Blog Details

• Somewhere House

Shop Floor

The "Shop Floor" role is an opportunity for clients like myself, who have completed treatment and are living in Somewhere House's "Move-On" community to volunteer with the team at the residential rehab. Shop Floor volunteers provide peer support by sharing their experience of treatment and early recovery with residential clients. I found it was a way to give back and demonstrate my gratitude for the opportunities that were afforded to me and it was an immensely constructive thing for me to undertake in early recovery, providing structure and purpose and contributing to building self worth. It also helped me understand the value of my experience and by sharing that with others helped me not only develop empathy but also a more crystallised understanding of myself. Because I had recently been a residential client myself, I believe residential clients found me easily relatable and this was a useful way of being something of a liaison between staff and clients, which is an integral part of the role. At the end of the day, Shop Floor volunteers write a feedback handover detailing how the clients have been that day, any problems and feedback on staff performance. In addition, Shop Floor volunteers undertake various practical duties that assist the running of Somewhere House, from shopping errands to escorting clients to appointments to setting up art groups. I felt that I was a valued part of the team at Somewhere House. During my stay in residential treatment, it was the subjective experiences of others that I learnt most from and my approach to supporting clients was to try to share my own experience. Shop Floor clients also support the staff team by helping to affirm the boundaries set out in Somewhere House's client agreement and client handbook and dealing with queries that can be easily answered without recourse to other staff. From a work experience perspective, volunteering as Shop Floor was useful in understanding the mechanics of Peer Support and the value of "Lived Experience", team working and organisational skills and communication. I went on to work within a Mental Health support service as a Peer Support Worker and my experience of the Shop Floor Volunteer role provided useful preparation for this.