‘Express Yourself’ this Children’s Mental Health week
NHS health Leaders in Coventry and Warwickshire are encouraging young people to ‘Express Yourself’ as part of Children’s Mental Health Week, running from 1 to 7 February 2021.
This year's theme is 'Express Yourself'. This year is all about finding ways to share feelings, thoughts, or ideas, through creativity. This could be through art, music, writing and poetry, dance and drama, photography and film, and doing activities that make you feel good.
Coventry and Warwickshire NHS Partnership Trust (CWPT) is proud to support this cause and wants to encourage children and adults alike in our community to explore the different ways we can express ourselves, and the creative ways that we can share our feelings, our thoughts and our ideas.
The Trust would also like to remind the public that NHS mental health services in Coventry and Warwickshire are still open and are accepting children and young people through lockdown.
RISE, a family of NHS-led services provide emotional wellbeing and mental health services for children and young people in Coventry and Warwickshire, can provide resources, advice and support, which comes in different forms:
- Direct support: group sessions for young people and their parents or carers
- School-based resilience programmes: such as Boomerang, Big Umbrella and Mental Health in School Teams
- Support the people who support you: working alongside social care, schools and other professionals
- Community-based support for parents and carers through Rise Community Partnerships and Coventry Family Hubs
- 24-hour support through the Dimensions Tool and CWRise website www.cwrise.com
Just as with adults, the effects of the coronavirus pandemic and continued lockdown measures have affected our children. In a study conducted by The Lancet, more than a quarter of children (aged 5–16 years) reported disrupted sleep and one in ten (5·4% of children) often or always felt lonely.
Michelle Rudd, Rise Head of Service at CWPT wants to stress the importance of looking after our children’s mental health from an early age, particularly during these difficult times. Michelle said: “More than half of adults and over two thirds of young people have said their mental health has been affected during lockdown, with younger people more likely to have experienced poor mental health during lockdown than adults.
“That’s why Children’s Mental Health week is important; we need to encourage more conversations about mental health at a young age and explore ways of talking, expressing and displaying our feelings. This is an opportunity to do that in new, fun and creative ways.”
For anyone under the age 18 who is experiencing a mental health crisis, contact the Rise Crisis team by freephone 08081 966798 (select Option 2).
During the COVID-19 response, this is service is available 24-hours a day, 7-days a week, with an advice-only service outside the core hours of 8am-8pm.
The following local and national mental health support and helplines are also available:
- Dimensions Tool offers immediate tailored self-help support and signposting to local services.
- Chat Health is a free service that enables 11 – 18 year olds across Coventry and Warwickshire to send confidential SMS text messages to School Nurses who will provide impartial advice and support.
- For Warwickshire, text 07507 331 525
- For Coventry, text 07507 331 949
- Warwickshire County Council
- Coventry City Council
- Childline call 0800 1111
- The Samaritans call 116 123
- YoungMinds Crisis Messenger: text YM to 85258
- Papyrus Hopeline UK suicide prevention helpline: call 0800 068 4141 or text 07860 039967
- For those aged 16 or over, Improving Access to Psychological Therapy (IAPT) on 024 7667 1090 or use the online self-referral form at www.covwarkpt.nhs.uk/iapt