lads like us
London
Lads Like Us are a Manchester based non-profit organisation. Our journey started
with a mission dedicated to informing the practice of professionals and
organisations that had failed us as children and adults. We had to make
something positive out of our lived experience, chaos and anger, in order to
thrive. Shouting and screaming about failures and trying to hold people to
account made us mentally ill. We needed to adopt a new approach that would help
" Us and them " that was our first problem. In order to break barriers between "
Us and Them " we needed to work out a way to weaponise the empathy of
professionals to allow them to see that the majority of the behaviours displayed
by service users/clients/citizens/people are a direct result of some kind of
trauma experienced throughout their lives. These people we refer to are lads
like us, from similar estates we grew up on, that are repeatedly presenting at
mental health units, substance misuse services, prison and probation. The answer
to our problem was to create a trauma informed training package focusing on
professional curiosity that would inform practice, using little Mike and little
Danny's experiences combined with the healing journeys of both not forgetting
the input from the services that supported us. " The Million Pieces Experience "
an NHS safeguarding award winning Trauma Informed package that has proven to
inform the practice of professionals was created. We then partnered with
Barnardos to create Million Pieces Trauma master classes. Lads like us deliver
bespoke packages across the country and are now recognised UK wide as a leading
Lived experience resource for organisational staff development for those who
work with people who have experienced trauma. Lads like us work with leaders in
the safeguarding sector both public and private through their consultancy work.
