‘Riding the daily roller coaster … hanging onto our core values during COVID-19’.

01.05.2020: This week marks the sixth week of the COVID-19 lock-down in the UK, and as I write this blog as the Lead for Psychologically Informed Environments (PIE) at Centrepoint, I am aware that for some individuals’ this time has flown past, whilst for others if has felt like it has gone on for ever. Regardless of our own perception of time, perhaps dependent on our particular circumstances, there is still no clear or definite end to the current situation. For many of the staff that I have spoken to this week, whether in individual staff support sessions or within team remote reflective spaces, as well as for me personally and for many friends and family I speak to, there have certainly been ‘good days’ and ‘not-so-good days’! Psychologists would argue that this is quite normal, even in our pre-lockdown lives, but during this COVID-19 pandemic, this may feel more pronounced or extreme than usual. When reflecting on this, the image of a ‘roller-coaster’ has come to mind quite a lot, which whilst making me think about what we can do to ‘hold on’ until this roller coaster ride finally ends!

As well as managing our own challenges on this roller coaster journey, there are also many complex challenges in working with a homeless population (e.g. Campbell, 2011), which may feel more difficult than usual right now due to the restrictions and challenges placed on all of us because of the necessary COVID-19 lock-down and the disruption to our ‘business as usual’. These can include the pressure we feel to find solutions, even when there may not be any right now because of the reduction in services or opportunities for our homeless young people to access. Alternatively, it can be the challenge we feel to ‘cope’, ‘manage’ or ‘contain our emotions’ so that we can continue to support others. Consequently, the accepting of our emotions and giving ourselves space to process these, as well as practising kindness or compassion to ourselves and accepting we are all ‘doing the best we can’ will be critical. Something I heard this week that has helped me when I have struggled to manage all my different roles as employee, mother, partner, teacher, daughter and friend, has been the comment that we are not ‘working from home during a crises’ but we are ‘staying at home because of the crises and trying to work’! Similarly, reminding our amazing ‘frontline’ staff that they may not be able to deliver everything they used to or want to at this time, is OK. We can all only do what we can do, and therefore reframing our expectations of ourselves at times to be ‘good enough’ can enable us to feel less stressed, anxious or disheartened.

In addition, when working with homeless young people we are managing many complex issues and emotions, in them and us. Sometimes even our willingness or ‘offer’ to help may be rejected. Remaining ‘present’ for another can be exhausting, we often ‘contain’ a lot of difficult emotions for our young people and this is why our own self-care, as discussed in previous blogs, through supervision, reflective spaces, personal activities and support mechanisms is so important. Sometimes, we can even assume a ‘re-parenting role’, often for many young people who have never had a positive or meaningful attachment figure in their lives or whose past attachments have been abusive or unsafe. This can create the challenge where their instinctive need or longing for an attachment to others (c.f. Bowlby, 1967; Attachment Theory) can also equally come with a profound fear of forming such an attachment (Glasser, 1996). This always reminds me of the ‘Push Me — Pull Me’ mythical creature created by Hugh Lofting in his Dr Dolittle children’s stories. This animal is something like a horse, but has two heads, one on either end of its body (therefore having no tail) and has difficulty in deciding what direction to take or making up its mind. In practice, these mean we need to be aware of how differently a young person may present at different times and to different staff, and ensure we offer consistent ‘team’ support to avoid the ‘splitting of teams’. It is also key to use our personal support networks and professional supervision to manage our own personal feelings of rejection if we are ‘pushed away’ rather than ‘pulled in’, when we are trying to help them.

There is also a challenge when working with a ‘homeless’ population of how we can create a ‘home’, which is a critical part of a Psychologically Informed Environment (PIE) as outlined by Keats et al (2012). This has never been more important than during the current COVID-19 pandemic as the instruction to us all is that we must #stayathome to protect others. For some of our young people, ‘home’ has never been a ‘safe place’ for them, particularly for those who have been abused, neglected or have travelled thousands of miles to seek asylum in the UK away from war zones and conflict. Therefore, it has been great to hear from our frontline services that the majority of our young people, who have had these experiences, have still been able to remain ‘at home’ and safe in our services. This is real testament to the support that our staff are offering and the attachment relationships they have created with the young people they work with, that they are able to overcome their ‘unhoused minds’ (Brown, 2019) and see that they are part of our Centrepoint family.

Another challenge can be the ‘fantasy’ that having a safe place to sleep in a hostel or ‘having a place of one’s own’ marks the end of all the homeless young person’s issues. However, we know that right now, even for ourselves personally ‘staying at home’ might not be living up to that fantasy of having more time with loved ones, home schooling our children, or having more time and space without our work commute to take up a new hobby or exercise routine! In addition, if we have little or no space at home or no garden, and are isolated from our friends and family in other households we might feel there are definitely more ‘not so good days’ than ‘good days’ right now. Consequently, Centrepoint continues to offer young people support to manage their own tenancies for a period once they leave our services to help to minimise the risk that they are ‘rejected’ by future landlords or accommodation providers because they ‘aren’t following the rules’ because of financial struggles, challenging behaviours or substance use, often the ‘symptoms’ of past traumatic experiences. This also means that we too need to seek out our support networks and continue to keep connecting virtually to others when we can, to ‘hang on’ as we face our current traumatic challenges resulting from COVID-19.

So what else can we do to manage some of these specific challenges, or to ‘hang on’ during this roller coaster ride more generally? Reflecting on this during the week, I have tried to remain focused on the importance of taking ‘one day at a time’ and remaining in the ‘present’ as much as possible rather than worrying about what may or may not occur in the future. Holding onto our core values of why we do what we do, as per Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT: Hayes, 1982), is also helpful in maintaining our motivation and energy to carry on each day when we are facing difficulties or feeling distressed. Therefore, this week I have also been reflecting on and highlighting to staff in some reflective spaces our Centrepoint core values, as well as how they relate to a psychologically informed or PIE approach. PIE’s grew out of the need to recognise and work with the levels of emotional trauma that can proceed and contribute to homelessness (Johnson & Haigh, 2011), and critical to this is the importance of relationships. It is though these relationships that positive change comes, whether that be our ‘frontline’ keyworkers or other staff working directly with homeless young people, or our ‘support’ teams ensuring we have the resources and processes in place through relationships with external stakeholders or donors / supporters (c.f. https://twitter.com/centrepointuk/status/1254800473812611075). This has never been more critical than right now, as we are dealing with an increase in need from vulnerable young people (e.g. https://twitter.com/centrepointuk/status/1255528607725821956).

Many of our core values at Centrepoint (e.g. ‘Integrity’, ‘Energy’ and ‘Humility’) are key to forming positive relationships with others and can be helpful in reminding ourselves why we do our particular role on those ‘not so good days’. For example, we have integrity in our interactions with others, putting the good of the homeless young people in Centrepoint at the forefront of everything we do by being honest, constructive and transparent, even when this might be difficult. I have heard many staff demonstrating great energy, commitment and resilience in order to overcome any personal or professional challenges whilst remaining empathic to others needs. There have also been examples of excellent professional practice leading to positive outcomes (or at least the avoidance of serious negative ones), that continue to highlight to me what a great resource our staff are within Centrepoint.

A PIE approach also challenges the ‘status quo’ and asks us to reflect on why we are doing what we are doing, considering the importance of ensuring that we are ‘Focused’, ‘Accountable’ and that our practice is evidence-based whilst also being willing to innovate or be ‘Entrepreneurial’ to deal with new challenges. We have had to innovate and adapt many aspects of our ‘core business’ over the past 6 weeks, to ensure that we continue to remain focused on the need to #changethestory for homeless young people despite the current restrictions. This has involved trying out new ideas such as the remote delivery of some services (e.g. Health Team, Engagement Team: #CentrepointChallengeAccepted) as well as making adaptations within accommodation services to staff rotas or physical layouts in order to try to manage the current UK government physical distancing requirements. Of course, this is sometimes about controlling or minimising a risk if we cannot entirely eliminate it, and remembering being ‘good enough’ may be all we can be right now. Being accountable also means celebrating our successes when they do occur, however small, as this also helps make a day ‘good’ rather than ‘not so good’. For example, in one staff team reflective space this week, we ended the session recalling the positive impacts that their work had had recently upon the homeless young people they were working with. This highlighted that there had been some ‘good days’ in the midst of the current lock-down and the associated risks, challenges or ‘not so good’ days, thereby re-energising their focus for the weeks ahead.

Finally, as noted jokingly in one staff reflective space this week, most of us “don’t do this job for the money”(!), instead we are here because we care and we want to make a difference in the lives of some of the most vulnerable young people in the UK. Even in ‘normal’ circumstances, this is not easy, as the complexity of the homeless young people, as well the systems we operate in can be challenging. Consequently, it is not surprising that in the current COVID-19 lock-down circumstances; this is going to feel even more of a roller coaster of ‘good days’ and ‘not so good days’ than usual. However, trying to ‘hang on’ to our core values as well as being kind to ourselves about what is possible right now, might just make the ride bearable and the journey in to the currently unknown future just a little bit more manageable…