Supporting volunteers with mental illness
Abstract
Mental illness affects 20 percent of the population worldwide; among those persons with mental illness, 70 percent want and are able to serve by volunteering. Consequently, interacting with volunteers with mental illness is a possibility for all volunteer program managers. This effective practice offers tips for helping volunteers with issues of low self-esteem and isolation, as a result of their illness, and in turn developing a successful program that matches volunteer needs with the needs of an organization. Rosanna Tarsiero submitted this effective practice in August 2004, from a paper prepared for the 18th Annual World Conference promoted by International Association of Volunteer Effort (IAVE). Read the full text of the paper.Issue
Volunteers with mental illnesses need to be helped with issue of self-esteem and isolation (both due to the illness) and provided with appropriate training.Action
According to the volunteer program manager at Bipolar Dream, effective practices for supporting volunteers with mental illness include:
The volunteer program manager can:
- Improve volunteers' self-esteem through an empowering managerial style
- Help lift the volunteers' isolation through proactive facilitation of human relationships among volunteers and with staff
- Create guidelines so that volunteers will be held accountable for what they do and for what they do not do
Bipolar Dream guidelines are as follows:
No one is allowed to volunteer without getting the help she or he needs. The Bipolar Dream site provides volunteers with a main support group and the choice of support in the areas of abuse, ADHD, anger management, bipolar, dissociative and eating disorders, a group for people who are gay and dealing with mental illness, a group to support those who have lost a loved one to suicide and a group for young adults.
Any volunteer is both entitled and welcome to use the Bipolar Dream site support services whenever she or he needs additional aid.
In addition to the main group, volunteers have a group for volunteering issues, which they are invited to use. This group addresses administrative and group tasks, volunteer "burn-out" syndrome, impressions or evaluations of members and whatever else volunteers would like to share.
Volunteers are encouraged to attend virtual monthly meetings to promote teambuilding and relationships with other members.
All volunteers are asked to:
- Be in agreement with Bipolar Dream's concept of volunteering
- Be in agreement with the mission statement
- Be comfortable with the code of ethics and abide by it
- Comply with policy and guidelines that will be given when starting probationary period
- Improve their education and awareness of their illness
- Accomplish accepted assignments
- Take certified training
- Give constructive feedback
All volunteers serve in an online setting, and use instant messenger, private emails, and group posts to communicate.
Assignments are sent to volunteers via email.
Additionally, volunteers are kept connected to the organization through dedicated e-learning groups and are provided with specialized training that is mainly self-paced.
Most of the training materials have been developed or adapted by the volunteer program manager. Supplemental, external sources are sometimes used, and these are mostly free materials that can be downloaded.
Volunteers are not asked to commit to a scheduled fixed amount of time per week, but rather for quality of their time.
Two main types of jobs are available (with the possibility of holding both kinds):
- Frontline jobs encompass moderator, senior moderator, volunteer manager assistant, chat operator, message board leader and all those jobs that require any kind of interaction with a number of served people.
- Administrative jobs encompass fundraiser, accountant, web designer, Webmaster, research assistant, publishing editor, translator and all those jobs that require only occasional interactions with few people.
Context
Founded in March 2003, Bipolar Dream is a virtual organization promoting online support, education and awareness of bipolar disorder. The international, multilingual site is run by people with bipolar disorder whose aim is to promote an awareness of the illness in our society and among undiagnosed people; knowledge of its long-term effects; education about its life-time course, concurrent illnesses, available treatments and coping strategies for mentally ill people and their loved ones; and support to the mentally ill during both acute phases and the recovery process.
Virtual volunteering can be particularly fulfilling when someone has a psychiatric disability that makes it difficult for him or her to get out of their home, but they are in need of feeling useful despite the illness.
In fact, many people having a mental illness often wish to be able to volunteer. They often also feel that their mental illness makes them not reliable as a volunteer and therefore are afraid to commit. With a flexible volunteer program such as Bipolar Dream, volunteers are able to stop volunteering when they need to and then resume their job when they feel better.
Outcome
For volunteers:- More education and awareness of the illness (manageability of the illness)
- Improved self-esteem, feelings of usefulness and goal fulfillment
- Certified training in a volunteer's field(s) of interest
- Flexibility of assignments
- Tactful direct supervision
- Straight and upfront feedback
- Assistance in facing oneself through self-help
- Support in many endeavors
- Job skills
- Awareness of social services programs
Those who volunteer for mentally ill people, and are themselves suffering from mental illness, are able to gain deeper insight into themselves and their condition. Seeing the illness in another person often helps a volunteer detach from his or her symptoms.
For clients:
The served population shares their experiences at an impressively high rate, with a surprisingly low incidence of arguments or disagreements.
For both:
There is a very deep sense of belonging to the online community.
Evidence
According to the volunteer program manger, many of those who have volunteered with Bipolar Dream are in college; all of them regularly go to their doctors and take medicines as prescribed. Additionally, most volunteers need less medication than before volunteering.Posted On
September 13, 2004For More Information