Aylesbury Women's Aid looking for volunteer counsellors to support domestic abuse victims

The service is asking for people with at least 40 hours counseling experience to join their team.

Author: Scarlett Bawden-GaulPublished 29th Oct 2020

Aylesbury Women's Aid wants to increase support for victims of domestic abuse.

Aylesbury Women's Aid is asking for people with at least 40 hours of counselling experience to come forward.

The volunteer counselors will help survivors of domestic abuse understand their experience and their feelings.

April is Director of Services and says the role is extremely important for helping victims come to terms with their experiences:

"They will be running counseling sessions, listening to the woman and helping them to make sense of their experience.

"Although there are other services that offer counseling that is a very generic counseling. What we want to do is to provide counseling that is specific to domestic violence/abuse.

"So it's about supporting them to come to terms with their experiences with domestic abuse, come to terms with their feelings and start to move on so they can start to make a difference in their lives."

The volunteer counselor would be working with women who have experienced domestic abuse and will be running counseling session with them.

There is usually about 12 sessions where the person can break down what has happened the them and hopefully start to move forward.

April explained there are lots of reasons AWA are looking for more volunteers right now:

"Because of the environment we are in at the moment with Covid we are not able to do as many face-to-face appointments as we would usually.

"Then with isolation periods and people not being able to go into work and these things, people can become quite secluded and isolated.

"These people might not have anyone around to talk to, so we want to be sure we can be there for them."

People interesting in the role should visit the** AWA page** and fill in the application form.