phams worker

Hi @Bobby2015,

Sorry to read you are not able to access the Phams program at present. It's a pity as you are clearly trying to be proactive in reaching out for help with your mental health. Could I ask what it is that you were hoping to get out of the Phams program? That may help us in suggesting some alternative avenues of support.

From what I've read of your posts I seem to remember that you may already have a case worker and a psychologist. Do you have any other support at present? Another option that I am finding helpful is support groups. In my area these are run by a few different community organisations. Some research on Google may uncover support groups that meet regularly in your area.

In the meantime, please feel free to talk in more detail here on the forum about any of the struggles you are going through day to day and we will do our best to support you. Best wishes.

Do you have a regular GP who knows about your mental health diagnosis? If not, I'd suggest finding a GP, make a 'long appointment' with them and talk through some of this. They should be able to refer you to a new psychiatrist and psychologist at the least. A GP, a psychiatrist and a psychologist are the cornerstones of mental health treatment in my view. Phams and other avenues of support I see as secondary to this, though very worthwhile.

General life and social skills might be improved in various ways that don't always need to be under the specific umbrella of mental health care. For example, even though I'm in my 50s, I have never developed good domestic skills and rarely cook. This year I hope to get myself to a healthy cooking class to try to improve on this.

Groups and workshops relating to various social skills may be run by community organisations in your local area. For example, you may find that there are workshops that focus on self esteem, anger management, getting organised, managing finances, and any number of other possibilities that may be relevant to you.

Again, I suggest doing some Google searches and making some notes about what you find. This may take some time but in my experience is worth the effort.

Hope these suggestions are of some help.

Great ideas @Mazarita! Linking in to new mental health professionals through a GP is a good avenue to ensure you have continuing support if you feel you need it @Bobby2015? Investigating what groups and workshops are being offered in your community, regardless of whether they are specifically related to mental health concerns, is a fantastic way to continue developing general life and social skills 🙂

@Bobby2015, if you are also keen to engage with a PHaMs-type worker, there may be community organisations in your local area that offer similar services. For example, organisations like Neami offer programs in which a community outreach support worker or peer support worker can come to your home and assist you to achieve your goals around day to day living and recovery. Are you aware of any community centres etc. nearby that might offer such services @Bobby2015? Perhaps another option to explore!

P.S. @Mazarita keen to hear about your healthy cooking class when you start that!

Thank you ladies,

will do your recomendations, l have had a mental health outreach worker through neami central intake and unfortunately they walked away and the neami central intake cant process my request of a new assesmant cant be done because the two agencies in my catchment area have said they cant help me for at least 12 months because l am to mentally unwell for them and am to difficult for them sso until l am better they cant assist me.

@Bobby2015, sorry you are in a difficult space at the moment, both with the level of wellness and access to support. It sounds to me like you may need to access especially a GP, psychiatrist and psychologist. I also might especially recommend again support groups that you may be able to find on Google. These will usually accept people at all different levels of mental wellness and there is usually no assessment process to be accepted into the group. It's usually just a matter of finding out where and when they are on, turning up and taking it from there. Very best wishes to you and hope you stick around on the forum to let us know how you are going and let us be of assistance wherever we can along the way.

Good on you for deciding to take action on those suggestions @Bobby2015!

That is unfortunate that Neami can't continue to provide a mental health outreach worker at the moment. I wonder if there are any other services in your area that might offer a similar thing.

Keep us updated on your progress with those ideas @Bobby2015!

Hi @Bobby2015 I have a couple of ideas: try your local Salvo's drop-in centre and see if there is some kind of mental health drop-in centre locally that you could visit. Lifeline is good (13 11 14) if you need someone to talk to and no-one is available. My experience is that all support workers (indeed, all 'normal' people) talk down to us, but if you can cope with that, that's great!

do an internet search on services and make a few phone calls is my advice. I hope this information helps you.

Thank you everyone for your wonderful ideas, l had my psychologist call me back today and has contacted the phams program and will have the case manager sit in the assesment next week, all l can say is yay.