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OCD-UK Annual Conference 2012 - Cardiff, Sat 10th November


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The location for our annual conference this year is once again a first, the first ever OCD Conference to be held in Cymru (I think that's right!)... but yep, we are off to beautiful Wales on Saturday 10th November, with Cardiff our hosts for the year.

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Our conferences are a great way to listen to, learn from and even ask questions of the some of the leading OCD experts here in the UK, but also to meet others with OCD and share coping experiences, and for some, to make new friends too.

If it's your first time at an OCD conference, then we understand you are likely to be feeling incredibly nervous and wondering whether you should come, even more so if you're traveling alone. We can assure you that you won't be the only one coming for the first time, and everyone there will be friendly, and understand exactly what you go through with OCD on a daily basis. We will do our vest best to make everyone feel welcomed and relaxed, so please don't be afraid, we will do all we can to make you feel welcomed on the day.

We will be lining up a superb array of highly acclaimed health professionals and inspirational speakers covering a diverse range of OCD related topics. We are extremely excited about the programme we are planning, and we hope that you will be too. Confirmed speakers already include Professor Paul Salkovskis, Dr Victoria Bream-Oldfield, Dr Anne Perry and Dr Stephanie Fitzgerald, and we will have people with OCD sharing their experiences of successfully living with their OCD, including the writer and actor, Corrie's Ian Puleston-Davies, himself an OCD sufferer. We hope to announce more speakers and the full agenda for the conference in the near future, so please do check back on this page for further updates.

For more information and to book your tickets please visit our main website conference page: http://www.ocduk.org...-ocd-conference

With direct trains from many parts of the country, attending our conference should be commutable on the day for many people with direct trains from London (Paddington), Birmingham, Bristol, Chester, Crewe, Derby, Manchester, Nottingham, Reading, Rhyl, Southampton and Swansea all getting you into Cardiff Central just before 10am, just in time for the 10:15am conference start. The introductions by myself and Kylie will perhaps begin at 10am, but the first conference speaker will be pencilled in to start at 10:15, we hope that this will help you with forward planning.

We are also seeking volunteers to help on the day, and if you are a resident of Wales and would like to tell your story please do get in touch with me.

We hope those in Wales, and in fact all of our members continue to approve of our policy of taking our conference to a different location each year, giving lots of people in different parts of the country the chance to listen to the specialists, and we hope to see lots of you in Cardiff in November!

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Guest stringbean

I would love to come and meet a few people but to be honest I worry constantly that i wont be well enough to do things i.e. work, socialise, care for my family and this hurdle seems it may just be one to high for me! :shy:

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  • 3 weeks later...
Guest saltwaterb

I'd very much like to attend if I get the chance. But A young'un like me isn't sure what to expect from a conference like this.

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  • 1 month later...

For those planning to attend this year, what would you like to see our expert speakers cover throughout the day? We already have a few ideas for new material to keep it fresh, and again we have reviewed the feedback forms from the previous years conference for ideas, but for those coming do let us know if there is anything specific you might like to hear about, and if we can, we will cover it.

id love to come along but i cant travel that far. :(

Sorry to hear that Angel, it is for this very reason we do our very best to travel around the country with our annual conference, so that we give people the chance to attend, if not annually, every couple of years. Last year we were in the North West, the year before Scotland and the East of England.. next year.. watch this space :) We also hope to make the conference accessible for those unable to attend in a more expedited fashion. Again, watch this space.

I'd very much like to attend if I get the chance. But A young'un like me isn't sure what to expect from a conference like this.

Hopefully, the conference offers the opportunity for those affected by OCD to listen to key leading OCD specialists, and hear from those with OCD that have made progress, Last year we had 15 different OCD presentations, from 12 different speakers, although this year we may have slightly less presentations to allow more Q+A time.

I like to think, and the feedback suggests so, that our conferences offer hope, encouragement and inspiration. Come along, meet others with OCD, and hopefully you will go home better informed and feeling slightly less alone :)

Ashley.

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Guest Wales

I am considering coming to this... my Uni house is just up the road from the Julian Hodge building so distance definitely isn't an issue!

But A young'un like me isn't sure what to expect from a conference like this.

Like saltwaterb, I'm not quite sure what to expect. And also, from a personal point of view, I'm a little nervous in case I see people I know (many of my friends do their Uni work in this building, and I try to keep my OCD on the down low! I don't mean that to sound offensive, I'm not ashamed of my OCD, I just don't like to broadcast it in real life!)

Grew up in north wales and I speak fluent welsh, unfortunatly in south wales it isnt spoken as much as in the north. Hopefully i can have a welsh chat with a few on the day.

Pottypotter, dwi'n ceisio dysgu siarad cymraeg, felly efallai os bydda i'n mynd, gallwn sgwrsio yn gymraeg yng Nghaerdydd :D

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Will you be having any conferences in Scotland in the near future?

I am afraid the short answer is unlikely in the next 18 months, the last event we hosted in Scotland was in Edinburgh in 2010.

OCD-UK have always tried to include Scotland and hopefully it will be recognised our efforts as the only UK anxiety charity to include Scotland and take events to Scotland, but the reality is we can not do it regularly I am afraid because of costs. We did host our first ever conference in Stirling, and we hosted an event in Edinburgh with the leading OCD specialist, Prof Salkovskis in 2010. But the sad reality is that the three events we have hosted in Scotland (we also did an OCD roadshow in Dundee) have all been relatively poorly attended, and cost the charity considerable expense. We will be back in Scotland, but it is unlikely to be this year or next year if I am to be realistic and honest with you, although if the opportunity arises to host an event Scotland we will, it is our intent to be back soon, and if we can make something happen for next year, perhaps host a smaller 'audience with' event in Scotland I will do my very best for you. I will work on that, but more likely to be 2014.

I suspect our 2013 conference to be much further North, so hopefully a bit easier to travel to in 2013, but also as I mentioned we are working on options for all those unable to travel.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I wonder if I can ask you all to put your combined thinking caps on to help us improve one aspect of this years conference.

One of our guests at last years conference happened to come alone, and felt that she would have liked some form of ice breaking introduction to other guests. She happened to pop her name on the feedback form so I have been able to talk to her, and I think we both agreed that an ice breaker that helps people feel more relaxed, especially guests attending alone would be ideal, but neither of us came up with the solution that gets people talking to each other. She will be helping me this year by mixing with guests and chatting to them so those alone will be hopefully feel less alone.

But I wondered if anybody has attended a conference before, where they saw some form of ice breaker amongst guests that enabled guests to get to know each other, could you please let me know of that or any ideas you might have.

We will have about 200 people in attendance so we cant get everyone to introduce themselves, but any ideas we can use during breaks and before the conference to get people talking would be great.

Thanks,

Ashley.

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Guest legend

I think at one conference ash i did volunteer, and we did a "forum users" room /meeting point if that helps ?... where i had my name

legend and the persons had there "forum names on "

worked well in that aspect, where people were diverted to a meet and greet room.

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Thanks Legend, we can do that again, although that is not really what I meant as only a small number of forum users attend each year. What I meant was a way that we can get all the conference guests somehow feeling less alone.

Since posting, unless someone comes up with other good ideas, I think what we may do is have a small team of friendly smiling faces at the doors simply greeting every person that arrives, walking with them to the registration area and introducing them to the registration team, and then showing them around, and by doing that all guests will feel welcomed and less alone initially.

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Guest legend

what about if they "tick a box" on the registration form, to say that are alone ? that way you could have people there to make them feel

more accomadated ?

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Guest legend

what about if they "tick a box" on the registration form, to say that are alone ? that way you could have people there to make them feel

more accomadated ?

oops and yep a meet and greet idea is also fab. So if people do turn up on there own there will be someone there to smile and welcome

sorry my brain isnt firing on all cylinders lol .

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Hi Ashley :original:

Are you still looking for volunteers at the conference? If so what does it involve and how to apply?

Regards

Zee

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Guest Jaz31146

I am considering coming to this... my Uni house is just up the road from the Julian Hodge building so distance definitely isn't an issue!

Like saltwaterb, I'm not quite sure what to expect. And also, from a personal point of view, I'm a little nervous in case I see people I know (many of my friends do their Uni work in this building, and I try to keep my OCD on the down low! I don't mean that to sound offensive, I'm not ashamed of my OCD, I just don't like to broadcast it in real life!)

I'm at uni at cardiff, and like you I'm a bit nervous about going in case I see anyone I know, none of them know about my OCD at the moment :s

I would like to go though

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I'm at uni at cardiff, and like you I'm a bit nervous about going in case I see anyone I know, none of them know about my OCD at the moment :s

I would like to go though

I have visited the venue, and it seems to be something of a stand alone building for the lecture theatre, away from other parts of the uni. But perhaps you guys could tell a little white lie, if you are seen unless someone comes inside the building they wont know it is an OCD conference, but if you are seen perhaps you can say you are with a friend with OCD, or even that you were helping the charity out as a volunteer. And if either of you are studying psychology, just say you are attending to learn more about OCD as part of your psychology course :)

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