In spite of the freezing temperatures, over 50 volunteers and clients attended St. Paul’s L’Amoreaux Centre’s annual Friendly Visiting Social Tea Saturday, December 15, 2007. The event was a chance for everyone to show their appreciation and celebrate the bonds of friendship between volunteers and clients. Activities included sharing stories, student and dance performances, caroling and refreshments. The social tea is a favorite event for visitors and clients and a way to say thank you for companionship provided throughout the year.
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Friendly Visiting is an essential service that offers outreach to home-bound seniors who don’t have consistent support networks. The service is made possible by the dedication of over 100 volunteers who are students, professionals and retirees. Activities include grocery shopping, medical escorting, and telephone support and assurance. It increases socialization and facilitates emotional, social and spiritual fulfillment. The primary purpose is human companionship. Friendly Visitors spend time on a regular basis with seniors that may encompass going for walks, writing a letter, playing games, reading, or simply enjoying a conversation. Another positive aspect of friendly visiting is that over the years, many deep and abiding friendships have grown out of this program.
St. Paul’s Friendly Visiting services witnessed an increase in usage from 162 clients with a waiting list in 2006 to 182 clients as of March 2007. There is a growing need for friendly visiting services due to the demands of an aging baby boom generation. Currently, Baby Boomers (those born between 1946 and 1964) account for 13.7% of the population of Canada. Moreover, the number of individuals aged 80 and over topped the 1 million mark in 2006.
For Mary Berger, 84, her friendly visitors have been a great comfort to her for a decade and a half. Berger states that she has a close relationship with her friendly visitor of 15 years. “I like her because I can talk to her about everything. She understands me when I have some problems. She’s very helpful to me.”
Anton Manuelpillai, 38, has been a friendly visitor for over 3 months. His personal philosophy is helping others by doing the simple things. Manuelpillai enjoys friendly visiting because he loves the exchange of knowledge. “Personally, I learn many things from my clients’ experiences,” he explains. “There’s a lot of sharing and multicultural interaction.”
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The Friendly Visiting Social Tea is the highlight of the year for volunteers and clients. Manuelpillai points out that it’s also a real chance to meet in person for some volunteers and clients who have been talking on the phone for months and have never seen each other. Berger looks forward to the social teas every year and was very excited to spend the day with her two friendly visitors. “They’ve helped me a great deal socially and mentally,” she says. “I would love to go more often than once a year. It picks me up.”
Social networks shrink over time making it more difficult to maintain relationships, social interaction and preserve seniors’ independence. Friendly visitors provide much needed help in the lives of seniors as shoppers, escorts and companions. Friendly visiting is an incredibly rewarding experience for both the visitor and the person visited and can...
