"Not today sorry…" July 4th 2018

Wrexham Maelor Residency Notes

4/7/2018

Erddig Ward

“Not today sorry…”

To our dismay, we were turned away at the Erddig ward today. Staff there suggested one gentleman- but he was visibly aggrieved and wanted to leave. After ruling him out the ward decided that nobody would be interested or suitable. We decided to use the time to regroup together and have a meeting to work out what could be done.

After a coffee and a discussion it was obvious what the problems were:

Þ    Misunderstanding of our intentions by staff

Þ    The misunderstanding being relayed to patients

Þ    Patient refusal

Also

Þ    Patients being misguided and unclear as to our purpose

Staff are assuming that as artists we are here to engage in “arts and crafts”. We aren’t saying it, those words don’t escape our mouths! But, in trying to help, the staff are making assumptions and are labelling our practice as a result of hearing the title “artists”.

What happens?

Patients decline. And why?

One of two assumptions

1)     They think we are here to do some benign activity.

Or worse still,

2)     They think we are going to put pressure on them to create something- or to have an ability or flair. They feel under pressure, and they don’t know what we want from them.

Being exhausted, unwell, and feeling utterly despondent aren’t exactly conducive to sudden sparks of impromptu creativity, therefore we have both decided that from now on we need to anticipate this assumption at the door- and gently replace the invitation of “doing arts and crafts with these ladies” to something more relaxed, and something that might indeed be more beneficial in terms of appeasing some fed up patients. What’s more, our brief to compile patient’s stories, does not in any shape require us to force people into creative endeavours. If they chose to then it is a massive bonus- and those who have had a go at various activities have expressed enjoyment and gratitude afterwards, but we are fast learning that the average person in a bed wouldn’t consider themselves to be “arty” and they all say, “I can’t draw”, “I can’t paint”, or my most loathed remark, “I haven’t got a creative bone in my body.”

There are several issues at stake here- and they all require individual attention, but I would quickly like to touch upon this thought which keeps returning to me on this residency:

When do creative confident children become stifled adults and decide that they have no creative ability? Why?

Why is creativity and an ability to draw combined?

Who told these people they aren’t creative?

What can be done on a large scale to demonstrate to people that creativity applies to innumerable elements of everyday life and isn’t tied to painting/sketching etc.

With regards to patient confusion we have decided to adopt a uniform for us both to wear. Betsi Cadwaladr University Health Board are arranging t-shirts, so to compliment matching t-shirts we are going to wear matching black leggings with a black skirt. We hope the continuity in our clothing, and unity between our attire will help remind previous patients, and staff, about who we are and what we are doing. In a hospital full of colour-coordinated staff members, and countless visitors, it is important that people can tell what we are about.

So we hope that next time when we come in that things go a little bit more like how we want: no staff misguidance and hopefully improved patient participation.

Watch this space….