Gomi’s path to LEAH is not a straight line. It winds through care homes and university lecture halls, through a pandemic and a marriage, through diagnoses and a graduation ceremony where she sat quietly wondering what on earth came next. And yet, at every turning point, something kept bringing her back to the same thing: a deep, abiding love of language, and an even deeper love of people.
The right moment
Gomi first reached out to LEAH in December 2019. At the time, she was working in elderly care – a career she had fallen into after a serious assault cut short her nursing degree at Birmingham University a decade earlier. Alongside her care work, she had recently completed a 120-hour TEFL qualification, sparked by a promotional email and a lifelong love of English, French and German.
“I had always loved English Language, French and German back at school. I knew that I was a people person, and wanted to spend time doing something that helped.”
She completed the majority of her LEAH training in March 2020 – right as the world shut down. With two neurological conditions and vulnerable clients to protect, her GP advised her to step back from care work entirely. Rather than seeing this as a setback, Gomi resigned from her job and threw herself into volunteering.
“I still remember being so excited. I felt maybe this was a path to a complete career change — from elderly care to ESOL teaching!”
Those first sessions
Gomi’s early volunteering was entirely online – a new and sometimes daunting experience. She admits to having had severe imposter syndrome from the start, worrying that LEAH would realise she didn’t know what she was doing. “Still do!” she adds, laughing.
But she absolutely loved her one-to-one clients. One memory stands out above all others: a year of sessions with a learner whose only English, at the very start, was “Hello, I’m good, and you?” Communication was so limited that Gomi would type instructions into a Word document for her learner to photograph and translate. Slowly, patiently, something shifted.
“After a year of sessions she was able to give more information about herself — including ‘I’m a stay-at-home mom!”
It is exactly this kind of moment – small, human, hard-won – that keeps her coming back.
The longer road
Fuelled by her experience at LEAH, Gomi enrolled at university for the second time – at 33 years old – to study English Language and Linguistics. The years that followed brought enormous challenges: a separation, a police investigation, a DWP assessment, and a string of further diagnoses. At her graduation ceremony in 2023, she sat surrounded by her classmates’ excitement and felt, she says honestly, utterly lost.
“I just had no idea what I would do with my life!”
But she kept going. Using her PIP back payment, she enrolled on a CELTA course online, completing it in September 2024. And then, as she had always known she would, she came straight back to LEAH.
Back where she belongs
Today, Gomi co-hosts our Entry 3 class on Tuesday mornings and the Conversation Club on Wednesday mornings. She is also working on an illustrated glossary of English language idioms for ESOL learners – a project born from a class discussion about wellbeing, during which she used the phrase “burnt-out” and realised her learners had never encountered it.
“It still amazes me that I spent four years in higher education to come back to the same volunteering position that started off the whole journey for me. But I genuinely couldn’t be happier!”
She is refreshingly honest about the wobbles along the way – the imposter syndrome, the occasional forgotten screen share, the challenges that come with ADHD and fatigue. But she is equally clear about what she has discovered.
“One thing I have learned especially is that even though I’m not always a consummate professional, my positive and friendly attitude makes up for that.”
And on what volunteering with LEAH has given her:
“My clients bring me so much joy, and have reinforced my belief that there are so many good people out there, and that culture, language and life experience will never divide us. The world needs more kindness.”
“Volunteering for LEAH has given me a purpose in life again.”
Gomi, LEAH volunteer