Pandanus



 **PANDANUS YOUNG WOMENS REFERENCE GROUP** By Rebecca Lehmann

**1. Introduction: **

In 2005 there were approximately 100 births per 1000 women aged between 19 and 24 years old in Australia. That gave the total fertility rate (TFR) of the Northern Territory the highest in the country with 2.29 babies per woman. Of this TFR 64% of them were under the age of 30. (Info from: Births, Australia 2005 ABS Cat no 3301.0) As you can see from this there are a lot of young pregnant women in the Northern Territory. And the above statistics were from 2005 so the number would have increased by now. So in light of all this we decided to start up a ‘Young Mum’s Reference Group’. First of all I would just like to point out that this project is not made up, it is one that I have personally been involved with in conjunction with Anglicare NT. **//COMMENT *reword this, it could go something along the lines of "over the past ___ months I have been working with Anglicare on.... " or similar//** We had recently started a child birth education class called “Pandanus”. During our first group of young pregnant women we learnt a lot from them. There is a lack of services/programs for young mothers. We class young mothers to be in the 15-25 age groups. There are a lot of playgroups and mums groups around Darwin but they don’t seem to be youth friendly. Being a mother myself and also talking to other young mums who have been along to one of these local groups at least 90% of them felt unwelcome, uneasy, like they were being judged and intimidated. Basically they felt like they were being looked down on and judged that they were too young to be a responsible parent. Therefore there were many young mothers in Darwin feeling alone and like there is no social group they can go to and socialise, have time to themselves and lets their children interact with others.

** 2. Consultation Process: ** Firstly we needed funding. This was provided by FAHCSIA (Department of Housing, Community Services and Indigenous Affairs) I did not personally put in for this part it was done by the team leader as part of the Pandanus project. We talked about the idea to current Pandanus group members and also other clients from other areas of youth at Anglicare NT. A bunch of them seemed interested and keen to be involved even though specific details on the group’s actual purpose were still not clear. We also put up flyers around the community on notice boards, etc to gain more interest. The day before the first session two youth workers from Anglicare and myself met up for a meeting to discuss the reference group. We wanted to get a brief idea of what exactly we were going to do within our group. We brainstormed ideas and ways we could empower them to be involved as well as making it a regular social outing for them. We decided that we would throw some ideas at them and they can choose what they want to do. We also decided that we need ‘rules’ for the group so we made a range of cards with different rules on them (details on what we did with them in the networking section). The venue in which the weekly meetings would be held was appointed to the Ta-Ta Centre in Karama. They run a playgroup there on Wednesday mornings and have free child minding and also an air-conditioned room for people to work, read, relax or chat in. This is also a free service to use so it worked in well with us. The centre manager was also keen with the idea and said a few of the regular mum’s would be involved in the group as well. I was appointed as the main co-ordinator within the group and would be there if they needed assistance with anything or to ask questions. Our main idea was encourage the group to run themselves with myself and other workers attending once every few weeks. We didn’t want them to feel like they were in a classroom teacher/student environment. We want them to be in control of all activities and affairs they do. I would call them each individually every few weeks to see how they are going and if they were enjoying it and if they needed us to purchase or bring anything to them. For the first session we decided to pock all the girls up that had transport problems or were not sure where to go. We then arrived at the venue and all gathered inside with the children were playing outside. There were 11 girls in total. We explained that this group was ‘theirs’ and it was up to them what they wanted to do within the group times. We really wanted to put some rules in place for the group to start off with so we spread the cards on the floor that we made the previous day. We asked all the girls to pick one rule each and then tell us why they think that rule was important. They did this and from that we decided on 5 solid rules in which they called ‘OUR PACT’. We then put to them the idea of designing a book for young pregnant women and young mums in the Northern Territory. They all expressed interest so I said to them //“ok if you were sitting in Family Planning and just found out you were pregnant, you look next to you and see a book with ‘Survival guide for young pregnant women’ what would you like to see in it?”// They all started listing different topics, etc that we could work on. I have a copy of the planned topics, etc we have decided on but because of confidentiality I an unable to place it here at this time but if needed I can photocopy it and blank out names. Once we came up with the topics each person volunteered to gather particular information for their topic of interest. It was up to them how much they did and how many different topics they covered. One girl enjoyed writing poetry so she chooses that. Another girl wanted to write her birth story and also the pros and con’s of drugs in labour. We also encouraged them to talk to family and friends about it and get some information and stories from them. And if they were interested in coming to the group meetings they were more than welcome, the moor the merrier. They were all given exercise books and pens so they could jot things down when they had time. Swapping phone numbers with each other was optional if they wanted to socialise or collect information outside the group with each other. The group also decided to have a box in the room for people who wanted to put something in the book anonymously. By the end of the first session we had decided that as a reference group we would all work together and produce a full booklet on pregnancy for young women. When completed (we have no time limit) Anglicare will get them printed and they would be distributed across NT through GP’s, Family Planning, Community Care Centres, Playgroups, etc. Other than the Ta-Ta centre members we did not actually involve any other agencies, but when we talked about the book idea with some services (family planning,etc) they all agreed it was a god idea and particularly the fact it was related specifically to the Northern Territory women.
 * 3. Networking & the Event: **

Although the reference group has only been up and running for a few weeks now we already have had a lot of discussion and planning, Members have already started researching and providing ideas towards the book. As it is an ongoing project I cannot evaluate it as yet but just from talking to the girls and observing them I believe that this project will be a great success and help a lot of other young women at a time in there life with it is most needed. They have already made new friends and get along well with each other and also enjoy seeing their children interacting with one and other. I guess they way we could evaluate it from a young person’s point of view would be maybe including a questionnaire at the end of the book that can be torn out and sent to us. Other than that I guess it’s just up to what we verbally hear about it and what sort of response we receive. They also use the time to get out of the house and socialise which improves their mood and gives them something to look forward to each week, so therefore they are making new friends and networks in time.
 * 4. Evaluation: **


 * COMMENT: * 5. References**