Training diary of a volunteer – Sessions 9 & 10

Volunteering with us is a great way to contribute to the community while gaining some serious self-satisfaction – believe us, there’s nothing more enhancing that helping people and seeing your work make a real difference.

But what about the training to become a volunteer counsellor? We asked one of our trainees, Libby Clifton (pictured), to make a diary for us, to explain her thoughts and feelings throughout the process.

In her final instalment, Libby tells us exactly the type of councillor she wants to become and how training has inspired her.

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I felt a mixture of both sadness and happiness that it was our last Sessions Nine and Ten. I felt a personal sense of achievement that I had kept my near full-time job, home life, Chrysalis course and NRC training all happening at the same time.

Session 9

Session Nine focused on the trauma recovery, classifying the different types of trauma (i.e. multiple or single) and helping clients with flashbacks, triggers, and the conscious process of walling off memories.

For me, resilience was particularly interesting as clients may have found resilience as a child but understandably were overwhelmed with multiple traumatic events in adulthood.

Again, the CEO and the Team Counselling Co-Ordinator were brilliant in these sessions as their insights into client’s experiences add context to the training and how the clients could present their narratives to you as a counsellor.

Session 10

Session 10 explained supervision in more detail and I do have to contact a Person-Centred Supervisor to try and develop a good rapport with to ensure I abide by the BACP Guidelines for supervision.

This will be important to me, as I will want to ensure the safety of my clients by developing my good practice and looking after myself. The discussion on planned and unplanned therapeutic endings was very informative.

I think again that after 26 weeks I will have difficulty saying goodbye to my clients but will find this so rewarding as survivors are hopefully empowered to live their own future.

Conclusion and New Beginnings

My hope is to become a sensitive, warm, congruent and empathic counsellor who will help survivors of trauma to live their lives.

I am very conscious how lucky I am to gain such a professional placement. The support I will receive at NRC is second to none as all the staff I have met are very kind, experienced counsellors and incredibly supportive.

They will have insights into areas of my work with a client I will have missed through inexperience. For me, the hope is I will become integrated into the NRC team and become part of their family to help survivors of trauma/s.

Thank you for this wonderful training, opportunity and for the absolute privilege of helping clients who have experienced trauma/s.