Edinburgh woman fears 'life-changing' charity will disappear from funding cuts
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A woman who dropped out of university amid a battle with mental illness says an Edinburgh charity at risk of critical funding cuts 'changed her life'.
Lauren Stonebanks, 45, atteded four and a half years of medical school at the University of Edinburgh before dropping in 2002 out when her mental health "deteriorated".
The Meadowbank resident went through a slew of diagnoses in following years - including depression, anxiety, bipolar disorder, and borderline personality disorder - before an Edinburgh charity turned her life around.
Lauren discovered CAPS in 2011 and has been an active member of the independent advocacy organisation for 14 years.
However, the charity is looking down the barrel of extensive funding cuts from the Edinburgh Integrated Joint Board (EIJB), which announced its intention to make £2.2 million in cuts to social care charities.
CAPS offers individual and collective advocacy, providing safe spaces to explore shared issues.
Lauren soon found a community of accepting people with similar experiences. According to advocates at CAPS, they provide the only pathway for people diagnosed with personality disorders in Edinburgh and the Lothians. They worry that without their services, people with personality disorders will not have access the life-saving community that CAPS facilitates.
(Image: Edinburgh Live)
After receiving a diagnosis for borderline personality disorder, Lauren said she was initially devastated. She later was re-diagnosed as having ADHD and autism, but says CAPS taught her to battle the stigma associated with her original diagnosis.
She said: "I spent two weeks feeling absolutely dreadful. There's not much good said about people with borderline personality disorder. It's all bad. That's what I was being taught in the late 90s and early noughties.
"[CAPS] changed my life because it showed positives. It just changed my entire perspective on it. I wasn't toxic, I wasn't a monster. I wasn't manipulative and evil. I was somebody in a lot of pain and trauma, and just as deserving of compassion."
Through CAPS' commitment to collective advocacy, Lauren began using her lived experience with mental illness to educate social care professionals on how to work positively with people with personality disorders. She began delivering training for mental health nursing students at Napier University as well as occupational therapy students, art therapy students, clinical psychologists, and social workers. She also organises exhibitions and advocates for LGBTQ and minority ethnic people.
Lauren added: "I can make a difference to the attitudes of all those people." Prior to CAPS, she reported being too shy to speak to people. She continued: "It made such a difference."
CAPS services are facing the axe this year with potential funding cuts from the EIJB and millions of pounds of funding cuts to social care charities on the docket. When Lauren found out about the proposed cuts, she said: "I cried, and then I got angry.
"[At CAPS] I've gained a family. My [biological] family was kind of emotionally abusive and not accepting of my sexuality or gender identity. They also didn't [understand] the mental health stuff and kind of blame blamed me."
She spoke on the change in her confidence CAPS has afforded her in her 14 years of involvement: "I used to run away if I had to give presentations, I would flee and speak in front of people. It gave me the confidence to actually challenge the diagnosis."
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Katharina Kasper, Chair of the Edinburgh Integration Joint Board said: "The IJB funds a range of non-statutory services with third sector providers, through block contracts and service level agreements. We are currently carrying out a review of this spend, with the aim of reducing annual spend by £2.2 million. This will enable us to focus scarce resources on the provision of core, statutory services which help keep the people who most need our help safe and well cared for, while allowing our partners to meet their legal duties.
"We have decided to take more time to consider this proposal until the IJB meets on August 26. This is to make sure we have taken the time to fully understand the services being provided, to assess the data and evidence on the impacts of any changes, and to consider the concerns raised by providers, service users and others.
"We recognise the concern this may cause, however we are now in a position where unfortunately these difficult decisions have to be made in order to protect the essential support we provide for some of Edinburgh's most vulnerable people."
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