Happy International Women’s day from all of us at Shared Lives Plus, to everyone using Shared Lives and Homeshare to create better lives and stronger communities.
Like so much in social care, these models owe everything to the often unsung women who pioneered them, and all those who continue to make them amazing today. Maggie Kuhn invented Homeshare in the US. Nan Maitland spearheaded the UK’s adoption. In more recent years this has been led by Elizabeth Mills OBE of Homeshare International.
Our President, Sue Newton OBE started PSS‘s pioneering Shared Lives service in the late ’70s. At PSS’s centenary recently I learned about its incredible founder, Eleanor Rathbone, who said, ‘What ought to be done, can be done’. So today in particular I’m thinking about all those shoulders we are standing on.
Escaping the invisible asylum 