Volunteer experiences
Every year we survey our Volunteers on everything about their Growing Well experience. This is a selection of what they said in our latest survey.
On what part of Growing Well is most beneficial to their mental health
“The encouragement, understanding and time to heal. To be with non-judgemental people. For me, to appreciate the risk you took by welcoming me to GW and making me feel cared about. Thank you for trusting me.
“Trimming shoots back to encourage new growth. Planting new seeds and watching them grow. It makes me enthusiastic about coming.
“All aspects of Growing Well help my mental health.
“Being around people/feeling accepted and able to be myself. Learning and having a challenge has helped me feel useful. Growing well is amazing it really helped me have something positive to look forward to every week.
“Being part of a group with such a positive focus. Connecting with nature and being outside. Being with individuals and group members who understand some of the challenges faced. Not having to explain, acceptance.
“Escaping from real life, getting dirty, working hard, sense of achievement at the end of the day. Learning skills and knowledge of horticulture, giving a sense of optimism to try and transfer knowledge to home growing.
“Hands in the earth, dirt under nails, laughing, friendly community…that stuff.
“The encouragement, understanding and time to heal. To be with non-judgemental people…
“Being around people, feeling accepted and able to be myself. Learning and having a challenge has helped me feel useful. Growing Well is amazing, it really helped me to have something positive to look forward to every week
“Being part of a group with such a positive focus. Connecting with nature and being outside. Being with individuals and group members who understand some of the challenges faced. Not having to explain, acceptance.
On the difference being at Growing Well has made to their life
“It has given me more confidence in myself. It has helped (given resources/signposted) so I am able to continue my progress outside of GW. It challenges me to do things outside of my comfort zone while in a safe space so I have the tools to recognise triggers when in the world.
“I have a reason to look forward to my days. I enjoy having something to learn and be able to document.
“Stops loneliness, helps interactions with good people and knowing people care about mental health and physical wellbeing. Building trust in people.
“Made it better in short. Mental health has improved, learned new skills, got given food, happy days.
“It’s encouraged me to be braver and not give up, even when things feel tough. It’s given me something to look forward to in my week and some time for me, where I can switch off from being a carer.
“It has been an extremely important factor in my journey back into paid employment. I started feeling like my old self again, pre-mental health breakdown. Before GW, I was starting to lose faith/hope that this would ever happen!
On their general feelings while at Growing Well
“Like a weight has been lifted off my shoulders and I can just be
“Growing Well is an important safe and happy activity for me to be doing, to give me structure for my mental health.
“Happy, life is good & worthwhile. Friendly. Understanding.
“Initially I remember feeling quite uncomfortable, but that changed quickly.
“Happy and relaxed
“Feel positive and comfortable and ‘away’ from the reality of outside problems for a few hours.
“Knowledge: Key to life. Horticulture. A need to understand how to grow my own food.
“I really enjoy the mix of activities on the day
“Positive learning experience
“They explain in a way you can understand.
“Growing Well has basically changed my life, yes, my brain is still rubbish. The social and confidence and skills has been a big part and helped so much. Thank you.
“Being in the kitchen has really helped with my confidence. I really look forward to being here, love how much there is to learn.
“Coming to Growing Well was the first time in a long time I started to feel positive about myself, my life and the future again. It has also helped me to prioritise the things that are most important to me – my health and well-being, friends and family, living in the present moment and connecting to the natural environment.
“I have been here a couple of weeks and I have already learnt some new skills.
“Looking after plants reminds me to look after myself.
“How to interact with other people and realise that not everyone in life is out to hurt and upset you.
“Just getting out of bed and getting on the bus is a skill GW has helped. It has helped me self-caring myself by learning veg and cooking! Fresh air. It gives me confidence of getting out the house where I get scared to go outside because of seizure.
On our Goals Based support
“A lack of goals was one of the contributors to my poor mental health. The goals I have here make me feel more optimistic for the future.
“It adds another purpose/reason to commit to coming to GW and being able to measure this gives you another sense of achievement on top of your day-to-day progress.
“Helps to keep track of different skills that you are developing, and is a useful record of how you spend your time each week/different areas of growing that you are gaining experience in. I still find the self-rating scale a bit challenging to complete, but this is improving.
“…But I feel stressed trying to put into words and write down those goals.
“Sometimes it’s hard to really connect with the data side of this process, I think the frequency may have something to do with it. Although I appreciate the opportunity to check in and reflect on how I feel things are going.
On our regular mental health and wellbeing surveys
“It’s easy to not take proper notice of any improvements that have happened. It’s good to allocate time to practice taking notice of achievements and skill learning.
“Because it gives a consistent indication on how life is going so you can see that things are improving.
“Mental health is not easy to talk about so filling in a survey will allow people to open up without any anxiety or worries.
“Double edged sword; however it is nice to discuss your results once a month.
“It can be good to see a trend and be able to look back on what was happening at that time and why I felt worse/better than today- however, it is a snapshot and doesn’t give you a full picture of how I’m feeling.
On learning new skills
“Horticulture…I feel able to ask questions easily at GW, without feeling out of my depth, or silly. Love learning skills, particularly the site tours.
“I am interested in the whole growing process and being here I am getting to see, and more importantly be involved in all stages from seed to harvest. (except choice of crop to plant – I’d be interested to see how this happens.
“Learning is ‘gentle’ and friendly. Opportunity to try new things such as wild swimming, pasta making, bread making etc as well as the horticultural skills. Tai chi.
“Building my confidence over the weeks/months that I have been at GW has been the foundation for progress in several different areas of my life – social, professional etc.
On the horticultural skills development logs
“It’s great to have a log of learning to demonstrate progression, especially on a day when feeling a bit useless.
“I don’t always notice when I have improved something or learnt something new. It’s a good way of highlighting that.
“Doing this helps me reflect on my activities in the day and see how I’ve been doing from week to week. The skills I learn make links to how I transfer the structure to my tasks away from GW week to week.
“I find it useful because it is a good record of what you have done whilst at Growing Well.
“Hopefully I can learn some positive things about myself
On how Growing Well could be improved
“It is just brilliant already with lovely people leading it – always kind and approachable and very patient and informative.
“I think it’s really good. I notice there is always things improving. I like the noticeboard in the middle yurts, the monthly walk is interesting as well. Thanks GW.
“The staff are interested and caring and supportive. The environment is safe and friendly. Philosophy is positive and promises are followed through.
“It’s fine as it is!
“Hopefully I can learn some positive things about myself