Art therapy: a safe space for creativity and wellness
It begins with a simple knock on a door in our hospice residence, asking if I may come in and visit. I introduce myself as Shara Mclaren, the Art Therapist at hospice.
Often a quizzical look results and is quickly followed up by the question: What is an art therapist? I often wonder myself, how to answer a question that has limitless possibilities of creativity.
Here’s the simple answer. Art-making as a therapy can take any form of creative expression. It involves understanding and honouring the experiences, interests and wishes that hold meaning and value for each person and their family.
Often times after this introduction I am forever and thereafter referred to as The Art Lady, and it’s a title I am privileged to be given.
As I look around a person’s room, often there are visual clues that may be just the right opening to begin a conversation. Family photographs offer small snapshots of their life reflected back, hand drawn pictures from children and grandchildren hang on the walls, cards and notes of support from family and friends rest alongside a vase of favourite flowers or plants on a bedside table.
These are the everyday gems and moments of lived experiences. A casual comment about a person’s plaid jacket or shirt gives them a new found outlet for the open and honest retelling of a lifelong love of nature and the outdoors, of past camping trips and trails hiked, of a life lived.
Art therapy can improve a person’s well-being by providing a safe space to be creative, lessening feelings of depression, anxiety, loneliness and isolation. The creation of legacy artwork can assist the person and family in their
grief journey.
Fingerprints of a loved one can be a limitless source for art-making. They can become centres of flowers, the base for a burst of fireworks in the night sky, wings of a butterfly or the bodies of snowmen.
Once, when I was explaining to a woman that we were going to turn her fingerprints into the centres of flowers, she commented, “Can you believe I have made it to this stage in my life and have never been fingerprinted?”
This cheeky statement was followed by quite a bit of shared laughter.
My response, “Well then, we’ll have to do something about that,” was rewarded with more laughter, waving her fingers towards me and asking, “What colours can we use?”
“Any or all of them,” I assured her, “It is your art-making process.”
— Since 1993, Hospice Niagara has been helping people and families live well from the time of diagnosis with a terminal illness, through to end-of-life care and bereavement. Our programs and services are free of cost and support people in their homes, in the community and in the hospice residence.