The following was sent to me by a follower of the Made in Grimsby & Cleethorpes Facebook page, in response to the post I shared on Great Grimsby Day. He asked to remain anonymous, but I thought that this was important to share.
Please Note: This post has not been edited, as I didn’t want it to lose the author’s authenticity.
What makes Grimsby great more than anything else is what goes on behind the scenes and I have had the pleasure of working alongside some of the greatest people this town has to offer for many years.
Life isn’t always easy and when times get hard and the government fail to provide a sufficient safety net, it’s the Great people of Grimsby who step in.
In the past I’ve had the pleasure of working with and learning from :
The staff and volunteers of The Roundabout. My introduction to substance misuse work and the difference that treating people as human can make to those who feel defined by their addiction. How a place can become a home for those who have lost theirs.
The team at Open Door – shows kindness and compassion for people with complex social circumstances, some of whom felt like they wouldn’t belong at any other GP surgery but found a sense of community and belonging there.
SYIL was my easiest job ever and considering that was working with people with complex mental health issues and brain injuries that’s probably saying something but the staff there ensured that no one in the service was lonely or struggling.
Special mention goes to services I’ve joint-worked with but never been employed by. The homeless team at the council, the rock foundation, Harbour Place, the adult autism service, Foresight, the We Are One Foundation and The Comeback.
My two most recent jobs show the best Grimsby has to offer.
Floating Support work – 5 years of watching people fight for people who had lost hope. Literally saving lives when we’d stay on the phone after hours talking to a suicidal client who had no faith in the crisis team. Finding a way to get food on the table for people who hadn’t eaten in days. The constant battle against DWP to ensure that people were getting the support they were entitled to and decisions overturned when DWP got it wrong.
I met some of my best friends in that job and without the support of that team, I wouldn’t be (slightly) sane now after the emotional burden of that job.
And then the contract changed and I took voluntary redundancy. I applied for a job not expecting to even get an interview. I didn’t end up applying for any other jobs because the universe put me where I needed to be when I needed to be there.
A year and a bit on, I’m once again seeing the very best that Grimsby has to offer.
The pressure of trying to keep people alive when their brain is leading them to behaviour that rolls a dice where a 6 will kill them, sometimes multiple times a day, is immense.
But everyone in the building handles it with a smile, a laugh and a non-judgemental shoulder to cry on. Sometimes they are tears of laughter, sometimes it’s a bit much and we need to let off steam.
Through their actions, people live that may not have otherwise. Lives are saved through medical intervention, relapse prevention, education and sometimes just treating someone as a person.
Without the hard work of my friends, past present and future, Grimsby would cease to be Great.
