Hans Wagevoort - employee Bookbindery
Work location De Derde Schinkel houses several work and activation companies and pathways. In addition to the Bookbindery, these include handyman company Homeservice, the Repro, sewing studio ZigZag and catering company Kluts!
As sweet-tempered and eloquent as Hans Wagevoort may sound, he was so hard on himself when things went wrong, in 2016. He says, "I always thought: I have an academic education, I am an adult; I should be able to do it myself and if it doesn't work out, then it's up to me. Then I shouldn't be so weak. I had moved to Antwerp as a freelancer. When the work stopped, I didn't do much with it. I no longer had an income and I kept thinking: it will come tomorrow. But of course you don't react that indifferently when you're doing well. I came back to Amsterdam - I still had my apartment - with all kinds of debts. Gas and electricity had been cut off and I was threatened with eviction.
At the bottom
It was not in my system to ask for help and I have always been a perfectionist. There did come a time when I was about to go to debt counseling with all those letters. NOW, for about five seconds, I got something inside me that thought, I'm sitting here, but this can't be happening at all. This is not really happening. I could hardly believe it: I was sitting in a cold house that I was almost evicted from and I was really down to earth. And still it felt like a kind of nightmare, like something that wasn't true.
Calling creditors myself
I crawled through the eye of the needle. By asking for help from my mother and a close friend, the worst was averted and I did not become homeless. I rang the bell at debt relief, went to a psychologist myself and to the walk-in Pluspunt (from organizations Dock and Centram) where you then go with your administration to do it yourself there. If you have questions, they can help you. I had to call my creditors there myself - and I thought that was very good of Pluspunt. They said: here is a phone and here are your creditor letters, go call them [laughs]. So then you do it yourself, but not by yourself. That's different from having to make calls at home by yourself.
Hans Wagevoort at the Bookbindery
.Up and running? And now move on!
At one point everything was running again. I received benefits and heard that the last creditor had also agreed and that the Credit Bank took over my debt with them. I was seeing a psychologist to address what had gotten me into trouble. All the arranging was over, but I didn't feel better. I am someone who always gets up early and then a day takes a long time. Through my customer manager at Social Services, I ended up at De Regenboog Groep's Bookbindery. It started with two afternoons, but soon I was working here five days a week. I enjoyed it so much. I found my creativity here. I am very different in life now than I was four years ago. I reach out to myself more often. The hard and merciless towards myself is still there, but different.
Time to move on
Everything used to be white or black; now there are more colors to choose from. The work I did, the colleagues here... It has brought me a lot. Through this work and therapy I have grown tremendously. I can now really stand on my own two feet again and earn my own money. This week I will start at the Van Gogh Museum as a visitor service employee. I was inducted last week and it was a lot of fun.
I'm leaving here with pain in my heart, but the goal was to get back into paid work. And I've managed to do that now. It's time."