Grace's Particip8! Participation story

Grace is a former Particip8! member and is currently a People Participation Champion.

I found out about Particip8 through being a member of Equal Lives, who help me manage my disability package. I got a newsletter and found out about participation in Norfolk.

It looked perfect... it played to my passion, interest and lived experience around mental health, seemed fairly accessible, I had a fair bit of time on my hands, I thought I could really do this!

But the catch was that I don't come from Norfolk, so surely, I thought, there must be something like this available in Suffolk too. I contacted NSFT Norfolk and Waveney people participation lead at the time, they passed me on to Sophie Davies who was their counterpart in Suffolk, and the rest is history, I haven't and would never look back.

Communication was very quick, as was the realisation from that moment that I really was looking at something special.

At my first participation meeting there were three of us - me, Sophie and another young person who I thought was another professional, maybe from an outside organisation. When Sophie had to step away briefly we got talking, they were very nervous at first but slowly by having each others' backs and sharing interests we have become very close friends and now talk regularly, mostly about our shared tastes in music.

There were more of us at the next meeting; we talked about how we could grow our comms to get outreach. I investigated the possibility of putting us on Kiss FM as their target demographic is young people and they put a lot of importance on mental health. I tried to contact them, but unfortunately didn’t hear back.

As well as my work with Particip8 and a whole host of other great activities I am also a member of a disability action group for young people. From the way my first meeting looked I thought Particip8 would be similar to that: meeting every couple of weeks, minutes recorded, and taking away tasks to share. I simply thought it would be a special place where I could put my experiences and energy, and that they would then snowball with other stories to hopefully make something great. I certainly didn't expect to make friends, but I have made some of my closest friendships through Particip8, and I couldn't thank everyone enough for that.

I was still struggling with mental health a bit when I joined Particp8 and never expected what would come with it. I knew it was special, but if you fast forward a year, I’m presenting online to NHS England representing best practice co-production. How did I wind up here? It’s fantastic to think what I’ve achieved and what these last two years have brought.

I’d say the most memorable project I have been involved with during my time in Particip8 was presenting to NHS England in March 2023. This was as part of a group.Two weeks later with Sophie, just the two of us, we took the same presentation to Provider Collaborative meeting. Whenever I achieve something like this that I see as so great I ask myself ‘How on earth does this happen?’

One thing that also makes me feel really proud is when I feel it is clear that my feedback has been listened to.

I had been part of Particip8 for around three months when we got sent a copy of a leaflet about mental health crisis services to give feedback on. I found the leaflet hard to read, the wording felt instructional, and because some of it was in capitals I felt like it was shouting at me.

I sent this feedback to Sophie and waited. Fast forward another two to three months and we got another draft of the leaflet that was easier to read and calmer in its written voice. It turns out that we had been consulted about the first draft when it had already been made, which sadly means it hadn't been co-produced. I don't know what other members of the Particip8 group had said in their feedback about this leaflet, because Particip8 wasn't as big a social space then as it is now. But even to this day I like to think that my feedback was listened to and used to create changes I could see, and that makes me feel very warm and proud.

Another moment that showed me how special Particip8 could be was when I did my Values Based Recruitment (VBR) training which has given me two years’ experience sitting on interview panels alongside NSFT staff. I will never forget my first one of these, even though I was just shadowing, and will always feel a sense of pride, now being staff myself, when I get to work alongside people I have helped to put in post. The big projects are great but the little things are important too.

Particip8 has been made fully accessible to me, a space that might not have otherwise been readily available; an area where I can share my experiences, passion and interest. It has also given me a space I can look at on the down days and when I’m doubting things; I can look at myself and say if I didn’t have all these experiences, I wouldn’t be able to do my job or have given feedback at the group. If you didn’t have rubbish days, you wouldn’t be able to do what you can do.

Particip8 has given me the confidence to look at my experiences and use them as a gift and skill. I have grown so much as a person and now I get to do a job I love... what better way is there to spend your working week?

For anyone looking to get into participation or join the Particip8 group I would say absolutely go for it. The best way to beat the bad bits is to manipulate them to make them good for you, and that is exactly what you can do in this space as well as hopefully making a difference to the mental health system for generations to come.