A life in netball

Fiona Astbury has had a life in netball and so, once her playing career started winding down, she turned to volunteering. And she has not looked back since. This is her story…

Firstly, can you tell us all about your role as a volunteer in netball?

I started as a player at school, then played the sport as a young mother, then as the mother of a netballer! As I got older and the joints got a bit creakier, I realised I didn’t want to lose my Netball Family. I started to explore different ways to stay within it. So I umpire, I coach, I volunteer as a NETBALLHer Champion. And I am also a technical official, so there’s plenty to keep me going to stay involved!

When did you make the move to becoming a volunteer? And what kickstarted it?

When my daughter started playing netball, I used to give her lifts to training and so on. And I thought to myself, ‘I don’t want to go for a coffee, I want to be involved’. So I volunteered to help. That ended up with me doing my coaching qualification and my umpiring qualification. She doesn’t play netball any more, but I’m obviously still very involved!

And then as I got older, I had a couple of nasty injuries – I did my ACL and I snapped my Achilles, and I wouldn’t have got through them without the support of netballers around me, people giving me lifts to watch my team play, others coming round and bringing food, everyone was great.

So that made me think that my body was telling me that I need to adjust. Being a NETBALLHer Champion and understanding a little bit more about what my body’s doing as I get older really made me want to share that message with other people.

And your life doesn’t stop when you can’t play netball anymore. There are so many different things you can do to stay involved in the sport, but I also want to have those open and honest discussions about subjects some people still feel uncomfortable talking about, but which affect netball players, such as periods, returning to netball after childbirth or injury, menopause, mental health challenges, marriage breakdown, supporting your child when they play and long-term health conditions such as osteoarthritis – all of which have affected me during my life and netball has been the one constant throughout.

So I am here to be a disruptor and to break the stigma attached to women’s life stages!

What would you say is the one thing that motivated you to go from netball lover to netball volunteer?

Passion for the sport, wanting equality for netball with regards to other sports and also as a feminist to break down barriers about communicating things that happen to us naturally as women.

What is so magic about the volunteering part of it?

You get to go to places that you wouldn’t dream of. You get to work alongside awesome people. So as a volunteer, getting to understand the workings behind things and going through that door that says ‘Team and Officials’ and actually understanding what goes on there and what makes netball and England Netball the sport and the group that it is and to be part of that journey.

Can you remember your first volunteering role and what was it like?

It was scary! I am not the most confident of people but I was basically a mum sat on the sidelines, but one who was taking notes about drills the coach was running. And then the coach asked me to come and get involved, saying that she could really do with the support.

And that made the bond between myself and my daughter closer! Netball is something that will bond us as a family.

You say you’re not a very confident person perhaps. Has netball helped that as well?

Yeah, definitely. I mean people don’t believe me when I say it, but I do suffer from depression and anxiety, and I think that in netball I can be myself and I participate as much as I feel comfortable with. I’m never judged, I’m always supported. There are so many people that would offer to help if I need advice or I’m not sure how to deal with something. I think everybody’s so giving and friendly within netball that it really makes it a safe space for me.

And whatever’s going on in my work life or my personal life, I feel that netball is my space where I can be me. So it’s absolutely made a huge difference.

Being a technical official keeps Fiona close to the game

What would you say to those who are thinking about it but haven’t yet caught that volunteering bug?

Have the confidence that you will be supported, you will be given the tools that you need to succeed. You can participate as much or as little as you like in volunteering. It may be once a year at a tournament, it might be four times a week doing different things as I do. There’s something there for everybody and it’s such a good community to be part of and it’s a female sport that isn’t still quite getting the recognition it deserves. I don’t think there’s another sport in the UK that you can participate in from five years old to 85 years old, whether that be as a player or as a volunteer. It is that real community and it will give you a family.

There are so many passionate volunteers out there who give up far more time than I do and it is just so nice to be part of that. Netball has no boundaries and it’s great to meet and become friends and colleagues with other volunteers. You might meet them only once a year, but you still greet them like an old friend when you see them

The Netball Family’s pretty special, isn’t it? Especially our volunteers.

Absolutely. And I hope that this conversation will help other people make that leap to volunteering. And you will be appreciated and you will be supported. So please, please, if you think you could give something, whether it be half an hour or four days a week, please just do it. Netball needs you.