they let me play".  So I told him that this charity-teacher is a different sort of teacher. The rules are made by the child as well, not just by the 'grown-up'.  They will not tell children what to do. In that special space, the children will do what they feel like doing, and say what they feel like saying.

Leo shrugged his shoulders, went to the kitchen to get his aeroplane toy, then came back to play. At some point he asked me : "Mummy, so that teacher won't tell children off if they say bad words?". Because Leo has concocted during the last few months a beautiful power-trip for himself where he looks me dead in the eye with a "whatchagonnadonow mummy, I'm gonna keep saying the bad word because I can. All you can do, mummy, is to ignore, or to tell me off, or tell me you're cancelling someting, or take a toy away. Lie I care! But mummy, you are getting cross even when you're trying to hide it [which is not often], and I know the ropes of ya so I'm gonna keep yanking your chain!".  

Ah, the beauty of having an elder brother as a role model!!!

Talking about the elder brother, that's how I've had my first hand experience with a similar organisation to this, through a bout of play therapy that we got for him a while back, when we couldn't put our finger on what felt off - his suspected neurodiversity, his emotional life, his social life, his behaviour. In the end, it turned out that our son was neurodivergent, and we embarked on a more technical exploration of support for him.

But for that time, when everything felt confusing, chaotic and intense, for himself as well as for us as parents, him having a place to be where he could do and say things that "are not your business, mummy; it's only between X(therapist) and me", it was what was needed. That 'place to be' was not this  charity per se, but another institution that in our priviledge we had the finantial resources and the know-how on how to provide it for him. Ours is a success story.

For other children, it hurts my head and heart to know, it is not like that. They may have long lasting sadness, erratic moods, extremely intense fears, worries, they may withdraw from people, they may not sleep well, or not eat well,   they may go under the radar because they're 'well behaved' at school (read - not disturbing lessons). It is already well known that in terms of unseen disabilities or masked neurodivergence, it is  hit and miss whether the school staffs would notice problems, and work on them - and who could blame them, with their workload [or lack of recent training in spotting subtle signs of mental health problems in children].

Or in the positive scenarios where school staff notice these subtle issues tied in to mental health and ND nonetheless, there may not be the resources to actively help that child, apart from highlighting it, signposting to local Mental Health services, liaising with parents about it. A whole , complex task, aside the school work. 

Or there may be parents feeling their kid needs help, but they don't know whom to turn to, desinfranchised with the bureaucracy of referals, or the 'the child is fine, don't worry, all kids are like that sometime's . There may be parents that are not aware of the help their child needs, because of life and things..  Or yes, there may be abuse, subtle yet cancerous, coming from the child's inner circle, or from relationships with peers. 

 Place2Be is one of the charities that offer life lines for these things, specialised life lines of support for kids, as well as training of the school staff in children's MH. Imagine knowing that in the school where your child is, there is a trained psychologist/counsellor/therapist day in day out, which is there for drop in sessions for kids, and they organise on site courses of therapy for children who need it, and they support the staff on creating an environment where mental health of kids is at the top of awareness.

 Why is this not at the top of policy makers? Clear, definite, tangible, accessible, specialised support for kids' mental health? I suppose it will be, when political pressure can be applied by massive numbers of people. Meanwhile, it is us, doughuts, doing dares participating in all sorts of events, begging, persuading, selling, imploring,  and other well meaning organisations, that can raise money so the more children can experience this, and the knowledge can trickle in, heal, and participate in creating next generations that are a little bit freer of MH stigmas, troubles, barriers to help,  and a little bit more powerful into manifesting these at policy level.

So yeah, rant over.  One day!!!