Betsy Gregory

October 31, 2013 (Betsy Gregory (Bill Sorrell))

My hero is Betsy Gregory. I have just recently interviewed her, and before I thought she was amazing, but now I'm blown away by her excellence. Betsy was born in Essex Junction, Vermont where she grew up. Now Betsy lives in Burlington, Vermont. She loves to volunteer. Now that she is 61, Betsy has recently turned down many offers to join organizations, as she needs to slow down.

(Betsy Gregory (Bill Sorrell))

Betsy works in real estate sales, at Lang McLaughry. It was through her work at the real estate office that Betsy found Meals on Wheels.They had done meals on wheels at her work, and she saw how important it was so she joined the organization. Betsy says that sometimes her job cuts into her volunteer work and her volunteer work cuts into her job.

(Betsy Gregory (Bill Sorrell))

Betsy has come across a ton of challenges during her many years of volunteer work. She told me "the challenges are putting aside your preconceptions and being objective about things, because we all approach things with our own biases." She has to put her personal feelings aside all the time.

One of Betsy's favorite memories was bringing a family together. The parents couldn't feed their kids. The dad ended up stealing food and getting caught. The kids went into foster care, but people realized that they couldn't punish this family for struggling with this time period. The family got some help and were reunited. Betsy's all time favorite story is when a girl came in and was having serious problems with school and her mom. She was doing drugs, and a ton of bad stuff too. She ended up going to a rehab facility. She is now an honor roll student, is going to college, and has a job. She has not been reunited with her mother, but she has an okay relationship with her. She has a great relationship with her siblings on the other hand. Betsy has had many great years of volunteering, and I am so glad I was able to interview her before she stops volunteering.

Betsy volunteers with a bunch of organizations and puts a lot of hours into them. She  spends one hour to twenty hours  volunteering a week. It surprised me when she said that she never volunteered growing up. She told me,"I started volunteering when my kids were in school so I was about 30." She told me that she saw an add in the paper looking for Guardian ad Litem, and it sounded interesting to her so she got into it. She enjoyed it so much she did more volunteer work with other organizations because it made her feel good. For volunteer work Betsy is a Guardian ad Litem (GAL), an educational surrogate, she is on the Domestic Violence Council, and she delivers Meals on Wheels. She usually spends the most time with Guardian ad Litem. For this she goes to court to meet with kids under 18, but sometimes she can meet with adults. She has to sit through and listen to the story about the person, and then give her best input on how the case should move forward. Within the Domestic Violence Council she is on the consultation committee, judicial dockets, and supervised visitation committee. The furthest she has traveled for these organizations is Virginia.