Giving time away. And coming back richer.
Once a year we prepare new volunteers for hospice work. 160 hours over seven months, together with the adult education centre VHS Leer.
120 hours of theory, 40 hours of practice.
The course is for anyone who would like to accompany people in the last phase of life and their families. It takes a willingness to grow personally and to acquire basic knowledge of nursing, medical and above all emotional care.
Since 1997 the courses have been led by Gretel Bluhm-Janssen, psychologist and honorary chair. In 2025 eleven women and two men completed the course. An information evening takes place every autumn.
Contents
- The hospice movement
- Motivation and needs
- Your own experiences of loss and farewell
- Your own death
- Helpful conversation
- Non-verbal communication
- Phases of dying and grief
- Sources of strength and limits
- Spirituality
- Pain therapy and palliative medicine
- Living wills and advance planning
- Forms of burial
- Basic care for the dying
- Families and the bereaved
- Death and grief in children and young people
- Basal stimulation, aromatherapy, expressive painting
- Rituals
- Placement with preparation and review
“I have become calmer. And I don’t clean the windows so often any more.”
“Listening, listening, listening. Noticing. Holding myself back. I have changed.”
“I now feel more confident with dying people. Not as helpless as before.”
“I feel great gratitude for life, for the people who belong to me.”
Those who accompany are accompanied too.
Supervision is compulsory for all volunteers in end-of-life and grief support. An external supervisor accompanies the companions. Their own experiences and feelings have room there. On top of this there is regular further training and the working group on the first Wednesday of every month.
