A perspective from Benjamin Conway, Chair of Trustees
“I’m just asking for a friend”. How many times have we all used that phrase often as a humorous throwaway line.
At Paperweight we hear it every day. Mostly in a quiet, embarrassed or sad voice and usually anonymously.
It’s one of the hardest things, asking for help. Admitting, perhaps for the first time, that things are not quite as they may seem. That you are not coping, that life is in a downward spiral and crisis is just a day away.
We all have a bit of that ‘British stiff upper lip, carry on and all will be ok’, mentality. And that’s fine if you can manage.
Nowadays it’s acceptable to talk about your illness, you are encouraged to talk about your mental health, it’s part and parcel of society and inherent to both the treatment and hopefully the cure. But no one talks about the finances, the loss of employment, the debts, all of which can lead to the lack of food on the table. It’s the last taboo.
Government research states:
People with financial difficulties are significantly more likely to experience anxiety, stress and mental health problems.
Hands up if you have struggled with online access to your bank or a utility company, have you listened to the monotonous music on hold becoming endlessly frustrated. Address the practical issues and you have gone a long way in helping to resolve the surrounding noise and the potential fallout.
The cost-of-living crisis is affecting families across the UK including in the heart of the Jewish Community. Many people who never expected to need support – the new vulnerables – are now encountering challenges that can dramatically change their lives in a short time.
“Community advice services are now the frontline defence preventing grief due to bereavement from turning into long-term poverty, homelessness and court action.”
Whether you are recently bereaved of a lifelong partner, in the midst of a divorce battle or struggling with unemployment and rising debts, we have learned, that in one form or another no one is immune from the possibility of needing help and guidance.
Paperweight have made many new friends over the last few years, about 27,000. A mother of four young children who called when the bailiffs were knocking on the door; the gentleman who has been sitting on the park bench each day for 5 years because he can’t tell his wife that he was made redundant; the elderly couple sitting at home unable to cope with life; and the young couple who have accrued colossal debt.
And we sit with each and every friend and we gradually peel back the layers and slowly address and resolve the issues one by one with a mixture of professional expertise and endless compassion, and as we do, the dignity returns and with it a belief and hope that something better is just around the corner.
And our friends are your friends too. Your neighbours, your family, the person you sit next to in shul.
And therefore, when we need you, will you be there to help us?