You are invited to take part in the Bendigo Community Health Services Storytelling Project:
“Identifying the impact of COVID19 on Regional Victorian Women’s Mental Health and Wellbeing.”
Participants must live in the Greater Bendigo region.
What is the purpose of this project?
Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, women have been more likely to experience domestic violence, more likely to lose work and more likely to take on extra unpaid domestic labour and childcare. These gendered factors have contributed to a mental health crisis for women in the Loddon Mallee region, with 35% of women experiencing moderate to severe levels of depression during the COVID-19 crisis, compared to 19 per cent of men.
Utilising the framework of Five Ways to Wellbeing, Bendigo Community Health Services will engage women across the region in a storytelling project about their mental health and wellbeing during the COVID-19 lockdowns and ongoing restrictions – providing an opportunity for women to reflect on their experiences and connect through storytelling, while also addressing the gendered drivers of mental unwellness throughout the pandemic.
Focus groups will look at issues including, but not limited to:
• physical activity
• mindfulness
• social connectedness
• community participation
• learning for life
• support services
What does my participation involve?
Participants will take part in a 90-minute focus group via online video conferencing platform: Zoom. Focus groups will be limited to 8 participants per session.
If you decide to take part in the project, you will be asked to sign a release and consent form once you have registered for one of the focus group sessions.
All participants will receive a $50 voucher for their involvement.
Our facilitators will ask the group a series of questions on the impact of COVID-19 as a woman. The format will ensure that participants have an opportunity to share their experiences with other women as well as hear one another’s stories.
Each session will be recorded. The stories and information collected in each session will contribute to a growing body of stories from women across the region.
Participants will be sent a Zoom event link upon registration.
Other relevant information about the project
The subject of these online interviews will be the impact that that the pandemic has had on women’s mental health and wellbeing. The discussions will include the challenges and difficulties, and also the positive experiences women have experienced.
The findings from these focus groups will contribute to the emerging literature and studies on the effects of lockdown on regional Victorian women’s mental health and wellbeing.
The project will recruit anyone who identifies as a woman within the local regional area of the partnering member organisation aged 18 and over. The focus groups will reflect the experiences of women differently affected by COVID19 and will include women from a range of marginalised backgrounds, such as women with disabilities, Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women, migrant and refugee women, LGBTI women and women of different socio economic status.
More about the project:
If you have any queries regarding the storytelling project or the focus groups Bendigo Community Health Services are facilitating, please do not hesitate to get in touch with us:
Siobhan, Health Promotion Worker - [email protected]