Matilda has been without a job for eight months after the hotel she was working in closed down because of COVID-19.
She has two children to support and her partner walked out on them four months after she was laid off work.
Dealing with the heartbreak of losing her partner of five years and the daily struggle of putting food on the table, she felt trapped and hopeless and her emotional pain became intolerable.
She lost all hope to continue living because life, according her, only became a burden.
But one last phone call turned her life around.
Matilda (not her real name) remembered the helpline 5626 advertised on social media for those who are stressed and are burdened.
That simple phone call was enough to nurse her back to life as a counsellor was there to offer her support, reminded her that there’s more to life than her current situation erasing all her suicidal thoughts.
Matilda is among the thousands of affected Fijians who have been assisted through Empower Pacific’s variety of programs aimed at enhancing the health and wellbeing of the vulnerable under the Australian Humanitarian Partnership’s COVID-19 Activation 2 Response.
These programs also facilitate opportunities for learning and personal growth.
Imagine if Matilda hadn’t asked for help, she would cause her children more suffering – leaving them behind in this cruel world she wanted to leave behind.
“We have had many people experiencing suicidal thoughts, especially during time of stress, faced with mental health challenges. This is an underlying problem and our counsellors have managed to offer positive support because they took the first step to seek our help,” said Harrison Kautoga, Empower Pacific’s AHP program manager.
Through the counselling helpline, Empower Pacific’s social worker also assisted Matilda whereby she was able to access her Fiji National Provident Fund assistance and they have been provided with livelihood support from other AHP partners though the referral pathway to – Save the Children Fund; Live and Learn; and also Friends and other agencies.
“Empower Pacific social workers support people to make decisions to enable them to overcome difficulties they are facing. Social workers can provide information for people to know what is available to help them and how to get it. Empower Pacific social workers can provide a link to targeted services which assist people in meeting their financial, family, social and personal needs,” Mr Kautoga said.
“Social workers help clients plan what they can and should do in certain situations, and work hard to ensure the safety of their clients is a priority.”
He said people seeking help should be rest assured as social workers were bound by confidentiality and work within professional boundaries to respect the wishes of their clients as they work alongside them to develop goals, which best works for them.
Social workers at Empower Pacific have worked with individuals, couples, families, children, community groups and also work closely with the Ministry of Health and Medical Services (MOHMS), Department of Social Welfare and other community agencies to provide support to those in need.
Daily surge of calls through counselling helpline 5626
Empower Pacific’s chief executive officer Patrick Morgam said the daily number of calls received increased during the COVID-19 pandemic, and they sometimes received around three to 40 calls daily.
“The issues that most frequent callers face and call in needing counselling support is anxiety, stress, financial hardships due to COVID-19 and basically being worried about their survival in everyday life as they have children and disabled family members that need their holistic wellbeing to be taken care of as well,” Mr Morgam said.
He also said parents sought help out of concern for their children’s safety. Victims of abuse opted to access their services as they were referred to a counsellor in a timely manner and their issues dealt with accordingly.
People were also reaching out for parents in need of essentials for infants.
“There have also been calls from individuals in home isolation in need of essentials such as food assistance, baby milk formula, milk powder and diapers for their children. People are struggling one way or another during these troublesome times and it is through our helpline that individuals are able to reach out and have the holistic services rendered to them.”
Counselling services at quarantine facilities
Following the first outbreak of COVID-19, 30-plus trained and qualified counsellors and social workers from Empower Pacific conducted counselling services on a daily basis to hundreds of Fijians in various quarantine facilities.
Mr Morgam said a counsellor could deal with at least six cases in a day and the numbers varied depending on client’s counselling needs.
“A counsellor will attend about five to six cases in a day, so we have to see the roster we have and how many cases we give them,” he said.
“It is, of course, an increase in workload for us, but we are prioritising staff care as well, and we make sure we follow strict COVID-19 guidelines, and we also look at fatigue, so they are supported with daily debrief from head office, and we also do wellbeing check with them.
“The clinical support for them is 24 hours and this is the small ways in how we maintain the workforce we provide services and we look after our own mental wellbeing.”
Mr Morgam said their workload kept increasing as the country continued to grapple with the effects of COVID-19 second phase.
He added the work of their donors continued to boost services offered by Empower Pacific.
Exhausted frontliners seek help
COVID-19 frontliners have accessed the Empower Pacific counselling services because they were exhausted and burnt out, and needed someone to talk to.
“The frontliners call because they are exhausted, they are burnt out and they need somebody to vent out to and connect,” Mr Morgam said.
“They also present a little bit of anxiety and despite the fact that they know about science, they are human beings who will get stressed out from the work they do.
“So they have a lot of questions to ask, like what if I get positive? What will happen to me and my family, some of them have young children, some have just started off their families, so these are issues that come into their mind.
“There is a little bit of depression about how this pandemic has turned out and Fiji is a small island nation and these numbers are high for us. We sincerely encourage people to get their vaccinations and continue practicing COVID-19 safe protocols.
“We support the MOHMS in its endeavours to eradicate and solve this problem and we are here to support frontliners and those in quarantine facilities.”
Mr Morgam said their counselling services were free of charge and counsellors would always provide telephone counselling to those who needed them during this COVID-19 crisis.
Fact file:
Through the Australian Humanitarian Partnership (AHP), Empower Pacific is supported by ChildFund Australia (CFA) under the Plan International Australia (PIA) Consortium.
