Carers, Family & Friends

This weekly session, held every Thursday, is for carers from our community to come together in a friendly and social environment.   

Our complementary therapist will be available to offer a free massage, aromatherapy or reflexology session, and our welfare officer will be on hand to offer advice and support. We have occasional guest speakers and organised seasonal craft workshops. 

Refreshments and lunch are available.

Our counselling service provides a confidential space with a trained professional to help you make sense of, and adjust to life, at a challenging time. Counselling can help you adjust to change, anticipating grief and improve your relationships. Counselling is also offered post bereavement.

We offer 12 sessions, each 50 minutes long, focusing on the impact of the life-limiting illness affecting the person close to you, and the effect it has had on you. Our counselling service can be provided in your own home, at the hospice, face to face, via phone or online.

Our Welfare Advice service can support you with any practical issues, such as applying for grants and benefits, financial planning, debt advice, housing and transport issues (for instance getting a blue disability parking badge). We can help with any pension changes and life insurance or critical illness cover and ‘death in service’ where this is required.

We can also sign-post to other services for support with will-writing and funeral planning.

Our social worker is a key member of the hospice team and can work with other agencies to help you explore options and make choices about the care and support your loved one receives, according to their needs and what matters most to them.

Our social worker can support you with the practical, social and emotional needs and is available to family and friends, as well as patients. This might include facilitating challenging conversations, how to communicate with your children or young relatives at a difficult time, plans for guardianship and tackling the effects of isolation.

When someone close to you is living with a life-limiting illness, people often reflect on their life experiences and important questions can arise. You might have questions and wonder what will happen in the future.

Our spiritual care team can help you make sense of these questions, or discuss confidentially anything you feel you need to. If you are of faith, we can ask our local community faith leaders to support you. We have a quiet, reflective space called The Sanctuary at the Hospice which you are very welcome to visit.

When someone close to you is diagnosed with a life-limiting illness, you might find that as a carer, you become isolated and find it difficult to do everyday tasks such as grocery shopping due to the need to provide care.

Our trained volunteer companions can offer a social outlet to carers, at home, via telephone or online. They can also offer practical support such as sitting with the patient to allow the carer to have a break or by collecting urgent prescriptions and groceries as required.

Our volunteer befrienders run two walking groups at the National Trust’s Sheffield Park and Garden, which kindly grants access to the park and gardens for free. Each walking group takes place once a month.  

Ambles: Connect with other carers. 

Footsteps: Connect with others who have been bereaved. 

This service can include aromatherapy, massage and reflexology sessions. The therapist will discuss with you what treatment may be of benefit to you and adapt it to suit your needs. Alongside any medical treatment that you may be having, complementary therapies may help to ease a variety of symptoms.