Creating Space Project

Trigger warnings: mental illness, suicide

Jeanne Ringwald is a 20 year old woman who tells us a story of realising, as an adolescent, that her father had a serious mental illness.

If you in Australia and are a young person, or know a young person, with a parent experiencing mental illness, an excellent resource to contact is 

Children of Parents with Mental Illness

If you are in Australia and are an adult experiencing emotional difficulties or mental health problems, a useful online resource to connect you with various types of support is Australian mental health resources

Vylliana Jattan is a 20 year old woman who moved from America to Australia to spend a year volunteering in Sydney with Josephite Community Aid. This was an organisation that assisted refugees and was sadly closed halfway into Vyllianna's year.

This interview was conducted at the time that Vyllianna was trying to make sense of the experience of JCA closing and to cope with the loss of the relationships with the refugees that she had become so close to in her six months here. 

I am interviewing Sr Helen Sullivan, an 83 year old Josephite Sister who lives in the beautiful little rural town of Eugowra, in New South Wales, Australia. Among the many things she has done with her life, Sr Helen has spent many years working in Australia with refugees and young people. She also spent many years working in Papua New Guinea.

The story she relates in the interview is an incident from her time in Papua New Guinea. After she tells the story, I use a narrative practices framework to ask reflection questions to elicit values and beliefs.