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Report transcript in: Chris's Volunteer Story
Please Report the Errrors?
really pleased to be talking to Chris, who is one of our volunteers.
Epilepsy action.
He has been volunteering with us for
around 15 months,
and he's a befriender.
And he's recently just started,
um,
to take on more responsibilities and become
a virtual talk and support group leader.
So Hi, Chris.
Hi. Just wondered if you wanted to tell us.
Tell me a little bit more about what you actually do in your volunteering roles.
Uh,
in my volunteer
roles, I
do be
So I support other people with S,
and it's really, uh,
uh about listening and being able to help raise their confidence
and things such as
being able to build a good rapport
and maybe increase their independence so they can go
out and about and meet other people as well.
So that's what we do is a befriending service. An idea?
So how do you do that? Do you? Is it a telephone call or
it's It's either telephone or they can. They can choose to do it through zoom. So
either of those ways we do it.
Yeah,
so that's just kind of like having a chat with them and just Yeah,
yeah,
yeah,
Yeah. No, that that's great.
And it Well, you just started doing your virtual, um, talk and support group leader.
So that's, um what?
W When you actually start doing that role, what will you be doing in that role?
I'll be, um, helping at the start after I've finished training
to
host and co-host uh,
meetings virtually with other people and it, uh, with epilepsy.
And it's things like virtual group work
so they can talk about their own
epilepsy or other interests and stuff. And it's more peer support work as well.
OK, that's great.
So it's just it's like kind of like befriending but more in like a group context.
So you're working with more people rather than 1 to 1.
That's that's brilliant. So obviously you really like supporting people.
That's what I'm getting from that.
So what kind of difference? Um, do you think your volunteering roles make um,
to
people?
It makes me feel a lot happier and better about myself,
and I find it rewarding to be able to support others
and build my confidence and also build their confidence.
And it keeps me busy and, uh, gain new skills as well.
And training
and supervision.
Uh, for example, when I've, uh, been befriending and got really good feedback
from clients.
It's been really good to hear the
feedback saying that they've enjoyed working with me
and they feel better about themselves.
Yeah, that's Yeah, that's amazing. Yeah, I know.
You get very good feedback, so it's great to hear that. You
Yeah, that you're getting that feedback you're hearing about it,
So that's brilliant.
And do you think volunteering in general has an impact?
What kind of impact do you think volunteering in general has on
either yourself or
people in general?
Well, for example, for people I've worked with and supported,
they've been able to feel better about themselves, and they've volunteered.
They feel they're able to get out about more
and meet new people. So, yeah, it's had that kind of impact on them
when I've helped them to get into doing more, volunteering
for themselves in the community, like
things like cleaning a local beach shop or working in a charity
shop and all different areas of volunteering that they've chosen to go into
or when they've volunteered for epilepsy action as well.
Great. Some befriending themselves.
All right, so some of the people. So some of the people you have,
um,
volunteered
with
they've actually gone on to become volunteers themselves. Is that
right?
OK,
so that's having, like, a massive impact, then, isn't it? It's kind of
you're volunteering, but then they're becoming involved in volunteering as well.
So that's Yeah,
that's
that's amazing. That's great.
Brilliant. Ok, well, um,
that's that's it's been really great talking to you, Chris. Um,
to hear about how, um, you know the difference.
Um,
volunteering is made to you
and to the people that you work with.
Um, so that's that's great. Really good to talk to you.
Um, thank you very
much.
Thank
you. Bye
bye.
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