New Pasture Lane Community Centre

Approximately 1 in 4 people in the UK will experience a mental health problem each year. In England, alone, 1 in 6 people report experiencing a common mental health problem every week, which provides us with the facts that we are indeed experiencing a mental health crisis in this country. When I took over the management of New Pasture Lane Community Centre one of the biggest topics that I wanted to support was mental health. I wanted the opportunity to build a mental well-being centre within the heart of the community centre, which could help support people who are struggling with mental illness. At the time of this huge future goal, all I had was an empty side room that had 28-year-old carpets on the floor, no furniture and patchy walls where I had taken down the past Pre-School’s notice board.

The old Pre-School office before it became The Lewis Lounge

To even turn this into a positive mental health therapy suite with no money, no paint and basically zero furniture was going to be a job and a half! Especially with the vision I had in my head anyway! I wanted to create and build a full mental well-being department, let alone just one therapy room! However, I know that anything is possible when you place your heart on it! Especially when you are so passionate about supporting mental illness.

Why I am So Passionate About Supporting Mental Illness?

In my 43 years on this planet so far I have experienced many situations, painful losses and personal experiences with mental illness. I myself, suffer from mental illness, it has taken me 13 years of hard work, determination and focus to be where I am today. When I started my journey of self-discovery 13 years ago I was at concrete rock bottom, literally. To even get out of bed in the morning was a struggle, my anxiety was so high that even the thought of walking out my front door was horrendous. I would suffer really bad panic attacks which would lead me to major dizzy spells, losing my balance and losing control of my breathing. My chest would tighten up and it would feel like a ten-tonne weight had been placed upon my chest which completely restricted my breathing. My eyesight would be affected and blind spots would start appearing in my eyesight which would lead to just more panic because I had no control over what was happening to me physically. My mental health had been gradually ground down to the point where I didn’t want to leave the house in case I couldn’t control what was going to happen to my body next. It seemed like my body was shutting down, which actually it was due to the stress I was experiencing living in a domestic violence relationship. For nearly 2 years I lived with mental, emotional, financial and sexual abuse, it had stripped me completely from being a strong independent businesswoman to someone who couldn’t even walk out the door without her chest wheezing and losing balance due to the sheer impact of the panic attacks. The panic attacks were becoming so extreme that my body was screaming “That it couldn’t cope NO MORE”! Something had to give, or my health would be impacted immensely, which it was.

One day while I sat on the bus to journey to the nearest town to pick up some medication for my son, I sat on the bus and the blind spots in my eyes reappeared and my breathing was now starting to get out of control because I could not see properly. I started to panic even more thinking how am I going to even get off this bus without falling over? Oh, no! Everybody is watching me the bus is full of people, how am I going to get off the bus without making a complete fool of myself?… My right-hand side started to shoot pins and needles all the way up my arm, which led to more panic, more out-of-control breathing and more blind spots in my eyes. This was starting to be a really bad hamster wheel ride and I wanted to get off it, NOW! As the bus approached Driffield town centre I must have chanted to myself a thousand times with self-talk “Just walk in a straight line, take one step at a time and just get off the bus, you will be fine”.

However, I wasn’t fine. I left the bus and suddenly felt extremely unwell and my right-hand side had become numb. Knowing there was a hospital situated up the road was quite a blessing, so I shoved my numb hand in my pocket and walked in the direction of the hospital. No sooner had I walked through the hospital doors to speak to a male nurse who greeted me to ask what my problem was I collapsed onto him and he dragged me over to a bed while calling for help from the other nurses. He hooked me up to a heart monitor where my heartbeat was going over 250 beats per minute, my body had completely lost function on my right-hand side and I couldn’t speak. I was experiencing a stroke and my body had taken more stress than it could handle.

When I was discharged from the hospital I lay in my bed at home recovering and mentally building a plan, a plan to end my abusive relationship, move back to my home town and rebuild my life. I was going to get out of this bed and be fully functional again, even if I died trying. The stroke had left me with mobility issues, stuttering when I had regained my speech and major headaches which later were diagnosed as migraines. BUT! I had lived, for which I was truly grateful! Now it was time to rebuild what my ex had destroyed and rebuild my mental health one stepping stone at a time. Those stepping stones have taken 13 years, and every day I continue to keep going and keep having faith that when I place my foot down the stepping stone will appear and catch the weight of my foot underneath. Each day I am rebuilding the person who was broken 13 years ago, and the person who I use to be will forever be a reminder of why I am so passionate to build the well-being side of New Pasture Lane Community Centre. There have been many other experiences, loss of dear friends and family members struggling with mental illnesses along the way. As well as me living and constantly working on my own mental health to keep it uplifted, positive and medication free. The passion from all these experiences contributed to the never giving up attitude that made The Lewis Loung what it is today.

When you have so much passion for something, so much determination to make it happen a magical thing starts to happen. What seemed at first to be impossible soon comes together to allow it to happen, it is like the missing pieces of the jigsaw suddenly appear and what comes together is what you wanted to create in the first place.

The Lewis Lounge is named after my son’s dear friend Connor Lewis who passed away in July 2022 due to mental health. Connor’s passing just contributed to the passion I already had to make one of the community centre’s top priorities of supporting mental illness. Not long after The Lewis Lounge came together, so did the team to run it. The Lewis Lounge now provides a place where local community residents can come in sit down and speak about how they are feeling. An opportunity to know that a helping hand (and ear) is there for them in a non-judgmental environment that is strongly supportive of mental well-being. Together the community centre team will continue our journey to building a well-being department that will cater to and support more people in positive mental health.

If we can create all this in only 11 months, we can do a whole lot more in the next 11 months.

The journey continues….

Until my next time, take care

Kind Regards

Kate x