Vera has been a recipient of the friendship calls since October 2020. Vera is a lovely lady, who lives alone in council accommodation. Lockdown hit her hard as she is a very social person, but found herself shielding and also suffering anxiety about the situation. Although Vera is retired, she often visited Gambia 2 to 3 times a year taking gifts for the children out there, with Covid this has stopped. She will now make her last visit later this year, this will be her first trip back in over 2 years. Vera checks in regular on her neighbours in her block, but obviously the face to face contact stopped.
Vera really appreciated the calls and was able to access help through housing for some problems she had, she had weekly calls where she was able to sound off if needed but more importantly have a laugh and a joke with the volunteer.
More recently Vera has been able to go out more and has attended RotherFed tenant voice events, these are great for her, as she can chat to her heart’s content. She is getting out again and forging new friendships. Vera contacted us recently to say that now her confidence had returned and her anxiety reduced she felt she no longer needed the weekly calls as she was out of the flat a lot more, coming to the coffee mornings and being able to socialise has given her this re-found confidence. Vera keeps in touch as she is now more involved in tenant voice events, where she sings the praises of RotherFed and its staff (especially Carrie who Vera has a soft spot for)! It’s great to see her back to what we imagine to be the Vera that was, pre Covid. A beautiful social butterfly with a heart of gold.