Card playing with the brain injury group

As part of my placement for fieldwork 2 I went with Lucy to the Brain Injury Assoication. At the start we didn't really know what to expect and we were told just to mingle with the people in the group. There were people sitting around talking and there were a group of men that were playing card, this caught my eye and I immediatly gravited towards them. Because this was a new environment to me and I didn't know the people, it was quite stressful for me to think about what I was going to talk about to the people. As soon as saw the cards I felt more as ease because this was a way that I could communicate and socialise with the people in the group with out the pressure of continuously having to come up with conversation. With cards I feel that you can talk when you want to it allows you time to come up with conversation because you can let the cards talk for you, cards allow non-verbal socialization.


Playing with the men was a good way for them to get to know us, they could explain the rules and how to play. And it provided them with conversation to talk to us, and banter about how you played the card etc.


 It felt that anyhow the men would joke about playing a wrong move it was always in a light hearted way and I feel that playing the cards was never about the competition of it, it was more about having fun and socializing with people.


I think that the need to do activity ranges from person to person I feel that my need is that level of connection through communication with peers, which leads to a sense of engagement. Card playing makes me feel included and sociable, it is a way to engage with peers and thinking of strategies to win. I get enjoyment out of winning and discussion's with the people I'm playing with. I like the way that card playing can bring people together you don't have to know someone very well to play a card game with them and it gives you some common ground to talk about, card playing can be a way of forming new relationships.