Description
Key purpose of the project is to counteract social exclusion of the residents of Poznań city and district who suffer from mental health problems and, at the same time, are parents. Project activities are focused on provision of multifaceted, systemic support (counselling and interventions, legal advice, psychotherapy, support groups, mediation, family conferences, etc.), addressing both the effects and the causes of mental problems of beneficiaries (e.g., violence, alcohol abuse, unemployment, marriage/partnership crisis, disability of a child and/or parent, etc.). Adequate support for a parent in mental crisis is a first step for their community and civic involvement. Furthermore, it triggers some very important mechanisms that protect the children against abuse and neglect and counteract social exclusion of those children in the future.
Summary of project results
"The experience of the Organization indicates that the needs for support of the families affected by mental illness, emotional and life crisis have grown in recent years. Parents in crisis have problems with keeping their job, motivation for treatment, with functioning in the society, and with parental issues. In many cases, their children are staying in foster custody following the parents' child care failure. There is no support center for people with mental health and emotional problems who have children, which would offer multilateral assistance with regard to difficulties in fulfilling parenting responsibilities. The goal of the project was to counteract social exclusion of parents experiencing mental health problems through providing them with multidimensional support. Several tens of families - 211 persons - have obtained help in solving their problems. In majority of the cases, the provided support allowed for psychological stabilization and termination of destructive emotions, helped in coping with life crisis, furnished with tools for proper communication with a child and/or spouse and with the knowledge on child development. The following measures have been provided: psychological and intervention help through regular duty hours of so called primary care psychologists (1,425 hours, 211 appearances), individual psychotherapy sessions (616 hours for 58 persons) - group sessions (104 hours for 31 persons) and sessions for parents with a child (182 hours for 27 adults) - legal consulting (200 hours for 60 persons), mediation (40 hours, 4 couples benefited), family conferences with the participation of the Social Help Center employees (80 hours, concerned 9 families), parenting skills workshops (80 hours, 22 participants), social skills workshops for children and youth (100 hours, 28 participants), social competence trainings and a support group (100 hours, 34 participants). The project participants were families with mental health problems - 211 parents (163 women and 48 men) and their children from Poznań and Poznań County. Both Partners took part in the recruitment and in the quality assessment of the service provided and adjustment to the clients' needs on a current basis."
Summary of bilateral results