We want to say something about the importance of love and compassion in public services. Our name “Love Barrow families” sometimes leads to raised eyebrows and strange looks. So the question is how do we ‘love’ Barrow families? Even the ones who have the labels “troubled” “costly” “resistant” “mentally ill”, “chaotic”, “anti-social” the list is endless.
And this is our best answer:-
- Look beneath the label and see the people.
- Expect assets. Most people want to give, especially those families who struggle. No-one asks the troubled families to give. Instead we want them to take what we give them, even when we know it doesn’t work.
- Build one key trusting relationship. Stand in the shoes of parents and teach them how to do this for their children. Give of yourself. That’s what most of us entered the helping professions to do!
- Be a team, connect with others. Be clever enough to understand the complexity, strong enough to bear the distress and resilient enough to have hope. Hope is contagious and can be passed on.
- Don’t try to fit them into a one size fits all-we are all unique. Listen carefully and quietly so that they take a leap of faith and help you to understand and treat the real problem.
If you can do this then you will have created something most precious, something that can be passed on through relationships and across generations. Some might call this cost effective and efficient but at Love Barrow families we have our own name for it. We call it magic dust!