Supporting Home-Start charity

I visited Home-Start today to hear about the valuable work the charity does supporting families in York.

 

Home-Start York offers friendly practical and emotional support to families with pre-school children.  Some families are referred by health visitors, midwives, social workers or children’s centre workers, and others refer themselves.  Home-Start York provides parents with support when it is most needed at times of bereavement, post-natal depression, disability, isolation, stress and illness.  Home-Start have been working with families in York for over 20 years.  All the volunteers are parents themselves and last year the team of 36 provided support for 112 York families.

 

The volunteers are recruited and trained by Home-Start York and visit families at home for a few hours every week and become a valuable source of support to parents.  They are able to help with problems of isolation, worries about children’s health, well being and development, parents’ physical and emotional health, parent-child relationships, as well as helping them find their way around health, education and community services.

 

All parents have times when they need someone to give them advice or just to listen to them.  For over twenty years York Home-Start has been doing just that, building confidence and helping families overcome difficult periods.  All the volunteers understand that being a parent is not an easy job.  Talking things through in a relaxed, comfortable environment can make a huge difference.