Month: December 2017

20 safe spaces. In the whole of the UK only 20 places where 40% of all abuse victims can visit and truly feel safe. What is the logic in this?

When it comes to Domestic Abuse, men are looked at as the perpetrators. In film, TV and books the abuser is usually a man, popular shows such as 13 Reason Why, the Walking Dead season 1, and multiple soaps such as Eastenders (Little Mo’s storyline) show woman as helpless victims, and men as the evil abusers. In reality this is not always the case.

To say men do not abuse women is to say women don’t abuse men. It would be ridiculous to say. Approximately 1 in 4 women are abused in their lifetime, be it sexually or through violence, whilst one in 6 men are abused. Yet women’s shelters are common with approximately one per city focusing only on women, compared to the 20 across the whole of the UK dedicated to men. According to Data from the Home Office which shows that men made up about 40% of domestic violence victims between 2004-05 and 2008-09. With men making up 43% of victims in 2006-2007.

With such extreme statistics I decided to go straight to the source and joined chat rooms for male domestic abuse victims and found Randy. A survivor of male domestic abuse who’s partner stole his money, slapped him multiple times whenever he disappointed her, whilst also making multiple online profiles to sleep with other men, then laugh at him whenever he found out. He stated “She was speaking to over 800 people throughout all her profiles” some of which Randy knew socially. One of the men was a high up police officer who she had spoken to about possibly hiding drugs in the house so she could frame him for dealing.

Something like this would mean his (now ex) wife would get full custody of their child, something which luckily he was able to avoid by reporting the messages to the authorities. But it was not all lucky, two days later she filed for divorce and then called the police claiming that Randy tried to stab her. “I didn’t know what to do”, he explained, “she stood at the phone crying whilst staring directly at me smiling”. Randy was taken in for questioning but let off due to lack of evidence. That didn’t end his ex-wife’s tirade though, his wife currently has full custody of their child and has even taken both of their cats. “I felt destroyed” Randy stated, ” she beat me, stole from me, used me, but I still felt like she cared”.

Many domestic abuse Victims are usually manipulated by their partners to believe it is for love and for Randy it was no different, “she’d occasionally show me the love she used to and I thought it would be okay again”. Currently Randy has spent over £15000 in legal fees to gain back his rights to his possessions, his child, and to prosecute his ex-wife. But with men receiving less and less help Randy’s story is just one in thousands and the victims are still voiceless. All because society dictates men as the abusers, not the victims.

Effected men can contact the website below

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Worries about mental health is rising at an extreme level, many doctors are already worried about the current number which is rising each day but in York is Mental Health taken seriously?

Sadly there is no simple answer to this, as Doctor Michelle Rose of ‘Mind’ explained to me “When it comes to York there is an adequate amount of facilities, but I do believe for the current levels of people suffering with Mental Health there should be more”.  In 2015 York was the only major city in the UK to not have a large NHS psychiatric hospital due to the unexpected closure of Bootham Park Hospital. It was stated this was due to some inspectors worries that patients were at risk due to the large drops from the building.

But that leaves York void of a large mental health facility. Which obviously means York’s mental health is not taken seriously, right? Wrong. As Doctor Rose told me, there is a division of ‘Mind’ (York Mind https://www.yorkmind.org.uk/) who are still working in York and supplying residents with many mental health services. Sadly due to their small number I was unable to interview any workers of York ‘Mind’ but I was able to interview a couple of patients as long as I did not disclose their full names. They spoke positively of York ‘Mind’ but also expressed some concern. David stated “I feel like there’s a lot of care put in here (York ‘Mind’) but, it’s just not enough”, he went on to explain, “There’s only a few staff members on at any time and they’re almost always busy, meaning we sometimes have to find somewhere else which isn’t as good”.

I decided to look into these other facilities and found a place called ‘The Retreat’, a very good looking place with one glaring issue. They don’t offer that many services. I was unable to speak to anyone for the same reason as York ‘Mind’ so I checked their website which only showed me 4 services. Complex Dementia Care, Eating Disorders, DID and Personality Disorders. All sounds good until you read that they only offer the majority of these services to Women. Only Dementia Care is also offered to Men

This was a large shock to me as around 3/4 of all suicides due to mental health issues are committed by men, according to multiple reports including the NHS. Currently the known statistics are that 19% of Women in the UK suffer from Mental Health Issues and that 12% of Men suffer from mental Health issues. I decided to call up Doctor Rose again to ask her explanation of how the two

statistics correlate since it should mean Women commit more suicides them men. She explained “the reason why there are less men diagnosed with Mental Health Issues is because, on average, men don’t show emotions due to this men don’t cry stigma which causes these uneven Gender statistics”.

Not everything is bad news though as in 2019 York will open a brand new Mental Health facility on Haxby Road which will have NHS backing so hopefully York ‘Mind’ will have less stress. The facility will also cater to both Men and Women so any gender bias will be dealt with. Hopefully meaning York’s position on mental health will no longer be difficult to answer.