In the month of June, we come together and celebrate Pride. A celebration of community, identity and visibility. It is also a time of raising awareness of many of the challenges faced by the LGBTQIA+ community.

At Burton & District Mind, it’s always been an important ethos to us that we support everyone. No matter their background, sexuality, age, religion, gender or circumstance. Mental health is something that impacts and affects every single person, so the last thing we would ever want to do is leave someone without support.

Over two years ago, when we last did our Help us to Help you survey, it was highlighted to us that we needed to improve our support to LGBTQIA+ people. Now two years on, we are proud to say we have taken great steps forward.

Our Expressions Focus Group

Expressions was an opportunity for LGBTQIA+ people to come and talk to us, offering their insights and experience, and instead of guessing what we could do better, we could act based on direct feedback.

We then hosted our first-ever Creative Spaces Expressions Project, which gave LGBTQIA+ people the chance to come and share different creative skills and interests. It’s a safe environment that encourages important conversations to happen, too.

So far this year, we’ve introduced 3 new Creative Spaces Projects…

Tamworth

Burton

Lichfield/Burntwood

There are still spaces, so if you’d like to get involved, please sign up today! Click here:

As a charity, we have also taken steps to provide our staff and teams with important LGBTQIA+ training, alongside other steps towards receiving our Queerify Accreditation which identifies us as LGBTQIA+ Safe Space!

We are incredibly proud of the progress made so far, but of course, our work doesn’t stop there. We are here for the LGBTQIA+ Community every day of the year, not just one month. We will continue learning and working towards making sure everyone has access to the mental health services that they deserve.