Lucy with senior resident Paul. PHOTO/SUPPLIED
ALEYNA MARTINEZ
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Lucy Adlam began her charity, Joy for Generations, when she recognised that many seniors in the community were suffering from loneliness.
“When I first started volunteering, I would take my newborn into a rest home and just chat to them and you wouldn’t see many other visitors,” she said.
“There were a few volunteers but in the rest home there might be about 50 people just sitting there sometimes really lonely.”
“It is a pandemic in itself – loneliness – not everyone realises it.”
Three years later, Adlam is readying herself to turn Joy for Generations into a charitable trust.
“Now, I have turned it into an organisation that connects seniors with younger generations, so I’ve just got a board of trustees together.
“It’s all looking like we’ll have that in the next couple of months.
“For ages, it’s just been me and it’s been quite exhausting and challenging because I’ve never done anything like this.”
Adlam estimates she had volunteered about 2000 hours before being paid for her first one.
She said isolation during covid-19 was good for some people in the community to experience because “some seniors feel like this all the time, they don’t have family who visit, they wait for phone calls and people don’t call them – it’s so heartbreaking”.
In the next school holidays, Joy for Generations is running a drive where they will give out 50 art packs to kids to make art that will be delivered to seniors in their homes.
“Everyone can give time to others”, Adlam said.
“I hope it would be on everyone’s radar that, somewhere in their week, month, or life, they take the time to volunteer for others, it’s just a way of life for me now.”
- National Volunteer Week, celebrating the work of volunteers and charities, began on Sunday and continues through to Saturday. Every day this week, the Times-Age will highlight a person [or organisation] who gives their time for the betterment of the Wairarapa community.
