It is with great sadness that DSN have to inform you that Karen Brereton, nee Mayers,  sadly passed away on the 28^th December 2011 after a battle with Cancer.

Karen joined Deafness Support Network in 1991 as a social work assistant and it wasn’t long before we could see the great potential in this enthusiastic and very committed individual . Her enthusiasm for supporting people endeared her to all who were fortunate enough to come into contact with her. She became passionate about social work in this time and decided that she wanted to go to University and study to gain the professional qualification in Social Work. DSN didn’t hesitate to support her to do this, confident from the start that within 2 years the Social Work profession would gain a wonderful asset.
 

Karen, as expected  qualified as a social worker but sadly DSN were not in a position to offer Karen a qualified Social Work post, so our loss at that time was the Local Authority’s gain; and indeed the very many families that were supported by her. However it wasn’t too long before we could offer Karen a place back at DSN and  Karen happily returned to us as a Social Worker with D/deaf Children in 2005.
 

Karen will be remembered for her commitment to her job and her service users, her friendliness; her kindness and her fantastic sense of humour will be forever missed by us all.
 

Karen’s personality and warmth could captivate a room full of people, she was always happy to help and would go over and above what was expected of her.
 

Everyone that knew Karen will have a lovely story to tell about her, we have very many of them here at DSN and we are sure you have yours.
 

We can shed tears that she has gone or we can smile because we were fortunate to have known her - All at DSN are smiling, so thank you Karen for enriching our lives.