A new approach to working with trauma

Thanks to support from the Sarah Jane Leigh Charitable Trust, Museum of Homelessness is developing specialist trauma informed work including training a pool of trauma informed coaches, to be based out of our future site at Manor House Lodge.

Why are we doing this?

As the UK lurches from one social crisis to the next, survivor-led solutions to mental health for people affected by marginalisation, inequality and homelessness are becoming more and more essential. People are being let down by systems that are badly under resourced and overwrought. We know that many people involved in homelessness or who are homeless have experienced childhood traumas. Then, on top of that, we are all navigating a time of structural traumas as systems struggle and inequality deepens.

Since our founding nearly a decade ago, MoH has attempted to highlight the problems in the current system. We have campaigned, organised, hosted major productions and events and sought to combat the injustices where we can. Now we want to go further with our work in trauma and make new solutions. Where we see something missing, we create it. In our new site at Manor House Lodge, we want to help our fellow individuals affected by complex and structural traumas and actively change a badly drained ecosystem of services.

Our plans

We are currently training five community members for a one-year intensive training programme in trauma informed coaching, with wrap around support, starting in May 2023.

·In 2024 and beyond, our certified coaches will have paid work delivering coaching for Museum of Homelessness through new specialist trauma informed work carried out by the charity. This will include one to one coaching and the delivery of a development programme for people working, volunteering and organising within homelessness.

MoH coaching will give people a non judgemental, fully safe and confidential space. We will offer a deeply compassionate and nurturing programme for all involved, with support built in at all levels. We see a need for better systems of care and we believe that a big part of the answer is equipping the community with the skills needed to make a better system.

 Our approach

Our approach to working with trauma is influenced by our long term organisational consultant Dr Christopher Scanlon. It is also influenced by modalities such as Compassionate Inquiry, Internal Family Systems, Polyvagal Theory and Somatic experiencing. We work with individual, structural and generational traumas. We hold deep compassion towards any coping mechanisms that people may have developed to survive, such as addiction or self-harm.

We want our organisation to provide support to people experiencing homelessness, frontline workers, volunteers and activists in the years to come. We also want to support our crew to develop specialist skills and knowledge around trauma, which many of us have personally experienced.

Why coaching?

Coaching is a creative process through which a person is supported to gain insight into their experience that can lead to a shift or change in their life. It acknowledges the effects of past traumas whilst supporting the individual to work with the present moment. It is a flexible and intuitive approach that does not seek to advise, diagnose, pathologize, fix or change. MoH coaches will hold a deeply compassionate space for coachees and be led by the person.

Coaching can complement with an existing practice (ie, drama facilitation, counselling, yoga or art therapy) Coaching can be one of a range of interventions that supports people to heal from trauma. It can work alongside therapy or can be an option for post traumatic growth after therapy. Coaching has a strong emphasis on partnering and collaboration which matches MoH's ethos and culture. Coaching gives us tools to help people experiencing homelessness, grassroots organisers, volunteers and sector workers and support a process of change in a difficult time.