Every Thursday, Antoinette awaits a visit from Véronique or Brigitte. Around a milk tea as she drank it as a child in India, the retiree, widowed for eighteen months, motto for everything and nothing. Being able to chat with someone, no longer feeling alone at home, changed the life of this 71-year-old lady who rarely left her home. “Now I come to play games at the association, I even went for three days with them, it was wonderful,” boasts Antoinette.
They are the volunteers of the Little brothers of the poor. For twenty years, the structure based in Champigny-sur-Marne (Val-de-Marne) has taken care of isolated and precarious elderly people in the city, but also in Nogent-sur-Marne and Chennevières-sur-Marne. The association will celebrate this anniversary this Wednesday, April 24 by organizing open days, from 3 p.m. to 8 p.m., in its premises at 75, rue Louis-Talamoni.
Afternoons of games or singing offered… “It saves me from sitting at home and being bored”
Last Wednesday, card games and Triomino hit the tables. Antoinette, who has developed a taste for outings, also comes to play games in a calm environment, at the association’s premises, once a week. “I also like the afternoons where we color mandalas, and singing, it keeps me from sitting at home being bored. » “Me, otherwise I would be in front of the TV, all alone,” also insists Jean-Pierre, a 65-year-old retiree from Nogent.
Like Antoinette and him, 49 elderly people, whose applications are accepted according to criteria of isolation and resources, benefit from the support of 40 volunteers. Some receive a weekly home visit from two volunteers who take turns, others enjoy short stays in one of the nine vacation spots that belong to the association, all over France.
“Everyone, whether they are 58 or 105, finds social connections here, it is essential,” defends Véronique Dumortier with enthusiasm. A former town hall employee, she joined the association as a volunteer when retirement time came, less than two years ago.
Since then she gives of her time, never forgets to send Antoinette a postcard when she leaves for a few days and has even met the daughter of the person she is visiting. “We also go to some retirement homes. Sometimes, even there, seniors are isolated due to lack of visits,” regrets Véronique.
The volunteer welcomes the approximately 106 events organized in 2023 by the Little Brothers of the Poor of Champigny. A figure which includes outings to the restaurant or the farm, meals, dancing afternoons and which makes the structure one of the most dynamic in the network.
Training for volunteers
The association is always recruiting new volunteers, to whom it even offers training. “I followed one on the end of life and one on listening. I am learning to respect times of silence, to let the person quietly confide what is worrying them,” explains the volunteer.
And if a problem arises, of an administrative or financial nature or on the health side, the association knows how to relay with the town hall or the structure which can help. The three cities provide subsidies to the structure, which also relies on donations and legacies managed at the national level.
