Anna’s story

Parent Anna Harrison shares her experience as part of a co-production group:

My daughter and I met with Debbie as part of a co-production group for the Minds of all kinds neurodevelopmental website.

As part of the discussions for the website, we mentioned to Debbie that my daughter and I used to attend a parent run ‘supergirls’ youth group once a month. It’s for autistic girls, to have a safe quiet space to meet with other autistic girls and get to know others who are going through similar experiences to themselves, helping them to feel less isolated.

Unfortunately, this had to be discontinued at the beginning of covid lock-down. Debbie listened to my daughter’s view about how much she got from this group, and how much she missed her friends. Debbie supported us in getting the group restarted and facilitated meetings with the local young people’s centre to support us in getting a suitable meeting place.

The group has now been meeting again monthly since December 2023 and it’s going really well. Some of the ‘original’ supergirls have come back, as well as new ones joining us. For my daughter, it helps her mental health and makes her feel less alone. They talk about her struggles with school attendance, friends, and activities, and share what helps them and enables them to do things. The girls range from seven to 17 at the moment, so it’s great for the younger girls to meet older girls to look up to. As parents, it’s also helped up build an amazing support network!

The participation in co-production has really enabled us to regain this much needed resource, which is a great support not only for us as a family but for many other families in the area too.