Liz's story
I trained as a Mental Health Nurse in London after working as a Healthcare Support Worker for a number of years in an Adult Mental Health inpatient Hospital.
Once I qualified I decided to move back to Southampton and saw a role within Bluebird House which is a medium secure forensic CAMHS site. Although I had done a placement in community with CAMHS I had never considered it as a career path.
Bluebird House is a well-known site and I heard lots of different things about working there. I was very career minded and I wanted to upskill myself in risk, self-harm, violence and aggression. When I visited Bluebird I could see that not only could I make a difference to young people but I could also reach my personal development goals so I decided to join the nursing team.
The young people we work with are very challenging but looking after them is incredibly rewarding. Unlike adult sites you feel you can help them before they reach adulthood and we have a very high success rate. Many of the young people we help will have had other placements breakdown before being admitted to Bluebird so we spend a lot of time building a relationship with them by providing a safe, controlled environment where we act as role models.
There are lots of fun times at Bluebird and we get to do lots of fun things with the Young people both inside Bluebird and on visits outside. I can honestly say life is never boring and being part of the nursing team is unbelievably interesting.
We are a nationally commissioned service and can offer lots of opportunities for development in CBT, DBT, Advanced Nurse Practitioner as well as many others.
My name is Liz and I am now one of the Ward Managers at Bluebird. If you are a qualified or newly qualified Nurse, I would encourage you to come down and see for yourself what life at Bluebird is like.