Emotional Well-Being

Emotional Wellbeing

Building the emotional resilience of the community of east Belfast is something that we are passionate about.  We care about people and want to see people living at their best. Promoting Take 5 Steps to Wellbeing is at the core of our work. Take 5 helps maintain and improve our wellbeing - Connect; Be Active; Take Notice; Keep Learning; Give. 

Take 5 Campaign

East Belfast Community Development Agency would like to encourage the community sector in east Belfast to join a Take 5 Campaign.  The heart of the campaign is to enable our community to build stronger emotional resilience.     Organisations are probably already including a Take 5 approach in their work and won’t need to do much more.  This is not something extra as a lot of our programmes and approaches fit into Take 5 – it is a way to frame our thinking and to have a bigger impact on helping people build their resilience and emotional wellbeing. We believe this shift in mindset will be beneficial to you, your staff / volunteers and your neighbourhood.

The Campaign is operates at three levels providing maximun impact for your organisation:

• staff and volunteers
• programmes and activities
• local community

Currently seven local organisations are implementing the Take 5 Campaign.

Training Provided

EBCDA is active in raising awareness around wellbeing and suicide prevention through a number of means. 

We offer a variety sessions to local organisations and offer open training sessions to those who live, work and volunteer in east Belfast. 

• Bespoke sessions tailored to your organisation i.e. Stress Management, Take 5, Self-Care, Wellbeing
• Applied Suicide Intervention Skills Training (ASIST)
• SafeTalk
• SuicideTalk
• Mental Health First Aid
• Top Tips for Looking After Yourself

Suicide Prevention

Every year EBCDA works with the SOS (Survivors of Suicide) Bereaved Family Support Group to organise meetings and other events to raise awareness of suicide prevention in East Belfast. These are open to the public and are publicised through our Suicide Prevention email list, Facebook and Twitter @EBCDAspio

Video highlighting the work of Survivors of Suicide (SOS)

Awareness events with Belfast City Airport (May 2015) and Glentoran FC (January 2015) 

In August 2013 EBCDA launched the “Message of Hope” suicide awareness booklet which was distributed to homes across each Belfast. The booklet provides information on how we can all play a role in suicide prevention in our community and lists contact details for crisis services, counselling organisations and other relevant support providers including bereavement support. To date almost 50,000 copies of the booklet have been distributed across East Belfast.  The latest version of the Message of Hope booklet is available to download here.

Message of Hope Booklet Launch - August 2013

Strategic Work

EBCDA represents the views and needs of East Belfast relating to mental health and suicide on a number of bodies, both locally and regionally including: Healthy Living Centre Alliance Mental Health Working Group, South & East Belfast Mental Health Community of Interest, the Belfast Protect Life Implementation Body (BPLIG), and the Northern Ireland Suicide Prevention Strategy Implementation Body (SSIB).

East Belfast Community Response Plan

The East Belfast Community Response Plan (CRP) has been developed by several organisations and individuals with an interest in suicide prevention in East Belfast. It puts in place a plan to support people and communities following a suspected suicide.

Whenever a suicide takes place it is important that individuals and communities are offered support. This can reduce the likelihood of further suicides taking place and also encourages people to seek help if they are finding it hard to cope. The CRP aims to deliver coordinated and effective support in response to each suspected suicide. Every response is different as it takes into account the particular circumstances of the death and those who have been impacted.

Who is involved:

There are several individuals and organisations involved in the development and delivery of the East Belfast:

Crisis Response Coordinator: Currently New Life Counselling are responsible for coordinating the plan.

Steering Group: The steering group for the East Belfast CRP is made up of local community representatives for each neighbourhood in east Belfast along with service providers who operate in East Belfast. These include local counselling and support services, BHSCT Staff, local community organisations, PSNI and telephone help lines. The Steering Group meets, if required, to plan and deliver the response.

Stakeholder Group: A wider group of individuals and organisations in East Belfast who have an interest in suicide prevention but would usually not be involved in delivering a response unless they are directly affected by a suicide (schools, community groups, MLAs, GPs, youth providers, etc). The stakeholder group will be kept updated on the plan by email and at public update meetings.

For more information on any of the above in East Belfast please contact Gillian Hamilton, Emotional Wellbeing Coordinator EBCDA on 028 9045 1512 or gillian@ebcda.org.