Being a parent wherever you live and in any circumstances is not easy. Many parents feel overwhelmed by the pressures of family life with children, especially if they are too young. Very often, additional difficulties such as a divorce, a disability or an illness, come to burden the situation further. It is even more difficult if your family or friends when you need them, can not provide you with the necessary support and vital space to breathe. Some parents lose confidence in their strength to cope with their daily routine or their particular problems, and most remember days when they would like someone to be there for them. Everyone needs a helping hand sometimes.

 

Home-Start is a service that offers you this helping hand.

 

What exactly does Home-Start offer to a family?

 

A trained volunteer, usually with parental experience, who, under the guidance of a professional, is linked to a family that she/he regularly visits (once a week for 2-3 hours) and shares his/her parental experience with them with the purpose of preventing the difficulties developing into crisis and the crisis leading to the dissolution of the family. Also, the objective is to strengthen the family members’ self-confidence and self-reliance and integrate smoothly into their social and work environment. Furthermore, the aim is improving the parents’ skills to be able to respond to their parental role. 

 

The content of the support provided by the volunteer adjusts each time to the needs of the family on the basis of which a plan of support is developed that the professional (volunteer mentor), the volunteer and the parent agree to follow.

 

Read different support stories to help you understand how Home-Start can help you.