Michael on volunteering as a Samaritan
‘It’s tough being a Samaritan…but is extremely rewarding and an absolute privilege.’
When I retired from working in industry, the latter 15 years of which I had held positions as MD or Chief Executive, I decided I wanted to “put something back” into society, so 9 years ago I applied to join the Kings Lynn branch of Samaritans. After passing the interview and successfully completing the 9 month training programme; I became a Samaritan.
I also volunteer with Fakenham Foodbank and with Talking Newspapers which is distributed to blind and semi blind people throughout Norfolk.
Of these three volunteering roles the Samaritans one is the most time consuming – in fact at times up to 50% of my life is involved with Samaritans because as well as being a Listening volunteer I help train and mentor new Samaritans, am part of the Outreach team, give Talks about Samaritans – who we are, what we do and I am one of the branch’s Deputy Directors.
Samaritans are available 24/7 – including Christmas, Easter and Bank holidays. In fact, there is no time day or night when we are not available on our Freephone number 116 123. That number is unique, because if dialled it won’t appear on your phone bill, so it is not only confidential (as are all calls to Samaritans) but utterly anonymous.
People who call Samaritans are many and varied; rich, poor, educated, illiterate, old, young, children, and those in absolute despair. We support school and university students many of whom may need a confidential non-judgemental person listening to them.
But sadly, we also get calls from the suicidal – people contemplating taking their own life or actively in the process of doing so.
Many people e-mail Samaritans. We reply to every e-mail within 24 hours. Live Chat is a new area with which we are experimenting. We visit Prisons where we train some prisoners to be Listeners – there as a first line of support for other prisoners. We work with Network Rail to try and prevent people killing themselves on the railway. Our Correspondence branch replies to those who write to Samaritans. Our Festival branch supports people at festivals.
Samaritans is a self-funding charity, so we have to raise all our own operating money.
It’s tough being a Samaritan because at times it can be gruelling and challenging, but is extremely rewarding and an absolute privilege.
So I would encourage anyone who really wants to help others – take the first step – by going to Samaritans.org and apply.