1. What the Club is all about.
The Riverwood Lunch and Leisure Club is a recently established recreational club for people who experience a mental illness, and live in Riverwood or surrounding areas. Local community services, churches and mental health workers have joined together to establish this community project to support people living with a mental illness. Many people who have an illness such as Scizophrenia or bi-polar mood disorder (often known as manic depression), can become isolated and may find it difficult to maintain social contacts. Sometimes this is due to a lack of understanding by members of the community. The club provides a safe and welcoming environment in premises at St Andrew's Anglican Church, Riverwood.Schizophrenia is a mental illness that can involve such things as thought disorder, delusions, hallucinations, withdrawal, loss of motivation or a lack of insight. About one in a hundred people will develop this disorder at some time. Some people find that with medication they can continue to live normally, while others find that it severely disrupts their life. They may have difficulty maintaining employment, family relationships and even day to day activities. For these people, Riverwood Lunch and Leisure Club provides a place to begin establishing social contact and participating in leisure activities. A barbeque is held at St Andrew's every Wednesday, with generous support of Terry's Quality Meats. Other activities such as cricket, tennis and painting are also offered. The members decide on the sorts of activities they are interested in and the community worker asists in organising these activities.
Anyone interested in coming along to the club or volunteering or providing sponsorship can phone Mary on 9153 7624 on Modays or Wednesdays.
The club is formed under the guidance of a committee drawn from Riverwood Community Services, St George Mental Health Services, St Andrew's Anglcian Church and Blakehurst Uniting Chrurch. Funding is provided through St Andrew's Anglican, by Anglicare. Sue, a trained community worker, organises the club, assisted by Sean & volunteers.