Lesley Glover and Kate Evans

Two Lapidus colleagues, Lesley Glover, a clinical psychologist who writes, Kate Evans, a writer who is a counsellor in training, come together. Lesley co-runs a therapeutic group for women managing chronic pelvic pain. She knows these women are often unheard, their complaints are not taken seriously enough, they become silenced. Kate has experience of running creative writing groups in health settings. They plan to offer a series of creative writing sessions as a means for these women to find their voice. Simple? So why did so few women come forward? How does such a collaboration work? Kate’s presentation at the Training Day explored what went wrong and what went right, and compares this project to experiences in other health settings.

Lesley Glover is a senior lecturer in clinical psychology at the University of Hull and an honorary consultant clinical psychologist in the Humber Mental Health Teaching NHS Trust. She has worked in clinical health psychology both as a clinical psychologist and a researcher since 1992. Her work has centred on understanding the ways in which people make sense of their health problems and the psychological interventions which can help people to manage their experiences. She currently co-runs a group for women with chronic pelvic pain. Lesley has a particular interest in reflective practice and in helping trainee clinical psychologists to develop reflective skills. She is involved in running reflective writing workshops for trainees on the clinical psychology course at Hull. Lesley is a part-time creative writing student at the University of Hull.

Kate Evans used to write mainly for publication, then she began to write madly, personally and eventually therapeutically. Currently working on poetry and a non-fiction book, she teaches creative writing at the University of Hull in Scarborough and facilitates therapeutic groups in the community and mental health settings, while training to be a counsellor. She was Poet in Resident in 2008 for Hospital Arts in North East Yorkshire. She is a Professional Member of Lapidus and attempts to co-ordinate Lapidus events locally. www.writingourselveswell.co.uk