At Simon on the Streets, on our bad days, people die. This is the sad reality of the harsh lives people who live on the streets lead. The life expectancy of people who sleep rough is estimated as 43 for women and 47 for men.We believe it is so important to memorialise the lives of these people who could so easily be forgotten. You may have seen ourblue plaque campaign and internally we have a memorial site for the service users we have lost. As we bring to you details of the working days of our support workers, here support worker B shares her experience of losing a much loved client of ours just last week. All names have been changed to protect the identity of those involved.
‘This week has been my worst at Simon on the Streets, one of my clients sadly passed away. T had been very sick for a while and had deteriorated rapidly. He was not himself towards the end and could not really understand what was happening, he was very confused, angry and upset. I struggled to manage my own emotions, it has been a sad week for the entire team because this gentleman was a true character.
T had a girlfriend called S. They were together for eight years, they split up a few months ago and she moved out of the city. Since S has moved away, she has become very stable. S has stopped drinking and taking legal highs. S now works in a shop and she is happy. My colleague and I knew we needed to tell S that T had passed away and we were dreading it. Our thoughts were racing and our anxieties were high. How will she take it? Will we ruin her recovery? Are we doing the right thing by telling her now? We knew we had to and it was looming over us all day. We met up with her and we chatted and laughed and eventually she asked how T was doing and I told her what had happened. S turned round and said, “Well it is the safest place for him. He had given up a long time ago.” S said she was ok about it because she was over that time in her life. When we were leaving, S gave us a hug and said, “I hope you are ok but at least he is safe.” We left feeling so much lighter, after seeing her it made a bad situation a lot better. Seeing S doing so well, how she took the news and seeing her happy, she is truly an inspiration. And validated why we do our job.’
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