Do You Need Support &
How Home-Start Can Help


Who can Home-Start Merton help?
If you are a mum, dad or carer with a child under five, and are finding things tough at the moment, you can ask for free help.

Our volunteers help parents going through difficult times including:

  • Loneliness and isolation
  • Relationship difficulties
  • Coping with twins, triplets or several pre-school children
  • Ill health, disability or special needs
  • Lone parenting
  • First time parenthood or new babies
  • Postnatal illness
  • Children's behavioural problems

What do the volunteers do?
A Home-Start Merton volunteer will visit you regularly (usually once a week for a couple of hours) and offer:

  • Friendly support through difficult times for as long as you need help
  • Understanding that when bringing up children, problems are not unusual
  • Reassurance that you are not alone
  • A listening ear and a shoulder to cry on
  • An extra pair of hands to help you cope with everyday situations
  • Practical help with activities like playing or story time.

Who are the volunteers?
Home-Start Merton volunteers are people from different backgrounds and vary in age, but all have parenting experience. They:

  • Will visit you in your own home and accept you as you are
  • Are carefully selected for their friendliness, practical approach and understanding
  • Have undergone a check with the Criminal Records Bureau, and have all attended a course of preparation before being matched with families

Many of our volunteers have been helped by Home-Start Merton themselves.

Will anyone else find out?
Home-Start Merton is confidential. Personal information about you and your family is not disclosed to anyone outside the organisation without your consent, except where there is a concern about the safety or welfare of a child.

What if I change my mind?
You choose whether or not to accept Home-Start Merton support, and can change your mind at any time. A volunteer will only visit on your invitation

Why not read about some of the experiences of families Home-Start Merton has supported in their own stories in our 'What our families say' section.

 

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