John's Good News Story

TRFS are committed to ensuring people are achieving their outcomes and are having FUN!

Below, John tells us how he has achieved his outcomes doing the things he loves.

John's Good News Story

My name is John, I have been with The Richmond Fellowship Scotland since 2017 and I reside at the Woodside Service. My good news story is about following my passion for arts and crafts.

I have always attended classes where I am able to create things such as wood work and soup making classes, but this time I decided I wanted to attend a pottery class. I wanted something to keep me active, give me something to do and help me improve on being creative. I spoke to my Occupational Therapist who asked me what I was interested in doing and I suggested a pottery class, she could only find me a pottery class in an area that I didn’t feel confident in going to and this was due to personal reasons. My support staff have encouraged me to work on my confidence to help me travel to an area that I felt un comfortable with.

I now attend that pottery class on a Friday every week for 2 hours and it has been going great and I look forward to it every week. I hope that I can continue my interest in pottery making when the class finishes. I have made things for my fish tank and I am currently making an artists pallet to help me with my painting, I am getting better at making items with the clay. I am also having fun every week.

I have already felt the benefits of these supports as I really enjoy attending the pottery class, my main outcome when I first came to The Richmond Fellowship Scotland was that I wanted to improve my sense of confidence as I felt that I needed staff to be with me all the time but as my confidence has grown I have realised I don’t need staff there and I can complete this myself which I have been doing. I now go to the shops independently and will try new things without staff.

I now feel more confident at meeting new people as I found this difficult but I went to Blackpool with the service and did not know the other people in the hotel and I spoke to them and really enjoyed meeting new people as it was fun.

I decided that when I moved on I wanted to move away from the area to be closer to family but now I have decided I want to stay within my local community as I am comfortable and confident here and I have what I need in my area. This means I can still continue to independently go to the clubs and classes I enjoy.