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Volunteers making such a difference to hospice life
LIKE many charitable organisations, Heart of Kent Hospice is celebrating the dedication and generosity of volunteers during Volunteers’Week, from June 1-7.
Maggie Lamb is just one of the generous local people who do- nate their time to help the pa- tients and families cared for by Heart of Kent Hospice. She has been volunteering for the charity for 18 months, originally as a pa- tient escort on the minibus, and now helping in Magnolia Place Outpatient Centre, in the Hospice café and regularly at fundraising events.
“Whatever I can fit in, I will”
says the joyfully effervescent Maggie. “When I’m in Magnolia Place, I help organise the quiz and other entertainment, make tea and serve lunches, socialise and help patients to have fun. Gener- ally, I try to give patients the best day they can have.” Maggie owned a B&B in West Malling with her husband Dick, who sadly died of oesophageal cancer in the Hospice three and a half years ago. It was their expe- rience of the Hospice that led to her becoming a volunteer. Maggie said: “Towards the end,
I lived with Dick in the Hospice. The staff pushed two beds to- gether in his room and often re- ferred to it as the honeymoon suite. We lived like that for 16
Volunteer Maggie Lamb helps out in the cafe and right, patient care volunteer: Debbi Boland talking to Maureen Kirchell (right)
days, and the staff really looked after us both. It was the most in- credible ending to anyone’s life.” It took a while for Maggie to consider volunteering. For 18 months after Dick’s death she didn’t even think about it.
“We’d been together since Iwas
13 years old, 52 years in total and had a wonderful marriage. We laughed all the time. “When I first came back to the Hospice for lunch with my daughter, it felt a little odd being
there. But after a second visit and doing some fundraising at the Light up a Life event, I knew that I wanted to volunteer. I wanted to give something back, so I decided to commit to a day and a half a week.” Maggie says: “There’s never a morning when I think I don’t want to go to the hospice, you get so much out of volunteering. I get as much out as the patients get from me helping them.” Heart of Kent Hospice has a
range of volunteering opportuni- ties in its A to Z of Volunteering (left). So whether it’s a day and a half a week like Maggie, volun- teering in a few different roles, or committing to a regular hour or two to run classes for outpatients, such as Tai Chi, yoga and relax- ation techniques, it still makes a huge difference.
Find out more about volun- teering at
www.hokh.org, call 01622 792200 ext 225 or send us an email at
volunteers@hokh.co.uk
26 Malling June 2017
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