Saints project’s memory goals
Help for people living with dementia
It’s a project which is helping to change lives across Perth and Kinross.
Saints in the Community’s Football Memories initiative has been both a rewarding and emotional journey since starting up in September 2013.
The project is aimed at people, their families and loved ones who all have to live with dementia on a day to day basis.
Football cards showing photographs of players of years gone by and other memorabilia are used at sessions to trigger memories of past times.
And for projects manager with Saints in the Community, Dave Black, continuing to provide this opportunity for local people is of great importance.
“We’ve been running the project for over three years now and it has been a success,” he explained to the Perthshire Advertiser.
“We started off with sessions in Perth and have since rolled out sessions in Blairgowrie in Crieff. We’ll be rolling them out in Pitlochry or Aberfeldy later in the year.
“With this project we always felt there was a need for it. It’s been recognised for a very long time now that football is very powerful.
“People remember the first game you went to or the team you grew up supporting.
“It’s the same for those who are now elderly and perhaps have memory problems.
“They can still remember who their favourite team was, who they were with at a game or who scored.
“When you unblock people’s minds and bring the recall back, it’s quite an emotional thing.
“Some can’t remember family members names, yet they can remember a cup final from the 1960s or even further back.
“You need to acknowledge just how powerful the memories from something as emotional as football are. It’s proved as successful as we thought it always would be.”
Watching people leave the sessions with a smile on their face gives the Saints team reassurance that what they are running is all worth it.
“We have worked in partnership with the Perth and Kinross local authority and they gave us the funding to run this,” Black said.
“They have been excellent partners and have put us in touch with people who could benefit.
“We have people come in with spouses, sons or daughters, carers and some come in from residential homes.
“The best feedback we have ever had from any project was from a lady who said she brings in a man who is living with dementia. But afterwards she takes home her husband.
“There is a lot of anecdotal evidence that those living with dementia, if they can be engaged with a reminiscence, then for a short period afterwards their mood is enhanced and memory recall greater.
“Sadly it doesn’t last for long but several people have said interest levels are raised when it’s the day of Football Memories.
“We’ll continue what we’re doing and try to expand the numbers in Crieff and Blairgowrie.”
There is the potential for the Saints in the Community team to expand their work with dementia away from football.
“We have plans in the pipeline to move into music memories to include more people, and also movie memories,” Black said.
“Later this year, hopefully in Highland Perthshire, we will start a movie memories session which involves cards and short clips of old movie stars.
“Every project we do at Saints in the Community is not football related.”
There is plenty of evidence to The Football Memories project has received help from local schools in preparing sessions back that comment up, with Black highlighting a number of programmes currently being offered.
He said: “We work with kids as early as three with our early years football programme, right up to people in their 90s who come along to football memories.
“There are people in their 70s still playing football with our Walking Football programme.
“And we work with people who have learning disabilities and also mental wellbeing issues.
“Our mental wellbeing football section was actually instrumental in getting the Scottish FA to set up a mental wellbeing football league.
“There is a national league which our guys take part in with a series of one off tournaments across the year, all over Scotland.”
Giving back to the community is a priority and helping those who are coming back from tough times is in the remit.
Black continued: “We are working with people who are on community payback orders.
“Working in conjunction with the community payback team and the safer communities team at the council, we’re trying to get something to stop them re-offending.
“One of the things which doesn’t help with the re-offending is that some don’t have employment or very good employment prospects.
“We have a programme which takes place once a week for three hours where we go through basic employment skills.
“And we are giving qualifications in food hygiene, manual handling and basic health and safety.
“Each session always has a wee fitness element, so they are fit for work if they get an interview and through to a later stage.”
Saints in the Community became a charitable trust last year and all information can be found at www. saintsinthecommunity.co.uk.