Three things to remember when you support a friend experiencing abuse

A bright Monday morning saw a room full of people gather to learn about how to support a friend or family member affected by abuse. It’s part of our efforts to make sure that Thanet and Dover communities are equipped to respond to domestic abuse, no matter who someone turns to. Developing a community of friends, family and professionals that are able .

We decided that there were three main principals to remember

1.       Don’t judge – Telling someone that your relationship may be abusive is a massive step. Let your friend or family member know that they are not to blame, what is happening is not their fault and that you will be there to support them, no matter what they choose to do.

2.       Offer practical support – In an abusive relationship you’re not able to make your own choices, it’s important that your friend is free to make the choices about what to do next. Don’t offer conditional support (if you leave them I will..../if you go back I can’t...), but let them know that you can be a practical support by offering to babysit, attend appointments like the One Stop Shop with them, keep some of their things safe at your house etc. But remember - it’s their choice, at their pace.

3.       Don’t confront the other person – doing this can put you and your friend in a difficult or dangerous position. You need to make sure you are available to help, if you are perceived as a danger to the relationship your friend or family member will become more isolated and getting help will be harder.

Always remember that you can contact Oasis or visit your local one stop shop for advice. There are experts available who can support you to support other people.

Fabulous Fundraisers

We would like to give a very special shout out to all of our wonderful fundraisers, who have raised huge amounts of money and donated some amazing gifts to Oasis.

Thank You to everyone involved!

Charlie Elliott

Special thanks to our youngest fundraiser of the month, Charlie Elliott. Charlie organised an Oasis Day at St Lawrence College collecting toiletries and essential items for the families we support. Charlie also used this opportunity to raise awareness of our work with his peers and members of staff at St Lawrence College.

Daughter of Jesus

The Daughters of Jesus CIO donated £100. We are so thankful for their continued support.

Punk Show

No Name Promotions raised £650 from their sold-out family-friendly punk show Everything Is Alright #2 at Elsewhere Records, Margate. We are so thankful to everyone involved in the success of the night especially Rob, Ben and Jim from No Name Promotions. https://handsuppunk.com/2019/02/03/everything-is-alright-2-raises-650-for-oasis-domestic-abuse-service/

Pavillion Cafe

Pavillion Youth and Community Cafe raised £200 from their Christmas fundraiser.

Union Yoga

Union Yoga Union Yoga raised £85 from their Community Yoga class. This is a weekly pay-what-you-feel class and we are thankful to be chosen as one of their charities.

Cafe G

Cafe G raised a fantastic £500 from 2 quizzes and a raffle.

Reading Rooms

The Reading Rooms hosted an online raffle for International Women’s Day raffling off a night’s stay in their luxury boutique B&B. Thank you to everyone who donated, you raised £240! And congratulations to the lucky winner.

Broadstairs Rotary

The club kindly donated £90 plus £50 Westwood Cross vouchers for our residents.

Wantsum Cork Lodge

Wantsum Cork Lodge donated £200 to our work with children

Margate Rotary Club

The Rotary Club of Margate presented a cheque for a staggering £3,043 from year-round fundraising and their annual Swimathon. Each year the Swimathon raises vital funds for local charities. The 14th annual Swimathon is being held on Saturday 28th September. Get your team together and get involved in this fantastic local event by emailing fundraise@oasisdaservice.org

Kent Fire and Rescue - Margate Branch

A big thank you to Kent Fire & Rescue Service Margate branch for raising £404.75 for our Thanet services.

Friends of Oasis

The Friends of Oasis committee continue to organise diverse and popular fundraising events in support of our clients. Recent events have included a jewellery sale with afternoon tea, bake sales, a wine tasting evening and their annual Fish n Chip supper with music provided by The Trotwoods all raising over £1,500.

Kent Roller Girls

For the third year in a row Kent Roller Girls donated a mountain of toiletries to our residents including beautiful gift sets that were given out on Mother’s Day. We are so thankful for their ongoing thoughtfulness.

Profanity Embroidery

Profanity Embroidery Group donated £200 for summer holidays activities for the children staying with us.

Kent Police Property Fund

Margate Police Station donated £346.99 from their Property Fund for the Community, to contribute towards refurbishing one of our communal area within refuge.

A Christmas Thank You

We would like to thank the members of our Community who have donated gifts and money to Oasis this Christmas. Without your support we would be unable to provide a festive meal on Christmas day, Christmas decorations for our refuges or presents for children who have been forced to leave their homes, we are truly grateful for your kindness.

Here are just some of the amazing people who have donated this Christmas:

Boys & Maughan Solicitors donated food, toiletries and gifts

Dover District Council raised £92.28 from their Christmas Jumper Day

The Pavilion Youth and Community Café raised £200 from their Christmas Wish fundraiser

Thanet Lions donated Christmas gifts

Concept Life Sciences raised £86.84 from a Christmas bake sale

Mary Rubie and Lorna Blackburn raised £520 from their Christmas quiz at The Northwood Club

The Rotary Club of Ramsgate organised a toy run around at local schools and donated a large amount of toys

Project Linus donated handmade blankets and quilts

Tesco Extra raised £103.00 by holding a beauty lucky dip

HMP Standford Hill donated advent calendars for all of the children

Café G raised £500 from 2 quiz nights and a raffle

ALDI donated food as part of their Christmas Eve Food Surplus initiative

Whitstable Mums donated Christmas gifts for Mums and children

Urchin Wines held a raffle at their Mulled Wine event

Dogs Trust donated Christmas gifts and toiletries to our residents

Windsor House Care Home donated Christmas gifts

Your Fundraising Efforts

We are so fortunate to have a fantastic community who fundraise, volunteer and donate. Below is some of the work that's been done to help keep people in Kent safe. A massive thank you to everyone who has helped.

True Friends 

The Friends of Oasis committee continue with their incredible fundraising events in support of our clients. Recent events include a guided walk around Quex Gardens raising £250 and their 4th lunch at The Yarrow Hotel. This year 110 guests were treated to a 3 course lunch, beautifully prepared and served by the students. Also present were staff from Santander’s Margate branch who kindly match-funded the event, bringing the total raised to £2,997.00.

Darwin Court

Thank you to the residents of Darwin Court who raised £1,000 for Oasis through a variety of events throughout the year. We are so thankful for your support.  

Margate Operatic Society 

We were delighted to have been chosen as the local charity of the Margate Operatic Society at their AGM. Thank you for the kind donation of £300. 

Dreamland  

Thank you Dreamland for choosing Oasis as one of your charities supported by your summer Variety events, £150 was raised through a collection and a raffle and the night was a huge success.  

Wilkes Ltd

David & Rebecca from Broadstairs Chiropractic Clinic hosted another fundraiser for Oasis with a guess the baby weight competition. Thank you to your customers for raising £130 for Oasis and congratulations on the arrival of your baby girl.  

Brighton Marathon, Lakesman and Ride London  

Ian Dodds took part in 3 big endurance events this year, focusing on raising funds for domestic violence charities. Along with Refuge we were delighted to have been chosen by Ian and have received over £620! Ian said about Oasis ‘In my role as a Children's Social Worker; I have to access their advice, support and services far more regularly than I'd like and they play an essential role in helping people escape and prevent abuse.’ 

Massive congratulations on running your first ever marathon, first half iron distance and a grueling 100 mile bike ride in the rain! We are so grateful for your support.

Thames Trudge  

We were so grateful to be one of the charities chosen by Tilly, Janice and Josh who walked the length of the Thames in lots of rain and wind (and a little bit of sun) raising £1,012.38 for Oasis!  We are thankful for all of the hard work you put in to fundraising by organising bake sales and a quiz and curry night. 

Anchorage Marathon 

Thank you Tristan Honeyborne for going all the way to Alaska (!) to run your first marathon and for choosing Oasis as one of your charities. We are so thankful for the £308 you have raised.  

Colourthon Moonlight Walk 

Huge thank you to Kerry Crossley and friends for taking part in The Colourthon walk around Southend by night. We are so grateful for the £272 you raised, and we hope you had fun by the seaside! 

London 2 Brighton Challenge 

Thank you Tyrone Austin for raising £456 on the 100km walk from London to Brighton and for dedicating this challenge to our mutual friend and colleague Aimee-Jane Connell. With your help we can continue helping families affected by abuse.  

National Citizen Service 

Thirteen 16-17 year olds took part in a sponsored walk from Dreamland to Viking Bay and back, a sponsored cycle and a pub quizraising over £700 for Oasis. Thank you for your enthusiasm and dedication to raising awareness about domestic abuse.  

Red, White and Blue Ball 

Thank you to the North and South Thanet Conservative Associations for donating £365.00 from your Red, White and Blue Ball.  

The cheque was presented to Claire Fenley, Community Fundraiser by Lynne Conolly, Sam Bambridge and Carol Messenger. 

Tesco Bags of Help 

Thanks to a grant from Tesco Bags of Help, we were awarded a grant of £4000 towards our Blossom project! Voting ran in Ramsgate branches of Tesco over the summer with customers voting for which local charity they would like to get the top award. Thank you to everyone who used their blue token to bag us this grant! Tesco image

Santander Foundation 

Thank you to The Santander Foundation who awarded us a £5,000 grant as part of their Discovery Project. This money will go towards our Blossom Project which offers support with employability and obtaining skills for life.   

From everyone at Oasis, Thank You.

A Year of Celebration

On the 12th September in our weekly Support Group we celebrated Rosh Hashanah the Jewish New year. We made marzipan fruits and had an enormous feast of sweet foods including hot apple pie & cream, cupcakes, chocolate biscuits & apples dipped in honey.  

At the end of the morning we all walked to the sea front blowing our Shorfa (Rams trumpet horn) and then we threw breadcrumbs into the sea. This symbolises throwing out your sins but we threw away our worries.  

This event is another of our 'Year of Celebration' events celebrating cultural and religious festivals at our Support Group. Thank you to KCC members Councillors Emma Dawson and Lesley Game for this grant enabling us to offer our clients the chance to share their beliefs and traditions. 

Power and Control on the Pitch

Power and Control on the Pitch

This week’s match (England V Columbia) was a masterclass in boundary management, and a great insight into the types of behaviours, born of fear and insecurity, that some will use in order to try to dominate others.

Colombia used harassment, tension building, violence, threatening behaviour, sabotage and intimidation throughout the match, and fair play to England, they did a good job of not letting that get under their skin. We all know that we should form our networks from sound people who help us progress our lives, but the reality is that sometimes you just get trapped on a pitch with people who want to win by bringing you down. It is a truth that some people function by sucking power from those around them with behaviours that drain.  The England team modelled handling that with dignity.

Let’s transpose that to getting trapped in your home with that behaviour. To having to fend off the above tactics of domination each and every day, of having children in the mix, financial pressures, loss of your support network and let’s imagine how hard it is to defend those boundaries.

England players train in sports psychology and Gareth Southgate has learnt the power of the mind on the pitch the hard way. But most people don’t, most people don’t fall in love with an attitude that they are playing a game. Most people fall in love and love the fact that they can become vulnerable, because being vulnerable with the person closest to us should be possible, it should be liberating and that other should be someone to whom we can entrust that vulnerability.

But when you love and the other person has issues with power and domination, when they need your power to feel powerful themselves – your vulnerability becomes their leverage. The digging away at you becomes the way in which your space to breathe, to think, to function, to make decisions becomes eroded.

Football players know that the game can only last so long, that there is always an ending. But what about in the home environment – can the person who wants to control you, to take your power, deal with endings? No, they can’t, not unless it is on their terms. They don’t get to the end of the game and have a cry with frustration. They think ‘how dare you?’ and they up the ante. After sometimes years of ‘partnership’, of being lifted up and shoved down, of trying to make do and make the best of, of becoming more and more trapped by insidious and harmful behaviours the ending can be the worst part and the most unpredictable.

Oasis helps thousands of people affected by abuse in the home each year, and around 60 of those travel through our refuge services, places of safety, places where women and children who are too unsafe, who have found the courage and opportunity to leave and find respite. Every year we are touched by their courage, their determination to say ’No more’, but we never underestimate how hard it has been to make that change, and we honour all of those who aren’t able to yet. Because, if we can see the psychology of this behaviour and how it is used to try to affect outcome in a 90 minute game, then we know that leaving after years of it is a tremendously difficult thing to do.

Unfortunately, abuse in the home goes up 25% when England play, 36% when England lose and 11% the day after. During this match we saw so many mini-incidents that remind us why we do the work we do, and every single one of them has the potential to be understood by people all around the country as representative of what has to be endured by some on a daily basis. Thinking about these behaviours through the lens of this game might help us to spread the message of compassion for those who have to experience the power and control of the pitch as their daily life.

Tags: UK Says No More, Safe Lives, Women’s Aid, Surviving Economic Abuse

#whydoesnthejuststop? #ENGCOL #domesticabuse #saveourrefuge

Oasis Golf Day Raises over £10,000

The Oasis golf day on Friday 15th June at North Foreland Golf Club has raised over £10,000 for Oasis Domestic Abuse Service.  

A total of 80 players took to the fairways for a shotgun start, following coffee and bacon rolls in the clubhouse, and played 18 holes in the sunshine on North Foreland’s beautiful course. The headline sponsor was Rotary Club of Thanet. 

On course, players were treated to whiskey and champagne, served by event sponsor Artemis Recruitment on the 10th Tee, while a Mini convertible, donated by Barretts Group of Canterbury , advertising auction prize 'Win a Mini for the weekend' was on display on the 18th Tee.   

Taking first place was Trevor Brown's team with a score of 90 points with the Team captained by Jane Pace coming not far behind in 2nd with 88 points. In 3rd place was Ann Gardner's Team with 87 points. Lee Hack hit Nearest the Pin on the 7th hole and Jill Lamerton was Nearest the Line on the 10th. All winners received golfing prizes generously arranged by club professional Darren Parris, presented by Club Captain Stuart Barr and sponsored by Lanes Printers of Broadstairs.   

In the evening, guests were treated to a 2 course meal with live music from Paul Messenger, aka Onelove , which was followed by an entertaining charity auction expertly run by Club Chairman Mike Bastow and Former Chairman Keith Rumblo. All of the funds raised through the auction and raffle were generously matched by Barclays Bank, whose staff also attended, helping to boost the charity pot and raise extra, valuable funds for those affected by Domestic Abuse.  

The event was well-supported by local businesses, 18 of which sponsored tees on the course.  

Speaking on behalf of Headline Sponsor, The Rotary Club of Thanet, Neal Elliott said, "Over the years the Rotary Club has raised considerable funds for Oasis through their annual Boxing Gala which is held in collaboration with the Ramsgate Boxing Club. We were delighted to be the main sponsors of the Oasis Golf Day 2018, which through the tireless work of the organising committee has been a sell-out, and a guaranteed success"

Oasis Ambassador Training Event

We recently held a training opportunity for our volunteers who were interested in becoming an Oasis Ambassador, or who were keen to develop their confidence, self-esteem and public speaking skills. The event was hosted by the inimitable Barbara Sturgeon, award winning BBC Radio presenter and journalist.  

Our volunteers were really excited and got stuck in to learning how to use a microphone, how to project their voice, and exercises designed to overcome any shyness they may have had around public speaking. Those that attended stated that they ‘felt really positive’ having completed the training, with one person feeding back that: 'This gave me the confidence to achieve what I want to do, and change people's lives'.  

Our new Oasis Ambassadors will now be supported in their volunteer roles, as they begin to speak at local community events and groups, spreading the Oasis message, and raising awareness of the vital work that we do.  

Interested in becoming an Ambassador? Contact us at volunteer@oasisdaservice.org for further details.  

Oasis Celebrates Wesak!

As part of our ongoing celebrations of different world religions and cultures, we observed Wesak or ‘Buddha Day’ at our Support Group today. Wesak is the celebration of the life, enlightenment and death of Buddha. It is the most important of all Buddhist festivals.

Our Peer Mentors led this event, and had been working hard to organise decorations for the day, and to get all of our residents to make paper lanterns to use within the celebration, reflecting traditions from Thailand and Indonesia.

During the support group, we took part in several activities, such as ‘bathing Buddha’ in scented water from wooden bowls. We used this time to reflect on the tradition of purifying our minds and releasing our negative thoughts. We also adapted the tradition of released caged birds, symbolising letting our troubles go free, by blowing bubbles around the room.

Our Support Group took turns to add their own colours to a mandala that was passed around the group, which looked beautiful when it was finished. After this, we sat down to share a vegetarian meal which had been cooked by our Peer Mentors and the Support Group listened to one of our women talking to us about their Buddhist beliefs and practices, to help us all get a greater understanding of the Buddhist principles.

We finished the morning off by having a group meditation practice, led by one of the staff, which encouraged us to focus on compassion and love. This moment of calm and quiet was really popular with the group.

Everyone had a fabulous morning, where we shared a lot of love and laugher, as well as growing in our knowledge about this culture and world belief. One attendee to the group said that ‘this morning felt like I was home, like I was part of a family gathering’.

Our next celebration will be in June, where we will learn more about the Islamic tradition of Eid.

Kent Community Foundation support employability

Our thanks go to Kent Community Foundation who have awarded a grant of £5,635. This will support employability focused training and work experience for people in the Thanet community who have been affected by domestic abuse, whether or not they have used Oasis services.

To learn more about these opportunities, please contact dee.neligan@oasisdaservice.org

Blooming Strong

The Oasis Support Group and Margate Women’s Institute worked tirelessly to ensure that our ‘Blooming Strong’ campaign was a resounding success; designed to raise awareness of domestic abuse whilst recognising the emotional resilience and strength of local women.

Between them, the groups made over 150 beautiful flowers which were handed out to women at the International Women’s Day coffee morning at Cliffs, and at The Oasis Shop.

Celebrating the Blooming Strong women in our lives