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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To think Young Carers should NOT exist and wonder why we are accepting this?

248 replies

OopsDearyMe · 31/03/2017 22:12

I was thinking about my own situation and after seeing the comic relief story about the young carers group. It got me thinking, Why is no one in uproar that children are doing the jobs of social care workers.

If you are elderly and need help, you receive a care package and a carer assigned to you, who visits the home and helps take care of you, yes ? As it should be!

Then why if you become disabled at a younger age, do you not get the same?

Children who work, do so under strict guidelines, if you made your child do the things young carers do, as an able bodied person, you would be seeing social services pretty soon..

So why are we and the government ignoring the fact that thousands of children are doing the jobs an adult carer should be doing?

AIBU to think this is all wrong!

I am not saying the money should not have gone to the charities helping young carers , as I know they do a really important job. But I would prefer the money paid for a carer for the adult, thus preventing any child from becoming a carer in the first place.

NB: I Understand that currently we haven't got enough carers for the elderly let alone anyone else, which is why this happens, But surely this is because the government isn't being pushed to make changes. People seem to say"Oh how sad" and move on..

OP posts:
SandunesAndRainclouds · 31/03/2017 22:17

Being a Young Carer is so much more than 'doing the jobs an adult should do'.

YABU. And ignorant.

Mummamayhem · 31/03/2017 22:19

Young people love their parents. The end.

LookAtTheFlowersKerry · 31/03/2017 22:25

My children are 'Young Carers'.

They don't do any physical care or have any extra jobs at home due to my illness. But it is often stressful for them and obviously impacts on them.

Young Carers funding and support enables them to have time away, people to talk to, opportunities to make friends in similar situations and someone not in the family to talk to about their feelings.

It's not as simple as paying someone to come and do actual physical caring.

BlueDaBaDee · 31/03/2017 22:25

I agree, OP. And I say that as someone with a wealth of care experience. And a best friend who had to deal with some horrific situations being a young carer for her alcoholic mum from the age of five.

Hard to know what to do about it though. As a PP said, kids love their parents and want to help them. Not much of a childhood though Sad

QueenofallIsee · 31/03/2017 22:26

I know where you are coming from OP, I was shocked as well at the level of expectation and maturity on children as young as 8. I am sure that the children do it willingly and out of love, but it does seem a world away from what their life should consist of and the freedoms that my children have, for instance.

SaucyJack · 31/03/2017 22:28

You know a lot a elderly people pay for their own care, non?

It isn't free. No one just turns up and arranges it for you out of the goodness of their hearts.

But YANBU on the young carers obv.

armpitz · 31/03/2017 22:28

But the elderly don't have live in carers. They will get a maximum of four visits a day and due to under resourcing will be when they can be squeezed in so you might be plucked out of bed at 6:30 am even though you'd prefer a lie in, have lunch at 11 although you'd prefer it at 2 and so on.

StillMedusa · 31/03/2017 22:29

Resources are scarce... like it or not it is how it is. The assumption that the elderly who are in need of care automatically get help is absolutely laughable... many elderly do NOT get funded care and are reliant of family or friends/neighbours.

A disabled person of any age is entitled to an social services assessment of their needs.. child or adult, and potentially a personal budget designed to help meet their care needs. But the criteria is high, the budgets inadequate, and actually recruiting carers is difficult.. there are not sufficient people willing to work the odd hours needed for inadequate pay. (I have a disabled young adult of my own and have been through this process)

Add to that the complexities of family dynamics, mistrust of interference by outside agencies and there is not simple solution ..you can't just throw cash at it (even if it were available)

If only!

Lastchancesaloonstudent · 31/03/2017 22:30

I haven't seen this. What kinds of things are the young carers expected to do?

Original poster
OopsDearyMe · 31/03/2017 22:30

Sanddunes my three children are young carers, so No I am not !!! Thank You.

Of course the children want to help and that's wonderful.

OP posts:
OvariesForgotHerPassword · 31/03/2017 22:30

I was a young carer. Practically it was easy, emotionally it was more difficult as my parents have MH conditions as well as physical.

I'd have hated some stranger coming into the house, because I know my parents and I know my dad would have freaked out completely and my mum would have felt anxious about the state of the house.

When the adult carer fucks off after doing a couple of hours of whatever, I'd be the one dealing with the fallout. Young carers need more awareness and support from schools and more funding for fantastic young carers projects, not well-meaning people sending strangers into the house for a couple of hours a day and congratulating themselves on a job well done while the young carer copes with the result.

BellonaBelladonna · 31/03/2017 22:33

I think you raise a very good point. I can't believe I haven't even questioned it.

Children should be free to do the care they wish, through normal loving family relationships but not obliged as theres no other option.

Original poster
OopsDearyMe · 31/03/2017 22:33

I didn't say that in reality the elderly get the help they need, I said that its accepted that there should be provision for that, however in these cases its not.

Of course many elderly people pay for the care, but there is a system in place if they cannot. No such provision is set up for those disabled at a younger age.

OP posts:
Lingotria · 31/03/2017 22:36

I was a young carer but caring for my siblings. I personally wanted more understanding from my school. One of my teachers sympathised because he used to live nearby and saw how hard I worked & he and his wife would often pop round with food for us before an exam but tbh most fobbed it off as 'cultural Asian problem'. In contrast when any of the 5 white or black kids at the school had the slightest problem at home the teachers would intervene. I felt really alone tbh.

SantasLittleMonkeyButler · 31/03/2017 22:36

It's so difficult. No, in an ideal world there would be no "young carers" in the sense in which that term is generally used.

But say a young person has a parent who becomes, through no fault of their own, disabled or ill. Should that young person not want to help their beloved mum or dad? No, of course they would.

If SS are using a child in place of a paid carer then YANBU at all. Otherwise, how would you propose to change the situation? Would you like all DCs of disabled or ill parents to be taken into care to prevent them being young carers? Would that help them do you think?

Original poster
OopsDearyMe · 31/03/2017 22:37

Ovaries .. I agree with you in part, I object more to the fact that no one questions whether young carers should exist ! Of course each case is different, but I known I would prefer a stranger help me than put my child under pressure to do so.

I am with you on the support front as far as helping children of disabled parents deal with the emotional as well as the physical impact. Maybe carer is the wrong word for it.

OP posts:
OhtoblazeswithElvira · 31/03/2017 22:37

Yanbu OP.

ALittleMop · 31/03/2017 22:37

Last chance

read this

SandunesAndRainclouds · 31/03/2017 22:37

3 of my 4 children are young carers. Not for me, for their disabled sister. They do not do the jobs an adult should / would do. Being recognised as YCs allows them access to support and other children who live with a disabled family member.

Your OP makes it sound like all YCs do is the role of an adult carer which, to me, comes across as ignorant of what YCs actually do.

Graphista · 31/03/2017 22:39

In an ideal world I absolutely agree. Children should not have to bear the burden of being carers either practically or emotionally.

But it will continue until we get a govt and a population that understands that care must be funded and organised properly.

The elderly, sick and disabled do not automatically get help and they rarely get it for free. And what is available is incredibly hard to get, inconsistent and sadly poor quality (not generally due to the carers not caring but being poorly trained, not being given full info, not being given proper support & resources...)

Care in uk needs a MASSIVE overhaul.

Original poster
OopsDearyMe · 31/03/2017 22:40

No I certainly do not agree with taking children into care, I just think its wrong that the situation seems to have just been quietly accepted.

Of course I am not saying that there is anything wrong in children wanting to care for their families, I'm saying it should not be the only option available and SS ought to be supporting the needs of the children in these cases.

OP posts:
Graphista · 31/03/2017 22:45

Sanddunes what do your dc do for their sibling that an adult carer couldn't?

brickinitIam · 31/03/2017 22:46

I agree OP.

And I cannot understand the mindset of the parents who don't seem to mind that their children don't have childhoods in order to care for them.

Some (not all) seem to expect it.

It's horrifying and Not Right.

Original poster
OopsDearyMe · 31/03/2017 22:47

Sunshine - that was not my intention, however I was thinking about the story on comic relief , the girl in this was making dinner, doing cups of tea and using kitchen equipment, that she may have been using at an age where really she should be supervised doing so, therefore having mature and more careful than others their age.

I know my children have all been described as having self care skills that are more advanced than usual for their ages and its likely this is down to living with a disabled parent and having to do so.

OP posts:
triskele · 31/03/2017 22:48

I won't be popular here.

In my line of work I meet a lot of parents with disabilities/illnesses who were aware of their limitations prior to having children.

They have the child(ren) and then they're upset that the child is missing out on their childhood because they have to help at home a lot or can't go out and be children. This infuriates me!

Ok if you become ill or disabled after having the child but don't make the decision to have kids KNOWING they'll have to care for you! It's selfish.

I'm talking about planned pregnancy too, not an accident.

Children do usually end up getting extra support from a young carers organisation but they shouldn't have to.

I just wonder in these cases who they're having the kids for.