Meet the carers

Meet the carers

Clair

Clair, 20, was a carer for her mum who passed away recently. Clair finished college and gained an HNC in photography. She’s now working as a respite care worker while thinking about her next steps. She is keen to seize every opportunity she can to learn and develop, and is a part of a group of young adult carers who meet regularly to support each other through their experiences, learn together and have fun.

Lesley

Lesley, 44, worked through an Open University (OU) reflection course followed by an OU access course. Reflecting on the skills she’d developed through her caring role, as well as successfully completing the access course, gave her the confidence to continue studying. Knowing that she could manage to balance both caring and studying, she has now enrolled on a business studies course with her local university.

Jade

Jade, who’s 19, cares for her dad and is learning to be a youth worker. She left school and started training in childcare. She left her college course after the first year but knew she needed to do something else, so she decided to volunteer. Having gained experience of youth work through volunteering she was then accepted onto a training course and later offered a paid job. She is part of a supportive group of young adult carers who learn, have fun together and share and support each other in their caring roles.

Janet

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Janet, 42, had not studied since her son was born. While caring for her son over the past 19 years she’s learned a lot through volunteering at his school and also at SenseScotland. Now that her son is becoming an adult she has a little more time to herself and is in a position to consider what paid work she’d like to take on in the future. She is clear that she’d like to work in services for people with disabilities and would like to do further study to get there. Knowing that distance learning is the only practical way forward for her, Janet is studying Health and Social Care with The Open University and fitting that in around her caring and volunteering responsibilities, which can be a tricky juggling act at times.

Dean

Dean, who’s 28, cares for his mum, brother and grandad. He has decided that he’d like to find ways to develop his career. He knows that the better employment he finds, the better placed he is to support his family and fulfil his caring responsibilities. Combining his paid work and his caring role has been challenging and he has felt unsupported by his employer and trade union, despite being a workplace union representative. In order to progress his career, Dean has decided to reduce his work to four shifts a week so he can combine his employment with his Open University studying and his caring roles. He faces continuing challenges with his own health, but is clear and focused on his long-term aim to work in IT.

Scott

Scott, who’s 20, cares for his younger brother. He has been studying for four years since leaving school, starting in childcare and progressing to an HNC in social care. During this time he has decided he would prefer to work with young people with mental health issues, building on his own experience along with the knowledge gained through his studies. He has experienced personal and family difficulties, yet has managed to keep his study going. He says his young brother has kept him going and he’s proud that he’s able to manage his many roles and to gain the success he’s achieved so far. He is currently a mentor at his local college for students who have caring responsibilities.

Anna

Anna, 46, looked after her brother through his mental ill health before he had to accept professional help, while also caring for her own children and finding her way in a new country. Anna sought asylum in the UK from Congo DRC. She is proud of being able to cope.

Veronica

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Veronica is 55 and has been caring for her husband (who has a long-term condition) for 25 years. When he was first diagnosed, she had a senior nursing job and three young children. Giving up work was not an option as she was the main breadwinner for the family. Having a career is still important to Veronica, for her self-esteem as well as for financial reasons. She reckons the experience of managing her caring and working roles has made her more resilient.

Katrina

Katrina, 49, is married and has five children, two of whom live at home. One of her sons has autism and attention deficit disorder. As her sons got older Katrina found she had more time for herself and knew she wanted to do something but wasn’t sure what. She took up an Open University access course, which she passed. This gave her the confidence to take a Return to Nursing Practice course at university, something she’d been thinking about for ten years but didn’t think she’d ever manage to do. Katrina worked as a support worker in her local mental health unit while waiting for her nursing registration to come through. She now has a full-time post as a staff nurse at her local hospital.

Naomi

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Naomi is 24 and a single parent. She left school at 15 with no qualifications and before having her daughter she worked in call centres. Her daughter, who has just started school, is visually impaired because she has albinism. Caring for her daughter has changed Naomi’s ambitions and she has decided she would like to develop a career in social work.

Michael

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Michael is 49 and a skilled mechanical engineer. He has worked for the same Aberdeen-based construction company for the last 20 years. For the past four years Michael has been caring for his wife Linda, who was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis in her early 40s. As Linda’s condition became more serious and she required more care, Michael found that coping with the household duties and caring for Linda, as well as fulfilling his role at work, was becoming increasingly challenging. Being able to work more flexibly has been a tremendous help to Michael who, as a result, feels less stressed and more able to cope.

Acknowledgements

Caring Counts: a reflection and planning course was written by Lindsay Hewitt and Sarah Burton, quizzes by Julie Robson, The Open University.

This course was redeveloped to create Caring Counts in the Workplace in collaboration with Gill Ryan from NHS Education for Scotland and the Scottish Social Services Council’s Equal Partners in Care project, together with Sue McLintock (Carers Scotland) from the Scottish Government’s Carer Positive kitemark project.

Except for third party materials and otherwise stated (see terms and conditions), this content is made available under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 Licence. 

The material acknowledged below is Proprietary and used under licence (not subject to Creative Commons Licence).  Grateful acknowledgement is made to the following sources for permission to reproduce material in this unit:

Images

Clair: Ross Finnie for © The Open University

Lesley: Ross Finnie for © The Open University

Jade: Ross Finnie for © The Open University

Janet: © The Open University/Library image (model image only)

Dean: Ross Finnie for © The Open University

Scott: Ross Finnie for © The Open University

Anna: Moira Dunworth for © The Open University

Veronica: Richard Learoyd © The Open University/Library image (model image only)

Katrina: Ross Finnie for © The Open University

Naomi: © The Open University/Library image (model image only)

Michael: Richard Learoyd © for The Open University (model image only)

Every effort has been made to contact copyright owners. If any have been inadvertently overlooked, the publishers will be pleased to make the necessary arrangements at the first opportunity.

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