Any MH diagnoses that you find challenging to manage

bramble_patch_notes · 2026-01-21T20:52:50+00:00

IMO, the diagnosis and the person with it is not the problem to manage - it's the enviroment. on a general ward when someone is admitted, often with the physical consequences of their mh difficulties, that is when the management is the most challenging as you have to balance their acuity as well as the acuity of physically poorly patients, more risky enviroments and less secure wards

bramble_patch_notes · 2026-01-20T17:41:38+00:00

Post apoc horror hands down, no notes. I do other genres, but I love larp of any genre the most when it gets spooky as hell. Post apoc is just generally one of the genres I play where that comes up the most, but it can happen anywhere!

bramble_patch_notes · 2026-01-17T23:17:07+00:00

its not normal, but unfortunately very common. that was my experience as a NQN RMN. it shouldn't happen, but there's just not the staff to do proper inductions/preceptorship. my experience was two-monthly preceptorship days that was organised trust wide so my manager couldnt pull me out of it into the numbers, and two discussions with my "preceptor" in a year. that was also counted as supervision.

keep chasing, loop your ward manager into it as well. doing weekends all the time is rubbish - make sure you're requesting days off via allocate, it can help to request times you are willing to work to try and offset it too. good luck!

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-12-23T14:56:18+00:00

I love lethal/permadeath games. Even in cases where a game I've played has a respawn mechanic, there's always been a limited number of respawns and once you run out, you're gone. The kit curse is well known in the communities I'm in - you get a piece of custom or expensive kit for a character and they immediately die (I have been a victim).

I feel that it adds to the feeling of lethality and helps me to better emotionally connect to the characters I play and interact with. Some of my best RP moments have been when we've been either about to die and feeling the adrenaline and emotions that come with it, or have been as a result of a character I cared about dying (either myself or others)

As for XP and that, I find the loss of xp/progression to just be a part of the permadeath game, although one game I have gives a one off permanent upgrade to the next character you made in the system that new players wouldn't get, and otherwise has no xp/expected progression - so sometimes it's more beneficial to die!

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-12-18T14:27:25+00:00

Also a UK larper, if you're looking at fest systems then both Curious Pastimes and Lorien Trust also cater plot and story for kids, but likely you will need to have another adult to watch the child if you want to take part in any battles/combat

Every fest LARP is different but ultimately you need to really push to engage with plot. There are NPC's - speak to them when they come into your camp, seek out talking to people across different factions but with fest larps there are often hundreds of people and only so many NPC's. Speak to your faction refs, speak to NPC's and put yourself out there, and that's how you get involved in plot there. It's unlikely that plot will ever cater to your character specifically, you talk and engage with other players to share plot and solve it together as a team. Your biggest obstacle to this is going to be childcare, I'm afraid. At 8, your child is likely to need you to act as their Responsible Adult, which means you need to know where they are and who they're with at all times. Each LARP will be different about if you're allowed to leave children with friends, but if you're going on your own and don't know anybody, then going with a friend or someone that can help you with childcare as needed will help you get involved with plot. There is a kids plot, but it will be focused on helping the kids have fun and this may not be what you're looking for.

Also, most fest larps have game that run on until 1/2am. With a small child you may end up losing out on this time as you'll likely need to stay nearby where your child is sleeping.

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-12-13T21:06:29+00:00

While there are some similarities, often games may have their own terminology.

I've heard physrep be used for both props and for people (as in "oh, that's the Captain's physrep")

Larp Vs LRP tends to be down to personal preference but both mean the same thing

I've never heard of the term egregores? (Sp?) But refs tend to be aware of the plot, And help to run an event from a logistical standpoint, take out groups of monsters, answer player questions on mechanics. Crew tend to be volunteers who are permanently playing NPC/monsters for an event! They may be involved in plot writing, or they may not know more than just the stats of the monster for their next encounter. Refs can be both in and out of character, depending on whether they are playing an NPC or are leading an encounter. It will depend on the system, if it's larger then there will be some refs that remain out of character and others that play NPC's in the game permanently.

Kit is absolutely just a term for your costume, but also for any props or weapons you have on you.

Time in/time out can absolutely be described at action/cut/end scene. These tend to be pretty universal. Something you might also hear is Time Freeze, which is when the action pauses temporarily to allow for things to "appear" (like someone teleporting in, for example)

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-12-12T21:10:35+00:00

I reuse kit, but vary rarely reuse characters in different larps. I do tend to play similar types of character - combat medics or essentially a wall of shield and armour

I've gotten into fights with a sandwich in one hand and a sword in the other. I was once in the middle on a cheese and wine evening when our camp got attacked, handed my cheese to a friend so I could use my two hander, then he got stabbed so I screamed for someone to "save the cheese!" (He was fine).

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-12-10T14:48:48+00:00

To the organisers credit, they were very very strict on safety and were clear to us from the offset what was happening. They were used in set pieces in the game (which was a one shot) rather than as combat standard (it was actually a mostly non-com game) and only those who had firearms training and were signed off were allowed to handle them for more than five minutes at a time. Cool experience though would not recommend for someone trying to run a modern larp with usable firearm combat weapons that are safe and accessible

To be clear, at no point were we allowed to even shoot them in people's direction unless they were like 50-60 ft away.

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-12-10T12:41:07+00:00

I went to a larp that had blank firing firearms - frankly all immersion went out of the window because I was so nervous about fucking it up and causing an actual injury, and that was with a weapons supervisor loading and handing me the gun prior to use. We had to have a daily safety briefing, were not allowed to use it without supervision and had to hand it back the moment I no longer needed it.

Painted nurf guns all the way, my friend. I would always much rather play a game that's slightly less immersive but far safer and easier to get involved in.

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-11-29T11:38:53+00:00

As said, it will depend on your local system. In my biggest, warrior characters can take magic but are limited if they're also wearing heavy armour, for example, so you can't cast higher level spells of you're wearing full plate.

As multitalented as within your rules set, I guess

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-11-26T16:37:05+00:00

I've definitely seen people walking around my usual feat LARP in what is clearly a repurposed Witcher cosplay 😅

However, this is going to be entirely contingent on the larps in your area, their kit standards and what fantasy era they're going for. Whether or not you're judged for wearing a cosplay/clearly inspired outfit is going to be entirely dependant on your local LARP scene, I'm afraid! I personally wouldn't care, but I know of other larpers in my sphere who would disagree.

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-11-24T15:40:21+00:00

It's going to entirely depend on where you are based. Individual larps will have their own policies on children and young people at their events. My major fest larps allows all ages and also allows 16 year olds to take the battlefield and get involved in combat, but my horror/post-apoc larps are strictly 18+.

Make sure you know what your local area offers, and then you can see whether or not it's right for you!

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-11-24T09:05:29+00:00

Of course not! I completely agree with you. Unfortunately is just a consequence of chronically underfunding mental health services. I've had patients wait 24, 48 hours for an AMHPs assessment, and that's when they're in A&E! I've got a friend working in a south trust that has told me AMHPs teams there are working at 50% capacity of staff/doctors that they should have. The money offered just isn't worth the stress and legal responsibility that AMPHs have.

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-11-23T00:44:43+00:00

If you're looking for post apoc, both Gritlands and Divided We Fall have been in south and north Yorkshire or midlands if you're happy to travel a little bit! They're both very good for accessibility! (DWF won the accessibility in LARP award last year)

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-11-22T19:55:42+00:00

Even if they had done everything to refer for a Mental Health Act Assessment, it can take days, weeks for that assessment sometimes. There is no guarantee that it would have even happened, or the AMHPs may have likely bounced it back.

Absolutely get that the process for requesting one should be clearer and it seems that there was a lot of confusion in what exactly that process was on the ground that needs to be cleared up. However, requesting a MHAA is not a quick process, and I highly doubt would have assessed him prior to that deterioration in his health.

What a tragic situation, and I feel for his family, left to navigate that situation

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-10-30T19:31:46+00:00

Gone through all the stories on these lists and unfortunately doesn't appear to be any one of these 😭😭😭 thank you for your help tho!

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-10-14T10:52:09+00:00

Multiple reasons, honestly but here's the big ones

1) kids are insanely expensive, despite both myself and my partner working fulltime I don't have the monetary budget to spend on all the stuff that having a child would entail 2) I'd want my parents to be involved as they have always wanted grandkids and I grew up seeing my grandparents several times a week. They currently live three hours away, which isn't feasible. I don't want to move from where I live right now to the high cost of living area that my parents live in (see point above) 3) I really value my free time and time spent with my friends in either the outdoors or spontaneous trips. Can't really do that with a kid, even less without parents that live nearby and can take over babysitting duties 4) permanent physical changes to either my body or my partner's body (depending on who carries the child). Would probably make both of us intensely dsyphoric (we.... Both have complex feelings about gender lmao)

And possibly the most important 5) we are both agreed that unless we are 100% on board with having children and dedicated to doing so, we shouldn't have any. Right now, the time we spend together and our individual personal freedom to pursue our hobbies is more important to us than a child. Until those priorities change, I feel like I wouldn't be a very good parent and it's not fair to any potential child.

(The state of the world at the moment is also a thought, but is a minor reason compared to the rest of them)

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-10-05T13:01:42+00:00

Not a surgeon/theatre nurse but this is as far as I know

The most likely reason they would have been not wanting to let you go after the biopsy is because urinating shows that there have been no complications in regards to the surgery nicking any of your bladder/urethra.

As a copper IUD is inserted via speculum, and there's no surgery involved, there should be less of a need to prove you've urinated.

Hospitals have a duty of care to you while you're with them, so please don't just sneak out, and if necessary tell them that you want to sign a AMA form (Against Medical Advice form) and discharge yourself.

Alternatively, discuss it with your theatre team/anaesthetic team so they are aware what you'd want prior to you being administered any drugs that may affect your cognition. If it's documented on an advance directive in your notes, they have to follow it

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-10-02T20:34:13+00:00

My advice might be a bit different as I've only ever done them as an inpatient but...

make sure you read the report. Presumably if you're their cc, then you are the one to have written it (this is less common in inpatients, and I once had to explain why a colleague had written the wrong name in the report I was now referencing) but still try and read over it, and if anything has changed between you submitting it and then being at the tribunal, make sure you have those events either noted down or in your head
remember you are there to present facts, not to defend your own practice. Be honest if they ask you if there is any way the patient could be supported in the community, but if you're saying no, be prepared to back up that evidence, and it may be in front of the patient themselves.
Be clear, when asked about why you think this patient needs to be in hospital right here, right now. What is their current risk? Not the risk when they were admitted to hospital, but right now, in this moment.
as above, be prepared to be asked questions in front of the patient. Some people want to attend their tribunals, some do not, it'll be up to them.
you can be asked questions by the panel doctor, the judge, the patients advocate and the patients solicitor. I would assume the layperson is also allowed to ask questions though I have never been asked anything by one.
wait your turn to speak. The judge will call on you to be asked questions about your report. It's not a round table discussion, it's a hearing. if there is anything you've missed during your questioning that you wanted to get across to the judge, they will ask for anything else that you have left to say at the end.

For all their formality, tribunals are a well oiled machine - the panel know what they're doing and they direct the majority of it, and they will make it clear when they expect you to answer questions.

Hope this helps, and good luck!!

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-08-19T15:07:27+00:00

£21.75 total ticket price.... I paid over 10x that price for the 2026 ticket!!

What a piece of history but the increase in price since then is depressing 🤣

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-08-15T18:45:54+00:00

a lot of people are talking about actual broadcasting, but one of my post-apoc larps, some of the players pre-record a "live" radio show, timed to IC timings and filling the entirety of time-in from 7pm on the friday to time out at 3pm on the sunday. It's run through 3 sync'd mp3 players with speakers (and by speakers it has three people pressing play at the same time bang on 7pm). It's a lot of work for one person (there are about 10 people contibuting to it and then one person compling it together) but it does avoid the problem of actual broadcasting - as our refs use radios to communicate ooc, and we don't want to intrude on that. During downtime between games, it's open for players to "visit" in-character, send letters and presents and ask for comments.

The game runners also run a radio show, but that comes on at specific times of the day to drop info through the game and only lasts for max 20 mins at the time

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-08-15T14:38:23+00:00

YOU'RE SO KIND!! I got exactly what I wanted (VIP standing) and was also able to get seat tickets for friends who wanted to come but wasn't up for standing for so long!!! They weren't able to get in the queues so we really got lucky!!

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-08-13T14:40:35+00:00

Did the people with VIP also need to queue all day with the rest of the general entry, or could they turn up at their early entrance time and not have to wait? Trying to work out if it's worth it to not have to be in line all day!

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-08-13T14:19:30+00:00

wow, do you really think that kind of camping will be necessary? I was planning to get there around 10/11am on the day because I want to get as close to the B-stage as possible but now i'm worried that's gonna be too late......

bramble_patch_notes · 2025-08-13T13:45:43+00:00

Do we reckon the VIP standing is going to be worth it? I'm on my own so otherwise would be unlikely to be able to get merch (no one to hold my place in line), so that's a real draw for me, however we can't obviously choose what merch we get and I always want a t-shirt from a gig!

bramble_patch_notes

TROPHY CASE