What we’re learning about better working with the LGBTQ+ community
We want everyone to know they’re welcomed and respected in our services. But for members of the LGBTQ+ community it’s not always that simple.
We want people of all genders and sexualities to know they’re welcomed and respected in our services. At the same time, we recognise that for members of the LGBTQ+ community it’s not always that simple. Many people in this group might have had negative experiences with healthcare providers and/or experienced discrimination in their lives, both of which could make it more difficult to reach out.
So how do we better understand the needs of the LGBTQ+ community? And how do we better support them with their alcohol or drug use? Alongside existing projects, we set up an LGBTQ+ working group and we’re working with members of the LGBTQ+ community to look at how we can answer these questions. We’re still at the very beginning of what will be an ongoing and evolving project, but it’s an aspect of our work that we know is worth doing better.
Ben Kaye, Young People and Family Recovery Worker and LGBTQ++ Lead at With You in Bournemouth
As a member of the LGBTQ+ community I feel I have a greater understanding of the specific needs of this group, particularly the way they use substances and why. But having the opportunity to set up an LGBTQ+ recovery group has opened my eyes even further and emphasised that no two people are the same.
Our recovery group is a diverse group of LGBTQ+ people and I’ve been educated why queer women might drink too much or what the substances of choice might be for a trans person. This particular community requires a specific group as their needs can’t always be met by heteronormative services. Creating a safe space where LGBTQ+ people are welcomed, understood and heard has proven successful. Since our launch in 2018 we’ve had regular attendance and people feel they’re able to be open and vulnerable in a way they wouldn’t if the groups were just gender specific. Members also benefit from the group being peer lead and I’ve learned that my facilitating it as a member of the LGBTQ+ community adds to its attraction.
My specialism is chemsex and substance misuse issues that affect gay and bi men and MSM (men who sleep with men), so by holding space and allowing those to come forward in a non judgemental way has encouraged new members. We’ve also seen that opening the group to people who don’t already use our services has been very beneficial. We work alongside local agencies and as long as someone meets the requirements for joining they can come along. Opening the group has encouraged engagement, which in turn allows us to further support the local LGBTQ+ community. As we are the only LGBTQ+ recovery group in the county, this really is what it’s all about.
Danielle Hopkins, Data Officer and Equality and Diversity Champion at With You in Lancashire
In my old service Blackpool Fulfilling Lives, we worked collaboratively with other organisations supporting those in the area with multiple complex needs. I would be in meetings with these groups and we’d talk about, for example, someone who was LGBTQ+ and homeless approaching a housing institution. The response would be “Well, hang on a minute, what do you mean they might have specific needs?” For example, if someone who was transitioning from male to female needed access to a female hostel many organisation’s didn’t have protocols in place to meet that need.
That’s why it’s important to talk to people in the communities. It can be a struggle to get engagement from the LGBTQ+ community because they sometimes think no one will be interested in what they have to say. But it’s crucial when building a service to know what their needs are and only they can tell you that.
Then it’s about making sure that frontline workers have a level of education and awareness about those issues. So if a client is gay then ok, are they involved in the chemsex scene? We’ve got this person identifying as Lesbian, how do we help them? Are they being abused by a partner? How can you put them into a refuge if the refuge might also contain their partner? Then how do you support them in a way that’s constructive for them? So say someone’s presenting with drug issues and that person is using drugs to manage feelings of guilt or shame because of their sexuality or gender identity, how do you help them work through that?
It’s essential that those frontline workers are knowledgeable about their subject matter. You can be the best recovery worker in the world, but if you have someone who’s LGBTQ+ come into a service and you know nothing about the issues they might have faced then you might not be able to help them in a way that works for them.
Felicity Simpkin, Associate Director of New Business & Contract Retention at With You
In late 2019 we started a project to improve the organisation’s offering to LGBTQ+ people who use our services or work with us.
As a group they had lots of ideas for what our LGBTQ+ offer should be. They looked at what we’re already doing in our services and built off the diverse experiences of the people involved in the project. But we want any changes in how we work to be meaningful and sustainable so they spent the first six months making sure the basics were right.
This included listening to and working with partners who are already active in these spaces. We know specialist groups often need engaging differently and we know how important it is that our work is informed by the shared experiences of people who come from the LGBTQ+ community.
For the last few months we’ve developed partnerships with LGBT Foundation, London Friend and Stonewall. We’re working with them on the first big offer from this project — LGBTQ+ specific hours with a specialist advisor on our webchat service. We’re also planning on upskilling all our webchat advisors to cover LGBTQ+ issues. This is a first step: we want to see how this initiative goes, learn from it and build from there.
At the end of the day it’s about getting people to the right levels of treatment and we’re working with the LGBTQ+ community to make sure we’re doing it right.
Starting in July we run specific hours on our webchat service for LGBTQ+ people. During these hours, from 11am — 7pm every Wednesday, the webchat advisors will have specific training and knowledge around substance use issues in the LGBTQ+ community. Use webchat on our website.
