In this case study one of our support workers takes a close look at the barriers our service users face in their quest to belong to a healthy social group.
When I think about the subject of ‘belonging’, there are specific things that surface as significant for me in considering a complete picture of this notion or ‘sense’ of belonging. Things such as acceptance, respect, connection, family and identity come to mind. My attempts to attach descriptions and concepts to what is, essentially just an emotional experience, is haphazard. I guess that’s because for the most part, you don’t need to have considered what ‘belonging’ is in order to know whether or not you currently experience it in your life. Faced with the sheer vastness to this subject (and on the brink of feeling somewhat overwhelmed by it) I shall simply try to share some factors that most typically come to light from time spent with our service users, who generally feel a lack of belonging in their lives.
The first thing I recognise from our service users is that the only sense of belonging they currently have tends to be with a very narrow and specific group of people. A typical example of this is the peer group that share the most similar habits and have an equal need for co-dependency in this area. The more polarised a person’s lifestyle tends to be, the more specifically like them other people need to be in order to offer any kind of acceptance. By ‘polarised’, I mean people who may be brought together by their mutual need to drink alcohol but then continuously fall out with each other through their actions whilst heavily intoxicated. The very thing that unites them is the very thing that makes the relationship so unhealthy. Perhaps the most significant example of this is when two people are a couple and they spend a large proportion of their time together. As the extent of an individual’s substance use becomes all the more consuming the narrower their peer group becomes and the gulf of isolation from the rest of society only broadens.
Not only is this minority peer group extremely small but the actual substance of the relationship is also equally shallow. It appears like a double-edged sword for our service users. Time and time again the insight I gain on the streets not only supports the notion that our service user’s potential choice of company is very limited but the quality of that relationship goes absolutely no deeper than ‘associate’. I really can’t stress this enough; there may be the odd exception to this but most people I work with at one point or another admits that every single person that is surrounding them during those years of their life are nothing more than associates wanting after their own gains. That is bleak.
However, what I also learn from my work is that very often our service users actually want to break away from these circles. One man comes to mind in particular, let’s call him Phillip. Phillip has consistently talked to me about his efforts to break away from the street drinkers that he also admits he most identifies with. This man is desperate for friendships and companionship but he finds that he is unable to meet anyone else. For a short time he tries to avoid his peer group and often resorts to riding on buses all day (enabled by his bus pass) in an attempt to keep himself occupied and meet new people. But this can only be maintained for so long before the sheer loneliness of it leaves him feeling worse still and then of course, he will always choose the other company over no company whatsoever. I wish to emphasize from this example, that these efforts to leave behind the old in an attempt to find a sense of belonging somewhere else, sometimes heightens this sense of not belonging. When the day is over and done with, what does Phillip have to reflect on?
‘I’ve abandoned these people over here because they don’t really care about me and they’re only interested in sharing my bottle, but I haven’t managed to meet anyone else who wants to spend any time with me’.
On numerous occasions I have found myself having to help Phillip out by helping him to avoid other people. Often we would cross paths at the town-centre community shelter and Phillip will turn to me and say, ‘could you take with me out of the back door and accompany me into the town centre so that I don’t have to deal with them lot out there’. Of course it’s only so long before people realise that they’re being avoided, which makes things even more awkward when Phillip eventually sees them again and the mutual understanding that neither one trusts the other develops further.
The steps to successfully break away from an unhealthy social circle appear to be a radical process. Putting considerable distance between you and every association with the life you are leaving behind is probably just one necessity, but even this is probably the easiest part. From those I have been supporting at Simon on the Streets, it is filling the inevitable space that is created when starting afresh in a new location that is the real challenge. It comes back to the same issue – How do I find a positive place – a social group where I can belong?
Whatever the answer to that question may look like, one thing is clear, Simon on the Streets is a place where those who feel most excluded, can and should belong. I really hope that what we meet people with is acceptance, respect and over time a sense of connection. For some of those we support, we may be the closest thing to family that they can identify with at the moment.