Cape Town – Police and community safety organisations play a vital role in developing support programmes for victims of gender-based violence (GBV).
This prompted Schmidhauser Electrical and Plumbing in
Woodstock to donate comfort
packs to be shared with
survivors.
Heather Kirkwood, a
consulting counselling psychologist at Schmidhauser, with
the company’s chief executive, Daniel Schmidhauser, have put together Comfort Kits.
These kits contain items
including a toothbrush,
toothpaste, a facecloth, body
cream, shampoo, underwear, sanitary pads, an information brochure on rape and counselling, and a notebook, pencil, pen and coloured pencils.
Kirkwood has been a Victim Empowerment Volunteer for
18 years.
The packs will go to the police’s Victim-Friendly Room which provides an opportunity for victims of intimate violence such as
GBV, child abuse, sexual offences and domestic violence to make
their statements in private and
in a non-threatening environment.
A team of dedicated volunteers work on a 24-hour standby roster
and offer their personal time, resources and support to victims of crime.
Kirkwood said that during a traumatic event, one of the first sections of the brain to “shut down” is the memory.
Slowly these “files” will again start to open, and additional details of the event will appear.
These details will be crucial to
the case and therefore the survivor will have the means to document them.
It is also hoped that by drawing, the survivor can start the process of healing, Kirkwood said.
Schmidhauser appealed to residents to assist wherever there was a need.
“This business has been
run successfully by our family
for three generations, on the foundation of family, care, support, kindness, community and unconditional giving,” he said.
Schmidhauser is an essential service and is operating 24/7 during the Covid-19 lockdown.
Call +27 214244588, Hotline 0800 029 999, email: [email protected]