Presenting ‘My Life Changing Journey’ to Nursing students at The University of Hull.

I recently had the pleasure of presenting to first-year nursing students at the University of Hull. This is the fourth year that I have delivered the talk ‘My Life Changing Journey’ in the largest lecture theatre on campus. I’m incredibly proud to continue a great working partnership with The School of Nursing and Midwifery at the University.

This year, I was delighted to take some of my team along too, namely, Emma (Service Delivery Coordinator), Mark (Marketing Manager) and Georgia (Marketing Assistant). I was also able to take one of our fabulous charity heroes, Victoria.

They were a great support, not only in helping to set up the theatre with our information flyers and capture content, but Emma and Victoria were also there to experience the presentation in this environment. With our ambition being that Victoria will present alongside me next year. Creating opportunities for our heroes is something the charity is constantly working on and that we are thoroughly passionate about.

Every year there are well over 200 students in this cohort. Standing in front of the next generation of health care professionals is both sobering and humbling.

It’s always an occasion when I take a moment. Allowing me to reflect on times;

– When I struggled to get my words out and needed speech therapy.

– When I found it hard to make sense of my brain injury and explain how it was affecting me.

– When I was deeply concerned for the future.

My objective of the talk is to share useful insights and promote understanding of brain injury.

It’s a key part of students’ learning and is a reminder how far I’ve come. I hope this can inspire others to never give up. I do this by openly sharing my journey since Easter Sunday, 2012. A day when my life nearly ended.

The presentation is ideal for nursing students as it gives a real life Insight into brain injury recovery. The topics which I cover include acute hospital services, targeted rehabilitation and therapeutic interventions and mental health services I share my vulnerabilities at rock bottom and how I developed resilience, adopted a growth mindset and used coping strategies to build a new life.

I’m always proud to talk about the team and services available at P.A.U.L For Brain Recovery.

To round things up, this year I shared the charity’s new service delivery video. This was a big moment for both myself and the team. Mark and Georgia have worked tirelessly to create the video and I am pleased to say that it was well received – thank you & well done guys.

It’s always uplifting to have a good Q&A at the end of the session and I was thrilled to once again be met with positive feedback. In particular, there was lots of interest in students spending time at the charity on placement. This is something the charity currently does with Nutrition and Dietetic students also from the University of Hull.

It was lovely to have favourable comments from the lecturer, Leonie. We discussed coming back next year and opportunities for Victoria, watch this space.

Another improvement this year was capturing the feedback digitally. A QR code was included at the end of the presentation, encouraging students to use their phones to submit remarks. Feedback both good and bad is always useful, especially when developing future presentations. I’m therefore extremely thankful that over 140 students took the time to do it.

Their feedback was resoundingly buoyant and truly humbling.

A link to the students feedback is included below, should you want to learn more –

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1RK_BSd2fxqVjAUQvhk3Y2I621qlQCTyR/view?usp=sharing

If you would like to enquire about my presentations please email

info@paulforbrainrecovery.co.uk

Thank you for reading.

Best wishes,

Paul