Complementary Health

Kids Company currently works with complementary therapists as part of a multi-disciplinary team, delivering therapeutic bodywork to young people and parents. We have a whole range of therapies whose emphasis is to use bodywork therapeutically with particular sensitivity and awareness to healing trauma.

At Kids Company we work with the knowledge that our young people have experienced a great deal of trauma in their lives. It is well documented that the effects of trauma on regulation of the body and emotional states often leads to chronic hyper arousal. This can manifest in sleep disturbance, eating disorders, and other forms of body distress. Many of our clients are prone to depression and anxiety.

Kids Company works on an attachment model, and from the perspective of bodywork, we believe that many stages of attachment invariably need the experience of safe touch. It is through this experience that we not only form a sense of our own identity, but we also learn to emotionally regulate. All of this within the medium of a trusting relationship with a body therapist can build important neurological pathways in the brain; a necessary component in giving us a blueprint on which to form healthy future relationships.

Parents and teachers are potentially key figures in nurturing the children. Kids Company recognises this and supports these relationships. When working with one parent or one teacher, complementary practitioners are in effect also helping many children.

THE TEAM:

Flo Francis – Placements

Flo Francis is a five element acupuncturist who divides her time between the Heart Yard (Kids Company therapy house), and private practice. She trained at SOFEA and graduated in 2006. She’s passionate about supporting new practitioners, helping them to build confidence and improve their skills in their first year of practice.

Almas Bhatti – Training

Complementary bodywork team is headed up by Almas Bhatti Director of Therapeutic bodywork for kids company, who is also a psychotherapist and reflexologist. She is very passionate about furthering research and work on trauma.
Her interest in working with the body led her to qualify as a clinical reflexologist through which she began to appreciate the somatic resonance of unprocessed trauma and how potent working with the body can be. she has gone on to explore this interest further through her study of body psychotherapy. Through her three years of clinical work with Kids Company she has developed a unique way of working which is specific to the particular nature of our work.

Sophie Fyfe-Jamieson – Volunteers

Sophie trained as in integrative massage therapist in 2009 at Costa Rica School of Massage Therapy. She has worked with Kids Company clients over 16 mainly young mothers at the Heart Yard, and is currently seeing a group of teachers at a primary school in Hackney. She also works as a Massage in Schools Program Instructor at a school in Stoke Newington, with primary school children.

GRADUATE PLACEMENTS

The team is putting together a one year Graduate placement program to commence September 2011.

The first year as a qualified practitioner can be a challenge and the placement program aims to provide a structured working environment, where practitioners can gain confidence and strengthen their skills with a ready patient base, sharing their experience with other newly qualified practitioners.

Kids Company have various projects based in schools around London. The placement will involve newly qualified reflexologists and massage therapists working in schools with parents, teachers and pupils.

The program will provide professional supervision and continued professional development training.

You can download details of the programme here.

Contact floella.francis@kidsco.org.uk

VOLUNTEERS

Kids Company recognizes that positive nurturing touch is fundamental for human beings to develop emotionally, physically and socially. Neuro-scientific studies have also shown that we need touch in order to survive and form healthy relationships, especially when predominantly negative touch may have been experienced.

Are you a qualified practitioner?

Kids Company offers a wide range of complementary therapies to children, staff and parents. We are always looking for practitioners to contribute to this program on a voluntary basis. We need specialists in massage, reflexology, reiki, cranial osteopathy, acupuncture, metamorphic technique, EFT and other treatments. Whether you work with children or adults, and can offer a few hours a month or a few days a week, we would love to hear from you.

What’s in it for you?

Due to the exceptionally vulnerable nature of our client group, Kids Company has developed an innovative and unique way of using bodywork to help process trauma. Through building relationships with young people over time, therapists are able to really see the difference their treatment can make to a young person’s life. We offer supervision and support to all volunteers from experienced professionals and a new training program is being developed for 2011.

Options:

· Volunteering at The Arches in Camberwell, either on Saturdays with those who can’t get access in the week or Sundays with teenagers who have just come out of care.
· At the Heart Yard therapy house in Camberwell, where we also provide childcare so that parents can receive treatments while their children are looked after.
· At the Treehouse, our newly opened drop-in centre and pupil referral unit for under-16s in Kilburn.
· In one of the 38 schools we support, working with children, parents or teachers.
· Working with Kids Company staff in a number of locations. Staff work in very demanding environments and so benefit hugely from having access to treatments.

Requirements:

· In order to volunteer with us, practitioners must be fully qualified, be registered with a recognized regulatory association and have full insurance cover.
· All practitioners will go through our recruitment process, see below.
· All practitioners will be supported by an experienced psychotherapist and bodyworker who provides mandatory group supervision sessions.

What next?

How to get involved:

- Download the complementary health application form here and once completed, send to complementarytherapy@kidsco.org.uk or post to 1 Kenbury Street, London SE5 9BS
- Come for an interview and complete your CRB check. We’ll also need evidence of your insurance and qualification documents
- We’ll contact your two references
- Attend the general induction – (this includes Kids Company philosophy, vision, child safeguarding.)
- Attend Complementary Therapy Induction (specifically related to working with trauma.)
- Complete Online Child Protection Training
- Placement

To apply or find out more about the opportunities available, contact complementarytherapy@kidsco.org.uk

Induction Dates:

· Next general induction 26th January, 9th February, 2nd March
· Next complementary therapy induction – Feb