On Christmas Day, Nansi Maclean will be donning a reindeer onesie and waking sleepy – and moody – teenagers up. But Maclean isn’t their mother. She’s actually a senior support worker for Brighton and Hove charity, YMCA Downslink group.
Her work involves managing a hostel for homeless 16- to 25-year-olds who have complex needs. The young people in her care are the most vulnerable people in the city and most don’t have a family to go home to on Christmas Day. Because of this Maclean is determined to make sure they have a great day.
“It will basically be like a big family Christmas. What we want to do is allow them to be kids, allow them to be young,” she says. “Christmas is hard and it brings up a lot of their trauma. On TV at the moment, it’s family family family and they can’t go back to their families.”
The preparation for the big day has taken months of planning. She says: “...it’s the culmination of so much work. We’ve raised nearly £2,000 in donations to fund it plus members of the public have kindly collected presents in a box for our young people – what we call our ‘Love in a box’ appeal – so underneath the tree, there will be presents for them all.”
For a self-confessed Christmas fanatic, having shifts on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day and Boxing Day isn’t her ideal way to spend the festive season. “Not being home directly affects my partner and my parents. They are sad but even though I’m not there, they know that I’m doing something for other people. My mum has actually made Christmas puddings for the hostel too.”
For Stuart Cashmore, who has volunteered for Crisis for 17 years and is now a shift leader at an outreach centre in Paddington, it’s a different story. Christmas is not his cup of tea at all and this is one reason he feels he should help homeless people during the festive season.
“Christmas isn’t special to my wife and me at all,” he says. “I know that’s probably shocking to some people but it just isn’t. So if I can do something useful to help people then why wouldn’t I?”
Around 250 people who are street homeless will be fed, supported and entertained by Cashmore and his team of volunteers each night during Christmas week. “There is a fantastic spirit on Christmas Day, not just among the volunteers but also our guests. We actually have people of every faith and of none, both among our volunteers and guests and a lot of people say, this what Christmas is all about.
“It’s about giving for the sake of giving and not about what we get back. That being said, I do think we get a tremendous amount of purpose and fulfilment out of it.”
In Scotland, Neil Chalmers will be able to enjoy the day at home, but as a crew member for Kinghorn lifeboat station, he’ll have to keep his pager on him all day and will be steering clear of the Baileys. The RNLI station is manned entirely by volunteers and covers a large part of the Firth of Forth, which is a busy shipping lane.
For the last few years, his pager has stayed silent on Christmas Day but across the country RNLI volunteers will have to launch their boats on the day. “It’s pretty common for the pagers to go off on Christmas Day.” he says. “A lot of people have their christmas dinner and then go for a walk, trying to be healthy. They might be on a coastal path and get into difficulty. Also commercial shipping doesn’t stop for Christmas Day so there’s always that possibility too.”
His family won’t bat an eyelid if he does get called out though. “My partner is also in the crew and my brother is as well so no one minds. Saving someone’s life is amazing.”
For Jenni McCartney, who has been volunteering for the Samaritans for 30 years and is now the chair of the charity, it’s also the thought of supporting someone in their hour of need that sustains her.
She says: “Christmas is a difficult time to cover shifts because people go away or have families. I feel I can do it [man the phones]. It doesn’t disrupt many lives if I’m not there.”
Traditionally, the Christmas period is a busy one for the charity. “If you’re on your own and life isn’t great and you’re struggling to cope, who can you ring on Christmas Day? If you happen not to be with family and friends having a great time, then I think it can feel worse on that particular day,” she says.
The reality of loneliness is one reason Caroline Billington set up her charity, Community Christmas, with the vision that no elderly person in the UK should be alone on Christmas Day unless they want to be.
It all started when she was approached to drive a minibus to take some local older people, who had no family to go to on Christmas Day, to a community lunch in 2007. She says: “When I picked the elderly people up from a block of flats, the conversation was really low key and they didn’t know each other. When I came to take them home after the lunch, it was great – they were chatting away and arranging to meet up for tea in the new year.
“Seeing that transformation made me realise it wasn’t just about that day. It literally changes lives because they were getting to know their neighbours and making friends on Christmas Day and that goes for the volunteers too.”
She says: “it’s a very bizarre, but it’s great that the idea of Christmas as a trigger for change is being recognised.
“That’s truly what I think Christmas is about.”
What are your experiences of volunteering during the festive season? Add your views in the comment section below.
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