Sarah's Story in Castlebar

Sarah is a mum who lives in Westport and volunteers in her local Oxfam Castlebar shop. After caring for her sick mother, she wanted to get out and about and help her community more. She shares her story below.

"I suppose I’ve learned a bit about myself here that I never had expected. I’ve learned to do steaming, using the till and other things in the shop. I also think that volunteering has made me a better person. When I leave here I feel like I’ve truly done something good, and we always have the craic in here. I think the difficult and challenging thing is watching people who might come in and steal things, there’s a good few people who come in and do it – it’s money that is taken away from people who need it like the refugees. Isn’t it awful? My heart goes out to them, when I see those stories, I see them children… it’s the children that I cry for. I have my own grandchildren and I look at them the same ages as them, little things only two and three years of age And I see them go for miles and miles across these long walks. It’s hard. I like the work that Oxfam do in relation to helping refugees. It has made me want to give more to help refugees. I go home and turn on the news and I see these stories and it’s awful, so I like to help in any way I can.

After I lost my mother to dementia, and after caring for her for so long, I knew I had to get out and about again and keep busy. Volunteering between here and my local community centre, working with old people keeps me busy. I get company with people, I love talking to people – I’m a talkaholic. My mother was the same, oh she used to talk! She thought if a person didn't talk, then they were no good! I’m the same as her. And you know I suffer from anxiety. It’s gotten me out, and it’s got me not thinking about my anxiety. And I’ll think to myself, "Oh my God, I haven’t thought about certain things all day until I get back to the house. I had an awful bout of it.

I’ve done this class called mindfulness, just a year ago I started it. Panic attacks are awful things. Life is not all about projects or work. If you haven’t your health, you have nothing. You have nothing. You can have millions of euros but you have nothing if you haven’t your health. People never really used to talk about mental health here – well they do more so now than before. It's so important to talk about these things that are more common than you think, we need to support each other.

I would get awful panic attacks. I was asleep in the deepest sleep, and I would suddenly jump up in the bed with it and I’d be sitting up with my heart pounding. And it’s one of those things - if you don’t go through it you won’t understand it. But if you talk to someone who has gone through it, they’ll know what you are on about. I thought I’d get a heart attack with the panic attacks and I was only what -28 when they started. I remember one time, I was buying a communion outfit for my son, and what age was he eight – and I’ll never forget it. I got a panic attack right there in the shop. And the poor child did not know what happened to me. I had to run out of the shop – I caught the man in the shop and said “I have to go”. I thought the man would suspect something was up, but he didn’t know a thing. If you are getting the highest panic attack going one hundred miles an hour, nobody would know it. They might think, “Oh look at her, she’s fine”. You could walk down the streets of Castlebar and I could be dying with panic and you’d never know. It’s a thing you can hide SO well and it’s quite common but people don’t speak out about it enough.

I’ll never forget the day, the healing for me started. The healing for me started when I spoke to a private psychiatrist, I’ll never forget the day – she said “okay you have stress you have anxiety, you are suffering from it.” But the next sentence was – “It WILL go”. That was comforting. And this was another healing for me – I went to a group, and I met a neighbour of mine at it, and we turned into great friends.

You know volunteering here has helped me. I go home and I think to myself, "You know, I never thought about the anxiety all day – that’s because I was in here". Even working in the community centre helping and chatting with the old people and having fun with them there, any sort of volunteering. I realise I never thought about it and the day I’m not in there is the day I’m thinking about it."

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