Lockdown & Addiction
East Sussex Recovery Alliance (ESRA) runs recovery cafés and support services for people in recovery from drugs and alcohol. Jacquie Skilton, CEO at ESRA, writes about how lockdown has affected their work.
Lockdown has hammered most charities in the UK, and ESRA has felt the impact both in terms of funding and client wellbeing. We have seen a huge increase in relapses, most notably among people who had achieved a solid recovery, in some cases more than five years.
Back to basics
We are now taking our clients back to basics with the usual in-person activities support, but with the addition of SMART groups (Self-Management and Recovery Training). This is an addiction recovery programme that helps motivate people to change. It focuses on looking forward and living a healthier life. SMART comes with a set of science-based tools and techniques to support recovery. Staff have been trained to facilitate this recovery group model and early feedback has been very positive.
The Recovery Cafe in Hastings
Funding crisis
When we re-opened after the first lockdown last year, we had more referrals in three weeks than we did for the whole of the previous year. Our services have never been more in demand than they are now. It is also a time of unprecedented difficulty with funding, especially in Hastings.
We are grateful to STAR Drug and Alcohol Service for funding Café North in Eastbourne, thereby securing a valuable recovery resource for the community in East Sussex. Things are very different at the Hastings Hub. We have been lucky to secure a number of grants of up to £50,000, and this has helped with core costs, but we are working hard to raise larger amounts to secure the running and staffing of ESRA in Hastings.
Can you help?
If you or your organisation can help ESRA, then please let us know on [email protected]
Alternatively, you can apply to STAR’s Big Ideas Fund if you have an idea that will benefit the wider recovery community in East Sussex. A maximum of £2,500 is available for one-off or regular activities, equipment or other resources, and this year the outlying areas have been prioritised.
• For further details and assistance, please contact [email protected].
The first awards will be made in June.
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