“It’s a very different kind of space”
Alison We are co-hosts for Thyme & Space - therapeutic gardening sessions for women who would benefit from using the space. Our role is to facilitate the sessions and make sure they flow.
Rita They are sessions where women can be together. Everyone is invited in to do something. During each session we are very conscious of what individuals do in a gentle, unobtrusive way. Women come here and find it’s a space where they don’t have to perform or do something in a certain way. There’s an openness and also a respecting of privacy too. Nobody has to say anything if they don’t want to.
Alison If we have someone new arrive, we ask for basic details and have a conversation about why they have come and what they want from the sessions, but the single most important thing people need to know is that we won’t ask them to share information about their lives in the group.
Rita They don’t have to reveal anything here. We don’t need to know people’s history to know them. They just need to be here, and we know them as they are in the space on the day. I have seen women change quite a lot since I’ve known them. We see women participating more in groups. Their confidence changes.
Alison I used to pick one woman up to bring her to the sessions but now she comes on her own! She’s gained confidence. And we see connections between the women grow. It’s a small group that meets once a month so it’s like a treat. But it’s impactful for the women who come here. It’s important to them.
Rita There’s something about feeling you are part of something. And knowing you are always welcome is important.
Alison People come and go. They use the space and support when they’re here. We have regulars but others ebb and flow. We start at 11 in the morning and people are told they have to come for meditation but what time they leave is more flexible.
Rita It’s a very different kind of space because it’s a garden. We’re not in a meeting room. It’s not a public space but it’s a community space. There’s a locked gate, there’s a set time – there are clear physical boundaries.
Alison For survivors of sexual abuse, there is often dissociation and they can get grounded here. They come back into their bodies. That is why the breathing, the meditation, the eating, the basking in the sun, and taking their shoes off is so significant. And they can do that because it is a safe space. This also applies to the women here who haven’t been sexually abused but have other traumas.
Rita We call them volunteers because they are coming here to contribute. The women share their knowledge about different things with each other, they are generous.
Alison I like it when I’m whizzing around and I hear really cathartic conversations going on. That happens quite often.
Rita One of my stand-out moments at Thyme & Space was when I asked one volunteer if she could co-host and be the support person for the meditation circle. That felt good because there was a blurring – in a positive way – of the role she was playing. Another one was when I heard how one volunteer helped another with her statement in court – it must have felt so important to have that support and ease that really difficult time.
Alison I first came to PLOT 22 through a mutual friend. I drifted off and then came back when my husband was seriously ill. Emma was brilliant and taught me how to breathe again. I’ve come back and forth, ebbed and flowed over about five years. The plot gives me space. It means I’m not working in my own garden though - but this is nicer cos it’s with other people!
Rita I spotted PLOT 22 in the Brighton and Hove Food Partnership newsletter the year they started the Friends of PLOT 22 scheme. I have a plot on this site and I came along to a session to lay a brick path! I pitched up and it was pouring with rain, windy and cold so we gave up after an hour and retreated to the cabin! And pretty soon I found I’d agreed to co-host the Community Sundays general sessions!
I like to get my hands dirty, grow stuff, and have things look better after two hours. I try and spend as much time on my own plot but actually it’s better doing it with other people. What I really like is doing stuff together, learning from other people, and being around different people.
I’ve worked locally all the time I’ve lived in Brighton and Hove and I’ve worked in community social services. I know how the system works. But I didn’t know how the third sector works and now I do. I’ve really learnt how community development works. It’s important to build up trust and show commitment when working in the community.
At PLOT 22, if we have an idea but it doesn’t grow, we let it go. It’s not a failure. We try something else. PLOT 22 is responsive, supportive. The way Emma has worked with project leads means that people feel they have the agency to make decisions but also have support. It feels like I’m valued for what I do here.
As told to Vaska Trajkovska September 2019