October Meeting

Thanks to all our members who attended the October meeting – important decisions were made about collaborating with other groups like GayLife Stoke and Staffordshire Buddies. The group showed great generosity of spirit in wishing to share the creative workshop opportunities – made possible by our recent successful grant from People’s Health Trust. Collectively, we examined the drafts for a new group leaflet and people made suggestions which influenced the final design.

We finally got a chance to view photos from the Canal Trip and Appetite Stoke 2017 events…as well as shots of our first funded outing. This was a visit to Trentham Gardens – collectively agreed upon at our September meeting. Although the weather was awful – the experience was quite the opposite.

Three group members attended the Older People’s Engagement Network (OPEN) forum at Central Methodist Church in Longton. The room allocated must have looked much bigger when empty…but the October forum was very well attended…in fact it was a tight squeeze to get everyone in. Nonetheless, we had some useful discussions about important issues such as those raised by Dr Amit Arora on Deconditioning syndrome and how the hospital can help to prevent this.

“Older people, whether in hospitals, care homes or at their own homes, who do not get enough opportunity to mobilise, can have an increased risk of reduced bone mass and muscle strength, reduced mobility, increased dependence, confusion and demotivation. These problems can be attributed to the phenomenon of what can be termed as ‘Deconditioning Syndrome’.”  Dr Amit Arora

OLGBT WELLBEING PROJECT

The first series of creative workshops begin under the direction of Ceramics Artist Jo Ayres.
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Understandably the first workshop with Jo had to be postponed because of a family bereavement. Nonetheless our planned visit to Spode Factory to see the British Ceramic Biennial Exhibition went ahead. Jo arranged for a colleague to meet us and let us work with raw materials in the Clay Pit. It was great fun and whetted our appetites for the start of the project on Tuesday 14 November. There are spaces available…so please get in touch if you would like to be involved.