Life Story
- Location: Age UK Oldham
- Price: Free
Age UK Oldham
10 Church Lane
Oldham
OL1 3AN
United Kingdom
Email: LifeStory@ageukoldham.org.uk
Telephone: 0161 622 9257
Tell us your life story and get a personalised book that can be shared with family, friends and carers.
Life Story
Everyone’s story is unique and important. Our Life Story project works with older people to produce a personalised Life Story Book that can be shared with family, friends, and care staff.
Our brilliant volunteer visitors and typists both play a central role in documenting the lives of older people. Volunteers visit or telephone clients on a weekly basis, and encourage them through friendly chats to reminisce and recall special events, people and places that have played an important part in their life. People are encouraged to share memories and include as much or as little as they want in their own story book.
The information is then passed to one of our volunteer typists who compile the stories into printed books, including special photos and images to bring the book to life. Once complete, we can organise a special Life Story presentation involving the volunteers, along with family and friends.
There is no charge for the service, two copies of the Life Story book are provided free when completed, one copy for care staff and one copy for the person. Additional copies can be requested by friends or family for a donation of £15 per copy to cover printing and binding costs.
We also try to make our life stories accessible for all, including large print and record audio books for the visually impaired.
If you would like to write your own Life Story, write one for family or friends or are part of a community group who would like to do this as an activity, we can provide you with a template to help get you started and some hints & tips on how to put it together and can give you support if needed.
The benefits of Life Story
Life Story is an enjoyable and worthwhile activity for everyone involved and can be cherished by the person and their family for generations. Our Life Story project has the following benefits:
• Helps to make people feel valued and respected, with the enjoyment of regular company, conversation and chats with people who are interested in finding out about their life.
• Helps families to reminisce with their loved ones with the book, sharing memories important to them.
• Can be used by care staff to assist them in getting to know the person they are caring for; knowing a person’s likes, dislikes, needs and aspirations can enable more effective care planning and delivery
What does a Life Story book look like?
There are many different ways of doing Life Story work, which do not always involve producing a printed book. Some people prefer memory boxes or picture collages or collections of music as an alternative. Each book is as individual as the person.
Here's an example of a Life Story book that our volunteers have put together, working alongside Audrey and her daughter who have kindly given permission to share Audrey's story to help raise awareness about Life Story work.
Download Audrey's Life Story book Here
Accessing this service
If you or someone you know would benefit from our service, complete the form below and return it to 'Life Story, 10 Church Lane, Oldham, OL1 3AN.'
Alternatively you can give us a call.
New Life Story Newsletter
Here is our full back catalogue of life story newsletters, produced monthly, started by our volunteers to keep in touch with people during the pandemic - featuring lots of things to keep you occupied and reminisce about!