Today we talk to ROMY BRIANT, chairman of the Independent Domestic Violence Advice Service
 

  • WHAT I’M CALLED: Romy
  • MY AGE IN YEARS? Still lower than my IQ (just)
  • WHAT I DO? My work has always been with families and children or with people who are more disadvantaged or marginalised in our community – as a social worker and then with charities and community projects. At the moment much of my work is bringing together agencies across Oxfordshire to try to reduce the impact of domestic abuse – we all work together under the name “reducing the risk’ – and I contribute to the county’s work to safeguard children. I remain involved directly with some charities and am trying to find ways we can help continue the work of small local charities as funding changes and decreases.
  • WHERE I LIVE? In Oxford, in our family home of 30 years, which we have shared with lots of people and is full of memories – and where we still haven’t sorted out the leak in the roof.
  • WHO I LOVE? My husband and our expanding family – and, in different ways, my close friends and colleagues.
  • HAPPIEST YEAR? They’ve all had wonderful moments. My most liberating year was in my late 20s when I realised I was not going to grow up into a super-efficient and immaculately dressed woman – and relaxed into being me. It was at the start of the decade when all our children were born, we were creating our home from a derelict house, had lots of people round us, and I became involved in various community projects. It was a good time.
  • DARKEST MOMENT? In 2000, when my father was very ill, my mother died, and I left a project which I had been very close to with sadness.
  • PROUDEST BOAST? My amazing family. Aspects of my work, both as a social worker in London and then in Oxfordshire, including a wonderful time with Relate and what I do now. I was very moved when I discovered that colleagues in Oxfordshire had nominated me for an MBE – less a boast than a very special moment. I can also touch my nose with my tongue – which was my most important boast when very young.
  • BIGGEST REGRET? Life always involves choices and there is so much I would like to have done, but I don’t have big regrets. I worry at different times that I may have let others down – and I would have liked to have played more music and sung and danced more.
  • WORST WEAKNESS? Fear of embarrassment; a tendency to be over-serious; chewing biros and losing my car keys; fear of falling – but that’s not a weakness, it’s a nightmare
  • LESSON LEARNED? We all have a part to play; I can be wrong; love and value one another; there is no single simple answer
  • DULLEST JOB? Ironing
  • GREATEST SHAME? I am one of a generation who have had it all – and not laid down good foundations for the future
  • LIFE-LONG HERO? Desmond Tutu
  • OLDEST FRIEND? My husband
  • WIDEST SMILE? Smiles are infectious, so laughing together with family and friends and with our new granddaughter. Or those smiles of recognition and shared joys – or sometimes just walking and feeling filled with the joys of life – and seeing the sea.
  • FAVOURITE DREAM? To go on being this lucky