From
time immemorial women
have always been strongly
involved with voluntary work
and often this has been an
underestimated contribution to
society. Of late there is increasing
attention and appreciation for this
important contribution - from
both men and women - because
often they help keep together
and enrich the very fabric of
our community. Without these
volunteers our lives would be
different and certain facilities
and development possibilities
would be a lot scantier.
In
a conversation with a neighbour, who gives of her time
to teach foreign women how to
ride a bicycle (a natural thing to
do when you live in the
Netherlands), I became inspired
to speak with some of the women
I know. They all give of their free
time to help improve the well
being of others and I asked them
what moves them to do what
they do.
Marianne Bosman: “A foot bath works
like an unblocking agent.” |
Marianne
Bosman works
as a community nurse in domiciliary care and
alongside this, once a week she visits a retirement
home on a voluntary basis, to treat
the senior citizens to a foot bath. “A foot
bath works like an unblocking agent,” Marianne
says, “it
makes for new possibilities because people release things.
As you grow older it becomes increasingly
difficult to generate new things for yourself
that may give you energy. Next to that you
exercise less compared to when you were
younger. This makes that on the long term it is more difficult to
get rid of residues of processes
you go through during the day. The
feet are an important ‘exhaust valve’ for the
body to get rid of these residues, and if this
process slows down, it can mean that some
of it does not leave you and settles around
the feet. A foot bath helps to release this, so
that there is space for something else to happen.
For me it is a question of putting into
practice what I know works and the effects
are enormous. Often I first give them a warm
damp towel for their face and after the foot
bath I give their feet a massage. I first started
with only two people, but the enthusiasm
grew and currently there are regularly fifteen
to twenty who look forward to it and
arrange their days in such a way that they
can make it to the session.”
When
I asked Marianne about her motives for doing this, you can
feel her compassion and desire to
do something for older people.
“
I have a great respect for people of an
advanced age and realise that the fact that
I can walk around freely and have everything
that is available today, I owe partly to them. I
have a respect for the qualities and principles
that they uphold, such as humanity and
warmth. These are things I want to see in
the world too. Often for instance, they
appreciate the little things and for me, I
don’t want to always do everything for economic
reasons. I give them space to speak about their lives. I’m
also very interested in
what wisdom they can pass on to me.”
What’s
in it for you?
“To
me it is very valuable to see that it works. By the movement
caused in them,
space is created to have a fresh look at
different aspects in their life. When I see
that happen, it makes my day.”
| Top
to bottom: Jeannette Hendriksen teaching a woman to ride
a bike and Olga Lemmen |
 |
 |
Jeannette
Hendriksen,
a mother of three young children, teaches women how to ride a bicycle, including
some basic road safety rules.
"I
do a lot of voluntary work at my children’s
school but I also wanted to make myself
useful in a completely different area and
thus I came across the Zahra Foundation,
which supports foreign women. A great
need appeared to exist for teaching them
how to cycle because it gives them some
freedom to get around Holland. Often they
have already tried to ride a bike, they have
seen their children do it, but haven’t managed
to master it. I teach them something
they really want to be able to do and it is a
real victory to be able to cycle. The Dutch
are used to riding a bike from early on, but
for these women it is even hard to push
one. For the first exercise we put some traffic
cones out and then they have to walk
beside their bike and navigate around
them. Sometimes if it seems difficult they
remove cones to make it easier!"
Jeannette
continues: "We
don’t normally
realise that for some people it is just as
scary to learn to cycle as it would be for me
to go paragliding. It is very frightening to
lift your feet off the ground, especially
because it needs speed in order to be able
to pedal and steer and it becomes even
scarier because your instinct wants to take
it slowly. The advantage is that I am a physiotherapist
and can help the women with
some other exercises to help them just find
that little bit of extra balance and confidence
they need."
“I
hear that you truly love doing this?”
“Yes, definitely,
they want to do it so badly, and it is not easy for them to go
out
amongst the traffic with a bike and to take
it into consideration. I find it satisfying to
assist these women in a way that offers
them some further independence and freedom.
For me it is important to expand my
otherwise limited small world, to include
the larger community.” Pointing to a picture
of a beaming woman cycling, who is
about forty years of age, she says, “This is
my reward. You can see reflected in her face the glow of achievement
when she
managed to conquer her fear! I happened
to see this lady on her bicycle the other day,
pedalling along right next to her son, with a
shopping basket on the front, that was so
great...” Olga
Lemmen is
professionally a
municipality Welfare policy staff member.
In her spare time she watches over and
cares for terminally ill people who want
to die at home.
“When
I come to watch I give some respite
to the regular carers, so that they can have
a break and do something else for a while,” says Olga. “As
a volunteer you can also offer your help to the dying person and
relatives, for example by offering emotional
support, to help finding answers to
questions they might have, or to help take
away some of the anxiety which may exist.”
What
caused you to engage in this kind of volunteering work?
“I
do this because the whole area of life and death intrigues me
and I am eager to be
close by during the transition phase of the
process of dying. It might sound strange,
but next to the pain and grief which go
with the situation of someone dying, this
last phase of life can also be very special.
For myself I am convinced that us humans
are on earth with a higher purpose and that
we have a destiny in this life. Often we are
searching our entire life to find a way here
and to get closer to the fulfilment of this
destiny. I see the moment of dying to be a
crown on one’s life, where you receive the
reward for what you have achieved. Also I
am convinced that life is not finished when
you die. I see it as a continuous process, in
which life transfers to another phase or
form, like the butterfly, which evolves from
a cocoon, which in turn was a caterpillar
before.
It
seems to me that you go through extraordinary experiences
by doing this work, what does it
cause in you?
“Especially
in the Western world in the last few decades a trend has prevailed
which
suppressed thinking about the process of
dying as a natural part of life and has caused
a lack of appreciation. As a result, people
often don’t know how to handle it, find
it difficult to talk about and have feelings of
anxiety.
The
loss of a loved one or someone who is very close to you is often
accompanied by
pain, grief and loneliness. The presence of
an understanding person, who is willing to
listen, can be comforting in these circumstances. Especially
by the special moments I
have experienced during the process of dying,
my belief has been strengthened that it can
be different and that also the last phase of
life can be very special.
In
my voluntary work I meet a lot of people who in their way try
to handle the often
precarious situation they find themselves in.
I have the privilege to be invited into this and
to contribute from this home situation what
I can give from my life and the experiences
I have managed to gather. I do this in the
first place by ‘being there’. This can already
be an enormous help, and that gives me
fulfilment!” |
