Go part-time to look after parents more?

https://www.gov.uk/carers-allowance

If your parents receive attendance allowance, you can claim carers allowance.

However carers allowance is only £333 every 4 weeks. It also allows you to earn up to a further £196 per week.
Your National Insurance contributions are also paid due to not working full time.

Can you afford to I've on this sparse amount of money ? You said that you had a mortgage to pay.

You do not need to live with the person that you care for

Rent out a room in your home for income ?

sorry just realised you aren’t an only, but you are the only DC shouldering the burden.

I am in a not dissimilar situation OP. Age 55 and my current contract ends mid August. I was hoping I would be kept on, as the wheels fell of my DPs bus at the start of April and it’s been really hard to juggle ever since, but at current role they let me condense to 4.5 days which helped.

In my case my DPs live an hour away, more like 1.5 each way recently due to traffic. They were managing just about ok until DM had a fall which seems to have made her bed bound, I am increasingly convinced it was a stroke but won’t know until her neurology appointment in August.

Like you I am an only DC but lucky enough to have a DH who is sharing some of the visits and even DS19 goes up to take grandpa out for lunch sometimes. We are in Scotland so DM is getting free carers 4 times a day, but DFs memory seems to be going and I want to check on them quite frequently, but it’s so much with working as well.

I am fortunate that I could just about stop if I wanted to as I got a big VR payment a year ago, but the thing is I don’t want to. I like working and DPs have more than enough money for just about any type of care, if only they would accept it.

I decided to look at part time roles, but the difficulty is there are very few professional ones so they are all not that well paid and at our ages, once you get off the professional ladder, its very hard to get back on.

I would say 4 days a week is good - you have one day to dedicate to their needs. Unfortunately you need to pull back a bit, or at least have the conversation with your DM as you can’t continue to put your DF to bed every night. So the carers didn’t come at exactly the right time and weren’t the same people every time, it’s not ideal, but unfortunately the only thing that would actually make your DPs genuinely happy os for your DF not to be ill any more and that’s not going to happen.

When you are old you won’t have a DD to support you, so it’s doubly important you continue to work and save for any care you might need in the future.

I know it’s hard with all the guilt, but you have to put yourself first.

We live next door and do a lot for PILs with carers on top. For your own sake, you can’t take on 3 peoples’ increasing needs with minimal external support, it’s a frankly ridiculous suggestion. If they’re not eligible for free care that means there is money that can be made available to pay for it. If you want to frame it another way, one carer would not be given these 3 people to look after alone, it’s too much and would be tantamount to neglect.

Keep working as much as you can and paying off your mortgage as long as possible.

You need to be in the best place financially as possible.
This isn't selfish, it's reasonable and a necessity these days.

There are ways to arrange more help for your family without it over burdening you.

I understand how you feel responsible but think of it this way, what happens if you lose your home or can't re-enter the job market, who will look after you and them then?

Put your own oxygen mask on first!

From the other end of the scale: I would not want my children to do this. We are younger than your parents - I am c70, my husband c80, but with a fairly debilitating life-limiting illness.

We have taken every step we can (including writing it into our Powers of Attorney) to prevent our kids sacrificing any aspect of their careers, incomes, future pensions, and more, to become carers for either of us. I watched my mum go down that route with my grandmother, and the impact on both my parents was huge, and mostly all negative.

We have discussed with our kids what we want should the Powers of Attorney need to be implemented, and obviously with each other about what decisions we will make whilst we retain capacity. You say your mum woukd be unhappy if she knew what you were considering; I would say you need to be having much franker conversations with your parents about how - as competent adults - they plan to ensure their future care needs are met, without overly relying on their children. It’s all very well and good them saying they won’t countenance residential care, so what will they do instead? What circumstances might change their minds in time? Who will take responsibility for ensuring there are regular, professionally led reviews of their needs? What happens if one or both lose capacity? And so on.

Your brother is a separate issue, but genuinely not your responsibility.

I should add, in case I sound like I’m rejecting my poor kids’ desire to help completely, that I do ask for, and accept offer of, help from them with things that are not overly time-consuming: some shopping if they are going anyway, advice on my car, or why the bloody TV is kaput…

I don’t know if this is the same for your elderly relatives but the generation above me, the women did do care,
but in very different circumstances. Your mum may be assuming the same? But you have to be realistic.

The generation above me, some women did retire early, at 50 or 55, with a final salary pension and with their mortgage already paid off. Or had pin money jobs with most things paid for by a husband. Then provided some care for elderly parents. But that was in the realm of shopping, taking to appointments, companionship, rather than personal
care and navigating serious medical issues.

It’s a very different situation now with lower pensions, higher pension age, mortgages running into retirement etc.

I don't have any advice beyond what other posters have provided, however I just wanted to say that I wish you all the very best. It's a difficult situation you are in, and you sound very kind, thoughtful and also very selfless.

Your 54 and single. You need to be earning a salary to pay your own mortgage and save for your pension. Also it important that you have some down time for both your own physical and mental health.
A few years ago one of my friends was in your position. She was in her 40's and has a small mortgage. She had a sister living about an hour's drive away with older kids who worked PT.
Both her parents were elderly and her father had Alzheimer's. At the time she was working 3 days a week but it was about 45 mins drive away. She was thinking of leaving work and claiming careers allowance. She could be around more for her parents then.
Another friend of ours said to her if you give up work now it will be extremely hard to get a job later on.
My friend stayed in her job and organised careers to help her parents. She arranged doctors appointments ect for the days she was not working.
After her father died a full time job came up with her company closer to home. She applied for and got this. Her mother need care shortly after this and she got careers in. She took time off work for a few weeks when her mother was declining and after her death. It was not easy but work gave her time away from elderly parents, give her a lunch break and kept her income up. During her lunch break she meet friends for lunch.

In your situation I would contact adult social services and explain that your parents and brother all have caring needs. They need an assessment for care and to have careers coming in. You need to arrange this for a day that your off and be very honest about their care need's. Your mother might try and say that everything is fine.
It fine if you're there most days and doing the shopping, cleaning, admin work but if you were not around for a few days they would be in trouble.
Tell your mother that careers are coming in to help out because your in work and tell her that you that you will be working late an odd evening.

From what you have told us they may need a nursing home at some stage. I know some elderly people are very anti nursing home but if an elderly person has high care needs due to declining physical or cognitive ability this is the most suitable care.

I would also contact age UK and see what benefits they could claim like attendance allowance and pip. This money could be used for careers ect.

The reality is that you can't give up work to mind them. If you give up your job you can't pay your mortgage or put money into a pension. You have to think of yourself and your own future also.

All the advice here is really useful, soI don’t want to repeat it.

Just wanted to add:

People don’t realise that modal (statistically most ‘popular’) life expectancy is much higher than average life expentancy. Typically, men live to their late eighties and women to their early nineties. Therefore, you are looking at at least a decade of increasing care needs. How do you feel about that?

If you went part time and became integral to your parents’ care, you’d then become the default and it;s very difficult to get support in. Example: all siblings plus another relative took on the 24/7 care of our FIL. They took turns to live there. Social services assessment “Your father has capacity and he’s decided that he will continue with the current arrangement of his sons living with his dad to meet his needs’.

I came very close to losing my career by caring for one terminally ill parent. At that point in my life I didn’t have major financial commitments like a mortgage,
but I did take a lot of time out of work. The trouble with caring is that it grows and grows. Even if you went part-time, they’d still end up needing support on your working days and you’d end up running around after them whilst struggling financially. The care needs will increase. It’s physically impossible for you to care for three people what will become 24/7, and it’s more helpful for them to have to engage more with other services so they’re used to it when more care is necessary.

How good are your finances? How many years left on the mortgage? How much in your pension pot and what sort of retirement would it buy you? You don’t have to answer those questions here but think about your future and what your needs will be in a year, 10 years, 20 years. The jobs market is insane at the moment, it would be crazy to step away from a job that has already agreed a flexible work pattern, and a very real prospect you might not get back into work again, or not at the same level.

I went in the opposite direction and went from part-time to full-time work. I have a mortgage to pay and a child to get through school and maybe university. But if I’d stayed part-time I’d have been expected to take on an ever-increasing amount of care and it wasn’t going to be sustainable. Going full time means I can’t be the default option although I can help organise things.

Good luck!

Keep that in mind, your parents wouldn't want you to give up your own life. Even if you did, it wouldn't be enough as the care needs keep increasing.

They need to have a team in place as if you take on with it and get unwell there will be no one to take over. You can still help but three adults is too much for one person.

It's a very hard decision, I too am the sole decision maker with a sibling who is unable to help. The responsibility can be overwhelming at times but try to think about your responsibility to yourself to live a fulfilled life which includes your career.

I've had to make a similar decision this year, part time work was refused so I have to go back full time.

I'm reframing it that I will have the extra income to spend on home helps, which aren't welcomed unfortunately. We have had many medical issues over the last 5 years and I was beginning to consider being a full time carer.

I've decided to embrace work this year as an outlet, a time when I focus on myself and my career. It sounds like you will have to make many of the hard decisions about your family in the future so put yourself first now.

It's very hard not to feel guilty but it is your life as well and personally I have already done so much and spend huge amounts of time and money helping them which has no real end to it. Try to advise yourself as you would a friend as emotions interfere with decision making.

If you don't want to change jobs however then don't but if you're excited about it then go for it.

You can’t do this. There is no way you can care for three people with increasing needs. It will kill you. Sorry but residential care is going to be the only way forward.

Don't do it!

You keep saying you're the only sibling who has the capability to do it, but you don't. You have a mortgage to pay. You wouldn't get benefits if you gave up.work voluntarily, carers allowance is a pittance, and only available if your other earnings are minuscule. You can't afford it. And caring for 3 people with steadily increasing needs will break you.

In some areas Age UK have advisors who can go through the finances etc to advise if they are claiming all the benefits they can. It doesn't operate everywhere but they were really helpful for my ILs. If there's more to claim you can use that to try and persuade them to buy in more help. On top of that we've found it's easier to get them to accept extra paid help if an outsider suggests it. They could also point you in the direction of local services like lunch clubs/day centres etc that could help your mum. MIL was severely disabled and non verbal after a stroke and went to a day centre 10-3 two days a week to give FIL a break.
But giving up your own long term financial security is really not a good idea.