“Steps for Life: How You Can Get Involved — A Conversation with Aubrey Bird”

In this episode, we speak with Aubrey Bird from Threads of Life about Steps for Life, their signature fundraiser and one of Canada’s most important awareness events for families affected by workplace tragedies.  Aubrey shares: 

What makes Steps for Life such a meaningful national event
How the walk raises awareness, support, and healing across the country
Simple ways YOU can get involved—walk, volunteer, donate, or form a team

Steps for Life isn’t just a fundraiser—it’s a movement. A chance for communities to come together, honour families, and help prevent future workplace tragedies.

Transcript

Perley Brewer   0:20
Welcome to today's podcast. My name is Pearly Brewer and I will be your host. Today's podcast guest is Aubrey Bird, from Threads of Life. Welcome, Aubrey.

Aubrey Bird   0:30
Thanks so much. Fairly happy to be here.

Perley Brewer   0:33
So you have a new position with threads of life. Tell our listeners about your new job.

Aubrey Bird   0:39
Yeah. So I have just started with threads of life in April last year. So I'm just coming up on one year. I'm the new regional development coordinator with our team and I represent all of the Atlantic region and Quebec. So my role is mainly consisting of partnership development. So I will.
Work really closely with all of our partners, our funders applying for grants, that kind of thing, I we represent threads of life at, like trade shows, conferences, events all around Atlantic Canada and.
My role is mainly focused on like expanding our reach, kind of broadening awareness and yeah, just expanding our community and network within the Atlantic provinces. I also I get to work quite closely with our lovely volunteers, which is actually my, my favorite part of the job. So I feel.
Quite lucky to to get to do that. And yeah, just get a chance to to really get to know the the majority of the threads of life community, which has been really, really amazing.

Perley Brewer   1:46
So what led you to getting involved with threads of life?

Aubrey Bird   1:50
So I'm actually relatively new to the East Coast. I just moved out here from BC about a year and a half ago. So I'm a new transplant and I've always worked with like small nonprofits. My professional background was in. Yeah, kind of development work with nonprofits, but actually.
To work in the housing sector, so like in support of housing. And through that I worked quite closely with people like vulnerable groups, people going through all kind of stages of grief, hard time. So yeah, I just like working with people, going through challenging experiences. So when I saw the the posting for.
Threads of life I immediately applied and I I also used to be an employment specialist, so I've worked within the realm of like employment and what kind of that means. So it just seemed like a natural fit to kind of bring those two things together.

Perley Brewer   2:45
Now we've featured threads of life on a on previous broadcast, but we wanted to do it again from the point of view that you can never really promote your organization too much. What you do is just so important. So what we want to do today is perhaps for for our listeners that haven't listened to previous.
This podcast on threads. I'd like for you to maybe summarize all the things that you do do at threads of life, and let's start with steps for life. Explain what it is and and and how it works.

Aubrey Bird   3:14
Yeah. Perfect.
Yeah, absolutely. So steps for life is our is our signature fundraiser. So it happens every year and it's our biggest fundraiser event, but also a biggest awareness piece. So going back to what you said, like just spreading that awareness, making sure that anyone who.
Needs our Services. Can hears about us. So that's kind of the the driver behind this and steps for life is a 5 kilometer walk that happens in I think we're up to like 37 communities now across the country. So we are in all different communities across the country. The walks are some of them are pretty quite large.
Now some are quite small, just getting started, but they're family friendly events, so everyone is welcome to come out and register, sign up to walk. You can create a team, it's it allows us to promote the importance of health and Safety at Work.
Also lets people learn about what threads of life is in our Services, but also allows people to come out and honor someone who they may have lost to a workplace tragedy or themselves been affected by a workplace tragedy.
So yeah, so it it we raise money and awareness for all families affected by it. And yeah, registration is open, so that will be it happens every year in May coincides with health and Safety Week.

Perley Brewer   4:47
Now in the past, I know you had a lot of public walks, but I noticed last year a lot of companies, a lot of organizations were also having their own walks just with sort of their own staff. Is that a change you've seen?

Aubrey Bird   5:00
Yeah, I would say I well, I'm not sure how much it's it that's changed. I think that's always happened a little bit, but maybe some organizations feel like it just fits better in their schedules. I know some companies decide to do it on a weekday when all their employees are actually in the office.
And they kind of create their own event and walk in honor steps for life. So that's, we would say like that's another third party event that we love to, to promote. We would encourage that for sure. And you know, the fact is that we these walks are not in every community, right, we we aren't in every single city across.
Yes, Canada obviously. So if if there's a company who's in a city who doesn't have a public steps for life walk, then absolutely that's a great way to kind of get out there and walk and support us. We also have our national like online event as well. So anyone in any area of the country can sign up and walk kind of on their own.
Own their own time their own date.

Perley Brewer   6:02
Now we've also featured a number of survivors on our podcast over the last three years, and one of the items they continually mention how important it has been to them is a family form that you folks also post. Could you talk a little bit more about that?

Aubrey Bird   6:16
Hmm.
Yeah, absolutely. So our our family forums are a whole weekend event and they we host three family forums across the country each year. So we have one in the central region in Ontario, one in the Western region at West and then one in the Atlantic region. So that happens in Nova.
Scotia and these, the Atlantic Family Forum is happening in May as well. May is quite a busy month for us on the the East Coast, but so the family forums are open to anyone who's been impacted by a workplace tragedy either themselves or a family member. Friends, anyone close to them.
It's a three day event where we bring folks together free of charge and it allows them to meet other people who have been going through something similar, gives them a chance to share network, and ultimately the goal is is healing right is to to not feel.
Alone and in the journey that they're going through and and have the chance to meet and form relationships, friendships kind of have a network of support with other people who understand what they're going through. There's so it is a three day event. So we have, you know, a variety of different workshops.
We have a really powerful reflection ceremony that happens on the 1st evening of the event as a chance to honor yourself or loved ones. But we we have workshops that go through like the experience of grief and working through that, but also lots of like.
Kind of more upbeat sessions and workshops to provide some healthy strategies helping coping strategies for grief. So I know the one I was lucky enough to get to go to to the family forum last year as a new staff member and.
I know they had workshops on like sound bass and music therapy and there was exercise classes as well. So as much as it's a a weekend, you know, to honor loved ones and to share stories. It's also a weekend to to connect and to heal together. So it's really beautiful.
And the Atlantic Family Forum this year is happening May 29th to 31st and registration for that is actually open now. So would encourage anyone to to visit our website and and apply for that if they're interested.

Perley Brewer   8:46
Now you also provide support ongoing support for someone that has lost a loved one, and perhaps you could say they're struggling. They need someone to talk to. They need some help and and you provide contacts.
Pair them up with someone who has gone through a similar type of scenario that they are in right now. How would you talk a little bit more about that as well?

Aubrey Bird   9:15
Yeah, absolutely. So. So yeah, we're lucky to have a pretty amazing network of family members. People have who have found threads of life, found healing through threads of life, found that that network of support and have reached.
To place in their healing journey, where they feel like they can kind of give back to others. And so we have specific training that we that we put these family members through, they sign up for if they would like to support someone else. So it's.
Kind of like a peer support program. So they sign up to be a volunteer. We send them through the training, and then they're actually paired with a new family member or someone who's recently gone through a tragedy, who it might be similar to their story. So it really allows for this, like, deeper understanding of.
The journey of what might be to come, and also to see, I think it allows folks who are just starting out on their healing journey to see that there might there is kind of a future, there is something past this I guess instills a little bit of hope. And also just to have someone kind of in your corner who who knows what you're going through.
So we have that program. We also have our speakers Bureau program as well. So that's where family members who are at that place in their healing journey feel like they'd like to start sharing their story as well. So we do have some training that we offer to them to.
Who kind of put their story together and then begin to share that in their communities. So this can be at like conferences, trade shows, schools just around different workplaces. And these these stories can be like really, really impactful.
And if there's stories that stick that they stick with you, right, I think is is if you've heard someone's individual story, you, you never forget it. So it's pretty amazing what what our volunteers family members are are doing. It's every time I hear one of their stories that I just am, like, floored.
At the like #1 like the bravery to to get up there and share a personal story like that. But but just knowing that they're doing it to hopefully.
You know, make sure that this doesn't happen to anyone else, right? So it's it's pretty powerful.

Perley Brewer   11:47
Yeah. When you talk about your peer-to-peer support, we've had a number of people on their podcast that you know the language they've referred to as it's for them. It was life saving it. It was at the point in their journey that they just, you know, they just didn't know what to do. And and once you paired them up.

Aubrey Bird   11:51
Yeah.

Perley Brewer   12:07
They were able to connect with someone the very similar circumstances and and really it wasn't their language, not mind a life saving to them. When it comes to your speakers Bureau, we've had a number of your speakers on our broadcast as well. And you know, for years I've been in the training business.

Aubrey Bird   12:12
Yeah.
Yeah.

Perley Brewer   12:26
And all kinds of courses. And I continue to hear people say, well, it's never going to happen to me. It's never going to happen to me and the speakers that you folks provide really deliver the the heartbreaking message that it it it can. And it does happen every day to people, the sort of the what you might call the average person.

Aubrey Bird   12:27
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And I and I think that's, that's the message that that we're trying to to drive home, right? No, no one thinks it's going to happen to them and and and really it it, it shouldn't happen to to anyone, right. So that's.

Perley Brewer   12:49
Yeah.
Yeah.
Yeah.

Aubrey Bird   13:01
Yeah, we find that our speakers Bureau is is, is quite impactful. It really sticks in people's minds like I've had because I work like closely with the volunteers. I've I've heard from from their end as well. The experience after. And you know, I've, I've had volunteers say that.
Someone has come up to them in a grocery store like five years later and said, oh, I recognize you from when my work had you in as a speaker and I just never could forget that story. So it really like sticks in people's minds, I think.

Perley Brewer   13:32
Yeah, we had an individual on one of our podcasts not too long ago that talked about how they felt that people had a difficult time relating to someone who had lost someone on the job that that, you know that people are used to. You know, if someone died of cancer or.
Or some other physical element they they could probably better understand or relate to it, but they this particular individual on our podcast said, you know, they they couldn't seem to relate to what she would go into with the loss of of a spouse in her case.

Aubrey Bird   14:03
Mm-hmm.

Perley Brewer   14:07
To a workplace accident.

Aubrey Bird   14:11
Yeah, absolutely. And I, I think that's what a lot of our like a lot of our community experiences, right is it. It is a very unique situation. It's different because it happened at work and because there is.
You know there can be a legal process that follows, like there's a lot of layers and it just has such a profound impact on the families and on communities and on workplaces too, right, like even on.

Perley Brewer   14:28
Yeah.

Aubrey Bird   14:39
You know the other employees around like it really does, kind of. There's a ripple effect. So I think it's, it's really important to have that network of peer support of people who understand what's going on or understand what that experience might be like.

Perley Brewer   14:56
Yeah. And you look at some diseases like cancer and in a lot of cases people will go through a period of time from when they get diagnosed to to, to, to when they pass. But with a workplace accident, it's it's, you know, sort of hear people talk about, well, it was just another normal day.
I I get up and we all went about our business. But our life changed forever. In that one day and there's sort of a blink of a moment.

Aubrey Bird   15:23
Yeah, absolutely. And and we talk, you know we we speak a lot about, you know, unfortunately the fatalities that have occurred, but we also support individuals and families who have gone through a occupational disease diagnosis or a life altering injury, right, which also I think brings with it.
Like there's a very unique experience there too, so we do have kind of those 3 streams of of people that we support.

Perley Brewer   15:50
So what's anything? We've had Eugene on our broadcast before as well, anything sort of new or what are you sort of working on in the background when it comes to threads of life in 2026 for example?

Aubrey Bird   16:06
Yeah. Well, we actually just finished a really exciting volunteer training that we haven't done for a few years now. It's called core training and this took place in Ontario. And so we actually brought some of our volunteers from across the country together for a weekend in Ontario for.
Networking for skill building. Really just taking a chance to invest in our amazing volunteers because we are a fully remote organization. Our volunteers don't really get the chance to have that like 1 to one connection like a lot of the time we're meeting on zoom or we're having phone calls and so we had a.
Found like that a face to face interaction was was missing and so this was a chance for us to. Yeah. Bring quite a number of volunteers together for a weekend. Allow them to get to know each other, build on their skills and also just help us.
We wanted to listen to our volunteers who wanted their perspectives on, you know, the direction that threads of life is moving, right? So it gave us a really lots of things to think about, really amazing ideas that came out of that weekend. And I would say that was kind of our our big focus for the beginning of 2026.
Yeah.

Perley Brewer   17:22
Look, Aubrey, for anyone that would like to get in contact with threads, how can they go about it either to to to get paired up, to get involved with your walk or to to get involved with your speakers Bureau? What's the easiest way to contact threads?

Aubrey Bird   17:40
The easiest way I would say is just through our website, so www.threadsoflife.ca and through there you can kind of navigate. There's a contact US form where you can put in a general inquiry, but they're all the program emails are listed there as well. I would say that's probably the first step if you'd like to be.
Involved in accessing our programs or signing up as a volunteer. If you're interested in getting involved in steps for life, we do have a separate website. You can find that through our main website, butitsstepsforlife.ca, and registration is actually open for our all of our steps for life walks.
And so we encourage, yeah, folks to to go on on the website and sign up and just and if anyone ever does reach out with someone on the team will will will reach back out to them for sure. And I know because you are you're based in.
New Brunswick, I do just want to speak a little bit about the the steps for life walk that will be happening in in Fredericton. So we have a returning walk in Fredericton. It's going to be hosted at Odell Park on May 2nd, so registration for that is open and we're yeah, hoping that we see a lot of.
Of New Brunswick organizations, businesses out there to form a team and and come out and walk. I've heard I haven't been to the park, but I've heard it's a quite a beautiful location, so hopefully.

Perley Brewer   19:07
Oh, it is very much so. Who's organizing that work?

Aubrey Bird   19:11
So that's it's organized by through our steps for life. So through us and we. So there's been a committee of folks who stepped up as volunteers to be committee members to kind of champion the organization of that. And a lot of them are actually are some of our family members. So we had some of them.

Perley Brewer   19:16
OK.

Aubrey Bird   19:30
Actually come to the family Forum, realize that we were looking for, you know, some more volunteers to create a walk in in friderton. And then they stepped up. And so now we have a a great little really motivated committee and a lot of them actually have that personal story. So the motivation to to get that walk in their community was.
Is pretty strong.

Perley Brewer   19:52
Well, look, Aubrey, I'd like to thank you very much for taking the time out of your busy schedule to to talk to us. The work you do is is fantastic. It's so important to the communities and and to the individuals. Thank you very much.

Aubrey Bird   20:06
Thanks so much. Barely.

Perley Brewer   20:08
As is always the case, we would appreciate your feedback on today's podcast as well as any ideas you have for future podcast guests. Stay safe and have a good week.