What began as informal care for dying AIDS patients grew into a form of life coaching for various clients within the LGBTQ+ community, including refugees from homophobic countries. Jos Holweg has closely followed and helped shape all buddy developments. A retrospective.
Aid for gay men
'You don't have to be a superman to become a buddy' says the poster in Jos Holweg's old office at De Regenboog Groep. The man in the poster is wearing a leather vest and has a stethoscope around his neck, an Erwin Olaf-like photograph in black and white. It is a poster from the Schorer Foundation, which in 1984 pioneered a buddy care project for gay men with AIDS. Back then, AIDS was still a disease you died of. Informal care was lacking, because many men had just fled their homophobic environment. They could not count on anything, except the superman from the poster: a buddy from Schorer.
For-and-by
"In those days, as a buddy, you were held in high regard," says Holweg, who started working as a social worker in 1992 at what is now called Schorer. "Buddies were the heroes of the community. You had to accompany someone who was dying. In the beginning there was some skepticism about that. Could you leave that to a volunteer?" It was quite possible, Holweg knows, and he also comes up with an explanation. "What made the buddy care project such a success was the by-and-for principle. Client and buddy both came from the LGBT community. So you didn't have to expect normative questions like: so you've had unsafe sex? That gave safety. There was no need to be ashamed of anything."
Great taboo
In 1996, combination therapy for AIDS put an end to the "deadly disease" label. "A magical year," said Holweg, who like many was struggling with what is known as multiple loss. "We had all seen friends around us die of AIDS. Now the switch had to be made. You kept living with HIV! That had quite a few consequences. Young people - 20s, 30s - had spent all their money because they thought they were going to die. They had sold their house and almost all of them had a hole in their resume. Go tell them in 1996 that that hole was because you had HIV. Especially back then, HIV was still a big taboo."
"What made the buddy care project such a success was the for-and-by principle. Client and buddy both came from the LGBT community. There was no need to be ashamed of anything."
Shaping your life
1996 was also a banner year for buddy care. "People signed up for bereavement counseling. Then we heard: I only want to accompany someone who is dying. We couldn't guarantee them that," Holweg says with irony in his voice. "But it was precisely during this period that we needed buddies to help turn the knob in your head. How do you pick up your life again, how do you shape your life? And how do you deal with that hole in your resume? In all these things, buddies could mean a lot."
Wider buddy care
From Schorer and later from De Regenboog Groep, Holweg broadened buddy care to other target groups. It changed from informal care for AIDS patients to a form of life coaching and empowerment for LGBT people with mental health problems. Holweg: "Anxiety disorders are more common among gay men, research shows. Lesbians are said to have more problems with alcohol. There is a lot of social isolation among the target group. It was a shame not to use the experience of social guidance that the buddies had built up for other target groups."
Buddyzorg | Fotograaf Hans Singels
Buddy Care