Are you the parent of a child aged up to 12 years who lives with type 1 diabetes (T1D)? You’re invited to join us for our mental health series, ‘Breathe’, in March.  

This three-part series will offer support, information and hope to parents and carers of children who have been diagnosed with type 1 diabetes.

What will be covered?

Made up of three sessions, each one around 60 minutes long, and hosted by psychologist and JDRF’s mental health lead Melanie Cullen, we’ll discuss strategies and skills to help you and your family through life with T1D.

In these sessions we’ll create a space where you can share your experiences and struggles, listen to those like you, and ultimately be able to recognise your strengths, feeling validated and hopeful for the future.

In sessions 1 and 2, we’ll: 

• look at understanding the impact of diabetes joining your family – not only with regard to diabetes-specific tasks, but the emotional and social impacts, too
• discuss the stages of childhood development and age-appropriate expectations, and how to balance these with T1D
• look at how to not let diabetes (including all the fears and anxiety it can bring with it) intrude on or dictate your parenting style or relationships, focussing on the importance of parenting from a loving, supportive and confident space
• support you with ways you can help your children understand and regulate their emotions (while giving you some strategies to do so yourself!)
• look at how we can sometimes get tripped up by our thinking and expectations (both ours and others), and explore strategies to support this
• learn to ask the question “Is it you, them, or diabetes?”, discussing T1D specific scenarios at different ages and stages, with strategies to help you support your child and look after yourself
• discuss how you can use connection, validation, hope and kindness so your whole family can live well, with T1D coming along for the ride!  

We’ll also set some goals for what you’d like to focus on before we meet again in April.

The third session will:

• remind you of the key takeaways from the earlier sessions
• give you the opportunity to reconnect and talk about what has or hasn’t worked for your family
• let you ask about anything else you’d like more information on.  

Get to know Melanie Cullen here.

The details

When:
Session 1: Thursday, March 23rd, 8pm AEDT
Session 2: Thursday, March 30th, 8pm AEDT
Follow-up session: Thursday, April 27th, 8pm AEDT
Where: Zoom
Cost: Free

How to register: Fill out the form below – we’ll then send out the Zoom link.  

We hope you can join us for this informative, helpful and supportive series.