A newly opened exhibition, ‘The story of Turning Point in 60 objects’ celebrates a milestone for the charity – and those involved. DDN paid a visit.
Over 60 years Turning Point has established itself as a leading health and social care provider for people tackling substance use and mental health issues, as well as helping those with learning disabilities to lead independent lives. To mark this special birthday, 60 objects were selected by a panel of people who are supported by the charity, for an exhibition at Kensington Palace.
Those whose objects were chosen were invited to view the exhibition, and that’s where we found Hendrik, a volunteer peer mentor, whose signet ring features among the exhibits. He explained the significance of the ring and what this experience means to him.
HENDRIK’S STORY
‘Today is a very special day, it’s like a 360, it’s giving something back. I graduated with Turning Point, here in Kensington Palace. I was able to get my mum over, together with my niece and nephew-in-law and they saw me in recovery for the first time. From that moment on my mother knew she could trust me, and that I was doing well. A couple of years later, before she passed away, she asked if I would take guardianship of her and my father’s wedding rings, which she had melted into this design for me. This was in the early COVID days and I had a conversation with her the night before she passed away. She knew the ring was safe, and that I would look after it.
So the ring is back at Kensington Palace six years later. I talk about this ring a lot, because it symbolises my connection with recovery, and my recovery is a symbol of my connection back to my family, My niece mentioned her Uncle Hendrik’s “seven years’ freedom”. She really likes that. She doesn’t understand much about addiction, but she understands from me and what I share, how it important it is that people recover and share.
When I came into recovery there were people like me talking about recovery and I remember thinking, “so it’s possible”. And now I’m one of those people – a peer mentor.
By sharing my story about the ring, about recovery, I hope that a few people will, over time, make a change to their life and find a different, better level of happiness – find something better for themselves. And all the pain I’ve gone through has found some meaning, which helps me as well as other people.
Freud explained this in a theory called sublimation, which is the ‘mature defence mechanism’ and talks about the energy held in negative behaviour – how you deliberately transform that into a positive thing, and in the process the negative thing disappears. So when I went to counselling skills training, I talked about my journey and how it’s helped me. It’s a recognised way of letting your trauma become something powerful to help other people, though it still amazes me that other people are touched by my story.
The exhibition has been helpful to me. Sometimes I talk about the technical stuff about my using, about the antics that went with it. But this has helped me to bring it back to the feelings and relate in a way that connects with even more people. When I saw myself on the film at the exhibition I burst into tears, because I’ve never seen myself tell the story.
My father was always like, we don’t share our stuff, it’s not for the outside world. But it turns out that by sharing it, by talking about it, it connects me much deeper to a lot of people. It’s not dirty laundry, it’s things that happen. It’s my story. Watching it is cathartic.
The staff that work with you don’t always see the end. I said to a group, “each one of you here around the table is a part of my recovery journey, you got me into a treatment centre and you helped me to become your service user rep.” I wanted to show them what recovery looks like and said, “it’s important that you see some of your clients end up really well.”
The secondary part of recovery – what do I do with my life – is just as important. Some people go back to their job, happy days. Some people die – I have friends who’ve died. Some people end up in prison. Let’s be honest, the statistics aren’t great. People go into treatment and months later only a small percentage of people are still sober. But you can’t give up because the statistics are bad, you can’t ever do that.
My peer mentor was amazing, there for me if ever I wanted to have a chat, and said to me, “you have a lot of interpersonal skills”. So I did some prison pick-ups and helped get them into treatment. One of the clients I worked with is now also a peer mentor because I shared my story with her. Another is now a family worker, and he and his wife talk freely about their story in front of people. I’ve had so many benefits from this. I’ve stood in front of the board of Turning Point, and the trust board from the NHS. I’ve become a national award-winning peer mentor. And there’s an ego in there that needs feeding!’
LIFE’S RICH TAPESTRY
At the centre of the exhibition is a large board displaying a colourful mosaic of artwork. Admiring it are three people who are each a part of its story, Jane, Trish and Zahra.
THE ART STUDENT
‘I’ve been going to the art group from the beginning, about a year now,’ says Jane. ‘It was the result of a coffee morning – my keyworker said I might want to go to it, so I thought I’d see what it was like. I hadn’t done art before – I was an advisory teacher for people with special needs before I retired.
I’ve always seen art and music as very good for people with special needs. And the good thing about the group is it’s so diverse, people from all different backgrounds. We all get on really well. Trish is fantastic and galvanises the whole thing – you walk in, sit down, and feel part of something. It’s about learning new skills – printing, string work, clay, neurotrophic art, pointillism. You can give it a go and if you don’t like it you can try something else – but I’m amazed at the skills people have got that they don’t realise.
Everybody feels included and relaxed really. Somebody might turn up, sit down and just want to be in a safe environment. But nobody wants to leave!’
THE INSPIRER
‘I began as a peer mentor, then started the creative workshop as part of my role,’ says Trish. ‘It’s really successful and I love teaching people new skills. I started the group to fill people’s days, to make them feel good about stuff they can achieve – something new, something they never thought they might be doing.
We started trying different things and covering different artists – we always think of something else to do. Even if people don’t join in at first, everyone gets up to something eventually!
We talk about everything and we laugh a lot. We try to stay away from politics and religion, and glorifying drugs and alcohol, but anything goes. People really look after each other and buy each other presents, art materials and so on.
It’s about anything to keep people interested and filling up their days. I don’t know many people who can go away and live somewhere else to stay away from temptation – that’s really hard. So you have to learn to stay where you are and put in place things to help you thrive.’
I’d like to start another group for women – it’s very tough for them coming out of recovery and back into society. They could update their skills, do some clothes-making, make themselves feel good.’
THE SUPPORTER
‘It’s basically using art as a form of therapy,’ says Zahra, partnerships manager. ‘It’s about welcoming people and letting them know recovery isn’t just about drink and drugs, it’s about expressing how they’re feeling, their emotions. And you don’t have to do that through talking, you can do it through other forms of expression. That’s why art is so important and why Trish came in with the idea of doing that.
People don’t have to come in and do art – they can just come in an and observe what’s going on and what other people are doing – that’s part of it as well, being in the room. It’s unhealthy for people to rely on one service for the rest of their life – they need the skills to go on and have a life outside.
We want to keep the group going for as long as the clients want it, and are always encouraging other clients to come in. We’d like to expand it beyond art therapy as we were talking about music therapy and how important that is – anything we can do that’s outside the normal realm of recovery.’