Chloe's Sightline Story

Chloe’s
Sightline Story

I am approaching my 10-month volunteering anniversary with Sightline having heard about the opportunity through another charity near to where I live. I thought it would be perfect for me as I have glaucoma and sensitivity to light so can understand life living with sight loss and share my support to someone else in a similar boat to me.

I do go out and about quite a bit, but the telephony system is really convenient as it just connects to my mobile at the time of the call. Some days I am out and about on the bus or maybe doing my food shopping or recently I have enjoyed doing my calls in the park enjoying the nice weather we’ve been having.

My befriendee is such a delight to chat to. He has these lovely one-liners that he will come out with which catch me completely off guard and has me in fits of laughter. We always have something to say – usually kicking off with a chat about the great British weather.

“We discuss all sorts – Bob loves a good chat.”

He’s based in Wales so tells me the places he used to get out and about to; not so much nowadays the older he gets. He lives alone but has carers coming in, so I feel better knowing that he has some company when we end our calls.

For someone who lives alone he is such a cheery chap and has a great imagination. He enjoys having a film playing on the TV in the background. The other day Bob asked me to sing to him out of the blue – I thought why not so duly obliged!

Bob is a good sounding board for me too, I love our calls. I am so grateful I reached out to Sightline; I’d recommend anyone with a bit of spare time each week to volunteer for them. They’ll try to match you with someone with similar interests to you. They gave me ideas for what to discuss during my first call and there’s lots of online resources they share with volunteers too – I feel well informed to be able to get the most out of my time talking to Bob.

I’d definitely consider taking another befriending match in the future.