Welcome to our WiCare For You Blog (We Care For You)!
Our WiCare Blog is dedicated to providing aid & comfort to widows in Singapore.
Mission Statement
"Bringing hope to the broken-hearted
widows and the fatherless"
Wicare is a support group for widows and the fatherless,
registered in October 1998 with the Registrar of Societies
as a Voluntary Welfare Organization.
Wicare Support Group is run by a non-salaried management committee comprising widows and volunteers who are also widows.
WICARE assists widows and the fatherless in their
time of need and provides grief support. This is accomplished through a
series of self-help programmes with the following goals:
To support widows emotionally and to encourage bonding with others in the support group;
To assist widows to become self-reliant and financially independent; and
To encourage widows to reach out and support other new widows in turn.
The ultimate goal of WICARE is to help widows to move on, care for their children and re-integrate into society.
WICARE reaches out to widows and the fatherless to identify with their grief and loss.
WICARE provides encouragement and friendship to widows and their children through its family activities.
WICARE provides help to widows with talks on single-parenting, financial management, self-care and other practical topics.
WICARE provides
opportunities for widows to accept their loss, to cope with the present
and provide hope for the future through programmes such as home
visits, support group meetings and the Grief Recovery Weekend.
WICARE provides
information on professional help for widows and their children through
its networking with counselling and family centres.
Since March 1996, WICARE has been
organising bi-monthly talks on widowhood, coping with grief,
single-parenting, financial management, self-care, sexuality and
remarriage, among other relevant topics. These interspersed with
social events for mothers and children, such as picnics, BBQs, annual
bowling and small-group gatherings in homes. As of January 2006, WICARE holds monthly gatherings at its own premises at Bishan Junction 8.
Since 1998 till June 2008, WICARE
has conducted nine Weekends (the previous name was Grief Recovery
Weekend). These were organised by its committee members, its advisor,
Mr Anthony Yeo, and Ms Christine Lim of the Counselling and Care
Centre. Each Weekend ran from Friday evening to Sunday and covered
grief work, accepting the loss, coming to an emotional closure,
rediscovering self-identity, setting new life goals and making future
plans. WICARE plans three such weekends each year, subject to
response, and takes in between four and eight participants at each
weekend for effective group support and sharing of experiences. The
“New Chapter” was revised to a two full-day non-residential weekend in
June 2007.
When WICARE started in 1999, it had
32 Full Members and seven Associate Members. As at June 2008, there
are 136 Full Members and 58 Associate Members, with a mailing list of
515. Membership data is updated annually.
Beginning in August 2004, WICARE extended its outreach to
the Chinese-speaking community, as it expects an increase in the
number of widows who need emotional and moral support. It started
with less than ten ladies. As of October 2007, the list of
Chinese-speaking widow contacts has grown to 87.
Joyce Lye was angry with God. Why did her
husband die so unexpectedly? He was only 33 when their car
skidded and crashed in Holland Road. Joyce was in a coma and
she revived, filled with bitterness and self-pity. She was
rude to her friends and even unkind to her two daughters, at
that time only 3 years and 14 months old.
"When I got out of the coma I was shocked and frightened and
wondered what the future would be like for my girls and for
me," she recalls. After 10 months of anguish, a Bible
passage struck her: "The widow who is really in need and
left all alone puts her hope in God and continues night and
day to pray and ask God for help." It was then 1985 and she
became a Christian with renewed hope.
"Then at one prayer meeting, the words ‘A widow among
widows’ flashed before me," Joyce recalls. "But I wanted to
remarry and my children were so young." So, she forgot the
message, closed down her floral business and become an
insurance agent. Today, Joyce is an Executive Prudential
Adviser and she has been with the company for 18 years.
"Somehow, God would not be ignored. It just happened that no
matter what I did, widows kept crossing my path." And,
naturally, Joyce consoled and counseled them. Her career at
Prudential also strengthened her. "I found tremendous
inspiration and motivation from Prudential's training
programmes that reinforced the importance of having a vision
and hope," she adds.
Joan Swee, a corporate trainer and Honorary Secretary of
Wicare, reveals:"“I met Joyce after I was widowed for over a
year. She was an oasis for me. She was struggling… juggling
between bringing the bacon home and making time for her
teenage daughters. Yet, she gave hours and hours of
listening to bereaved widows who needed someone to
understand their pain."
Joyce’s informal gatherings with other widows led to the
forming of Wicare Support Group in 1994 to support widows
and the fatherless. One of its core programs is the two-day
residential Grief Recovery Workshop.
"There are many emotional issues that need to be worked
through and released," explains Joyce. "Often, there are
specially difficult cases like wives whose husbands had
committed suicide. Or wives who get a big shock – finding
out their husband had cheated them all these years – when a
'second family’ turns up at the funeral."
Wicare was fortunate to have the support of Mr Anthony Yeo,
Consultant Therapist of Counselling & Care Centre, who
provided the help of family therapists. Today, Joyce and two
of Wicare’s committee members are trained to do the Grief
Recovery Therapy themselves.
"The wounds of widowhood are not easily seen with the eyes
because the process of grief is expressed within the heart
and soul. Others who are not widows can misread us. It takes
a widow to fully understand a widow," explains Joyce.
Wicare has benefited from the help of many people including Dr Teo
Ho Pin, Mayor of Northwest CDC, who found premises for them at Block 3
in Gim Moh Housing Board Estate. Now, Wicare has relocated at its new
1,000-square feet premises at Bishan Office Tower, thanks to the
National Council for Social Services. The office is managed by two full
time staff, who are also widows.