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Winston’s Wish is our charity of the month for December. They do incredible and important work with children, young people and families supporting them through bereavement. 

Our Raising Teens radio show about grief featured Ross Cormack from Winston’s Wish. It was a fascinating discussion between Ross, host Guy Lloyd, Winston’s Wish Ambassador, Mark Lemon, and two other parents who were all dealing with grief. 

Dealing with grief

Winston’s Wish have a trained team who will talk to young people and those who care for them offering guidance and support with a brilliant online chat service available every Tuesday (1-5pm) and Friday (9.30-1pm).  

Their Freephone National Helpline on 08088 020 021 is open between 9.00am and 5.00pm, Monday to Friday.

They also have a special website, Help2MakeSense, aimed at young people where they tell their own stories and share advice on everything from returning to school after a bereavement to expressing your feelings and looking after your mental health. 

We know that Christmas can be a really difficult time for those who are grieving, and especially so during this pandemic. They cite research that found that “90% of parents whose partner had died in the last 10 years said the pandemic had deepened their feelings of loneliness and isolation and 80% said their children had also struggled with loneliness and isolation”. Take a look at their latest blog post which includes tips for families coping with grief at Christmas.

The Winston’s Wish website offers a wealth of information including:
❤️ Specialist support information including following a bereavement by accident or illness, suicide, homicide and the military
❤️ Publications for bereaved families and professionals
training for professionals 
❤️ Support for schools. 

You can donate to Winston’s Wish via their website.

Follow Winston’s Wish on social media:
twitter.com/winstonswish
facebook.com/winstonswishcharity
instagram.com/winstonswish

🎧 Listen to Raising Teens: Dealing with Grief

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We tackled male mental health and home learning this week with two live Q&As with brilliant guests. Grab a cuppa and join Daisy and our brilliant guests.

Men’s mental health

On International Men’s Day, we wanted to focus on male mental health. We’ve been really concerned about the recent rise in suicide rates in men. All three of our guests for this chat have experience working with young people and gave us great insights into how to broach difficult subjects, on role models and how to tackle cannabis use, a particular concern in Brighton and Hove. Huge thanks to Carl Scott, a youth worker from Reboot Sussex, Glen Wiseman from YMCA Downslink Group and Lee Hine from East Sussex College for joining us.

YMCA Downslink offer counselling for young people aged 13+. Find out more on the e-wellbeing website.

Motivating teens to work from home

It can be so hard to motivate teens to learn from home. We talked to Darren Abrahams from Human Hive Learning to discuss the issues and he offered plenty of practical advice including what signs to look out for when your child is struggling as well as the language and tools to help build a better relationship with your teen. (If you followed our First World War project, you might remember Darren as he spoke to or teens about his work as a trauma therapist. You can hear the interview here.) Darren talked about his latest online course which is designed to help parents support teens learning at home.
For anyone interested in The Human Hive Learning course, all carried out over webinars and via their website, we have a half price exclusive to Make (Good) Trouble – which makes it about £10 (usual price $24.99). Click here for the offer.

If you have any questions for our guests or something you want us to cover in our future Q&As, let us know in the comments below.

Follow us on Facebook to catch our Q&As as they happen live.
facebook.com/wemakegoodtrouble

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We Are Poppy is a project that explores women’s experiences of the First World War and how the War affected their mental health. It is a story developed and told by young people, aged between 14 and 19. Created in a time of Covid-19 and lockdown, there are new parallels to be explored.

One hundred years ago, in November 1920, thousands of women wrote letters to the government asking to be part of the ceremony at Westminster Abbey on 11 November. They were convinced that the Unknown Warrior being buried there that day was their son. This was just one of the stories our young team unearthed in their quest to find out how the Great War affected women’s mental health. They wanted to find out what has changed for women in the past 100 years and which challenges women still face today.

“Nobody seemed to remember that women had been affected too. Nurses working on the front lines saw terrible things. Women at home had their houses destroyed and workers in ammunition factories often had life-changing injuries.” Daisy, 14

“I knew about the men and their shellshock and how mental health wasn’t such a well-known thing back then, so how they were all discovering what that was but it hadn’t even occurred to me that the women would get shellshock or PTSD from working on the frontline.” Amelie, 14

We Are Poppy, was set up by Make (Good) Trouble with a team made up of teenagers from Hove Park School in Brighton and the East Sussex Youth Cabinet as well as local volunteers.

The project culminated in a one-off podcast which will be broadcast on BBC Radio Sussex and Surrey on Sunday 8 November at 5.30pm as part of Armistice Day commemorations. The podcast imagines a conversation between today’s young people and the young women who lived through the First World War. It looks at how the war shaped the lives of a generation of women as they dealt with trauma, shellshock and loss as well as new-found freedoms. We hear excerpts from the letters, diaries and medical records of women living through the War, and interviews with experts. We ask why women’s experiences and mental health have been ignored for so long.

“I feel like it’s opened my mind more than it would have been because we don’t learn much about women in our lessons in history. The project really expanded my view of what women were doing and how women felt in the First World War.” Arielle, 14

This project is supported by The National Lottery Heritage Fund.

Our We Are Poppy project team members are awarded a Cities of Learning badge in recognition of their work. These digital badges give people a verifiable record of achievement and give employers a new way to connect with talent in cities.

Take a look at our dedicated website: wearepoppy.org which includes interviews, research and creative projects plus a comprehensive schools pack aimed at secondary school-age children. 

Teen in WW1 and modern dress
We Are Poppy student, Daisy

We’d love to know what you think of our project. Let us know in the comments!

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This morning, we were invited on to BBC Radio Sussex to speak about Sussex Police’s initiative to reduce knife crime.

Make (Good) Trouble founder, Daisy Cresswell, talked to BBC Sussex’s Allison Ferns about our work with young people and the brilliant REBOOT project that we have been involved in.

You can listen to Daisy’s discussion on BBC Sussex here:

There are also some great discussions worth listening to from our Facebook Live Q&As in recent weeks.

PC Joe Davis talks about keeping your teen out of trouble

Changing Chances’ Kit Messenger discusses tips for reducing conflict with your teen:

We talk to people from Sussex Police’s REBOOT scheme

Join the discussion on our Raising Teens in Lockdown Facebook Group

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