Been able to stay out of hospital for about a year now and with respect to previous education and training I am trying to get back on the horse and start a voluntary job (about 2 1/2 hours a week).

In my last admission I'd had a bit of an issue with one of the ward nurses and I enlisted the help of an advocacy service to help in the complaints procedure. As this year has progressed it dawned on me that I could perhaps work within that role and contacted them about a voluntary opportunity.

Have since done the training and I'm now waiting for them to get back to me re times allocated on ward.

I've had mixed feedback from friends and family with respect to doing this; some believe I'd be terrific at it... and others think it would be the worst thing I could do. The latter has admittedly resulted in me having a bit of self doubt... Hmmm, that might be a bit unfair... I guess I'd be stupid not to have some worry with respect to going back onto the wards as a peer advocate (one of the recrocites (sorry for bad spelling) of the position is to have had some experience as a service user)... but yeah, for the past couple of weeks I've been in one long panic attack.

For point of reference my dx is aspergers with severe depression and anxiety... though I'm sure others have been in this position with many other issues.

Curious if anyone can relate, have proceeded regardless (in whatever mental health related role that might entail)... and perhaps have positive experiences as a result?