From Seasoned Volunteer to Valued Team Member, Becky Schmidgall Joins Staff Team

Becky Schmigall will continue on staff as the Kinship Family Group Facilitator

As our work continues to grow, so does our team. We are excited to officially welcome long-time volunteer, Becky Schmidgall, to the staff team!  

Becky first began volunteering as a co-facilitator of our monthly kinship dinners back in February of 2022. As a licensed therapist, Becky adds insightful context to our discussion and helps our kinship caregivers unravel and understand their complex emotions when reflecting on their current life circumstances.

Just recently, a couple shared the mixed emotions they were feeling as they moved towards finalizing the adoption of their kinship youth. Over the past two years they have courageously advocated for this child’s needs and provided outstanding care for them. And while the best outcome in this situation is adoption, that decision isn’t made lightly or without the recognition of other opportunities that are lost. 

In this case, Becky was able to articulate they were experiencing ambiguous loss, a common experience for kinship caregivers. While it is perfectly reasonable to grieve the loss of a family member who has physically died, the feelings of loss that come with a broken relationship are harder to articulate. Ambiguous loss is an experience of loss or grief that is tied to something more abstract. For many of our kinship caregivers, their decisions to step into this role often comes at the expense of a relationship with the biological parent. Putting a name to these thoughts and feelings gives our kinship caregivers the tools they need to further understand their experience and in turn, flourish.

Behind the scenes at a SCC staff meeting

In addition to being able to speak to caregivers' needs throughout their time with us, Becky has also helped to prepare topical content to share with our caregivers. Since many of our caregivers step into this role with limited training, we take time each month to touch on various topics that could be helpful. In this new role, she will continue to provide on demand support during our kinship dinners, work to curate training materials for our caregivers, and develop additional curriculum for our kinship youth.

One of our two Arizona Gives Day goals this year was to be able to invest in the longevity and depth of our staff team. Transitioning our volunteer facilitator into a part-time paid staff role will pay off in dividends to the kind of support we can continue to offer our families. The relationship that Becky has built up with our kinship families over the last two years will continue to grow in this official capacity and we are excited for the future of our Kinship Family Enrichment Program.