PAUL: At Christmas time there's always a slight increase in calls. I think it goes up to something like one call every six seconds. It's noticeable in the call centre usually on a normal shift. Any other time of the year you would have periods of down time where the phones aren't ringing, whereas around the Christmas and New Year period the phones do tend to be ringing pretty much constantly.

I'm Paul Dodds, and I've been a Samaritan volunteer for just over four years.

I think Christmas has a huge impact on people. I think even where people are surrounded by family and friends they can feel terribly lonely.

They don't want to feel they're burdening their family and friends, particularly at Christmas when everybody's happy, or seemingly so.

You know, the expectations placed upon us by the media and then by ourselves create this myth that Christmas should be about excess, and I think people suffer terribly from feelings of inadequacy that they can't live up to that.

There's no one particular type of person who calls the Samaritans. We get calls from all the walks of society regardless of class or culture, race or religion. People drop in to see us, telephone us, e-mail us with problems; they're universal. We're all human at the end of the day. People don't have to be on the brink of despair to call us, that's not necessarily the case. You know, just if they feel they need to let off a bit of steam and they just need to hear a soothing voice, we're always there for people.

That's what Samaritans are all about - sitting with somebody and just saying it's okay, it's okay to feel this way. It's okay to cry, it's okay to worry. And the act of talking is quite cathartic and just getting stuff off your chest.

People can contact the Samaritans in a couple of ways. It's important to stress that we're open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year, so throughout Christmas and New Year we are available to provide that support for people if they need it.

People can call the national help line on 08457 909090, or take a look at the website which is www.samaritans.org, and on there you've got other ways of contacting us such as e-mail and our texting service.