We’ve all been there – we know what it is we need to do to make a meaningful difference to our lives, but something is stopping us getting it done. It might be our own energy levels, the time available to us or outside factors like work or environment. At times like this it can sometimes be helpful to have somebody else help us gather our thoughts and make an action plan. But that takes time. That’s why, with the support of our partners LV=, we’ve put in place tier 2 befriending, coaching and counselling services to help people contacting our FamilyLine service who need a little more support. Here we tell you a little more about how that works.
Tania contacted us at first because she was struggling to cope with her 16-year-old son’s behaviour.
She felt like the support provided by social services and Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services wasn’t enough, and the situation had escalated to the point where it was affecting her own mental health.
In discussion with our FamilyLine helpline it became clear that Tania had a good idea about the changes she needed to make, but simply felt overwhelmed and didn’t know where to start.
We arranged for Tania to work with one of our coaches to work on helping her make the changes she needed to her life.
Her coach was allocated within a week, and they discussed the best day and time for their sessions to take place (and to ensure we didn’t overload her already busy schedule!).
In her first session our coach discussed her history, helped Tania prioritise the main issues she wanted to tackle and created an action plan broken down into achievable tasks.
Over the following eight weeks our coach supported Tania to help her complete each of the tasks and also suggested how she could approach her son when dealing with his challenging behaviour.
We also provided a list of different organisations that might prove helpful in future.
At the end of the eight weeks Tania told us she felt the coaching sessions kept her focused on the tasks she needed to complete and how to prioritise them.
Importantly, however, she also felt that she was also more confident in her own ability to plan and prepare in future and also felt that her relationship with her son had improved due to her different approach.
She said: “The coaching sessions were really useful as the coach helped me to keep focus on individual tasks and put together an achievable action plan. I’m so grateful for the support”.
Although she was a lot happier, she worried, however, that she might feel isolated in future so, at the end of the sessions, we arranged for her to work with our befriending service so she could get ongoing emotional support, as well as made it clear she could come back to our helpline at any time in the future.
We’re here for anyone struggling with any aspect of family life, regardless of how much support you may require. If you’re struggling for any reason you can contact FamilyLine for free support, practical information and guidance. If you’d like to support the work of Family Action please visit our Get Involved page.
