To think being a carer is actually quite a nice job?

[Shouldbeworkingnotreadingtalk]

It's a honest question.... I've taken on a (subject to completing the training) a new job as a carer, visiting clients in their homes ... , having never done it before in my life. So far, the training is all Zoom workshops / e-learning. The trainers and management seem lovely, really caring about their clients and I'm actually quite excited to start in real life. Family and friends seem to think it's a grim job and think I'm mad to be doing it .... so, am I being unreasonable to think it's quite a nice job? Or is it grim?
If I'm looking at it with rose tinted glasses tell me now

I just think it's so badly paid and a few years ago there were massive problems with carers not being paid for their travel time or the time between appointments.
There was a care agency near me and they often had photos of the team. Every single person was overweight, which I put down to being linked to the income.
I would never have the patience for it. I really admire people who can do that job.

Every single person was overweight, which I put down to being linked to the income.

Yes partly, ime anyway, more so though is the shift work element, shift workers and especially permanent night workers are at higher risk of obesity, type 2 diabetes, depression, heart problems.
I'm overweight, a lot of it is because my sleeping and eating pattern is just all over the place, not enough time to eat a decent meal, too bloody knackered to prep and cook from scratch, and yes the fact that I can go into the local shop and buy a basket full of shite that I can microwave for £5 or spend closer to £10 on the making for one meal. When money and time are tight, I choose the first one through necessity.

Depends on the setting. In community I can imagine it's incredibly difficult. In a care home it's different and in supported living or residential school for people with disabilities it's different again.

My brother has a live in carer. They do two weeks on, two off. He's a personable man with a job and a good social life so it's quite a nice gig for his carers who tend to be younger men, more often than not European travelling. They have no living costs as they often go from one placement straight to another so don't need a home, as it were. Brexit will prob put an end to that though, a real shame. 😢

DH retrained as a home carer 6 months ago after nearly 40 years as a builder - quite a change! He loves it - he has time to do everything the clients need and also time to have a chat with them. Downside is the obviously the pay, the fact that you don't get half your travel paid and the big gaps during the day where there's no work but it's not enough time to do anything else IYSWIM - e.g. today he was home at 10am, back out at 11.30, home again at 2, back out at 3.30 and he'll get home at 7.30ish tonight.

I think it very much depends on the agency. The woman that runs his agency set it up after caring for her terminally ill daughter and seeing how people benefit from having care in their own home, so she tends to be more client-focused than just being about making profit (although of course she wants to do that too!). DH tries and limits himself to 24 hours a week - not easy at times - as it can be exhausting, physically and mentally.

I did dom care for a while. I did not like it.

I had about 10 minutes to get to another person when the travel time was more like 20 minutes. If you had to double up and the other person was running late, then you run late as a result.

I will never forget an elderly woman I went to visit who cried her eyes out because she was so lonely- she got 30min visits x 2 a day. She begged me to stay and just talk to her. I had no time to give her the care she really needed and deserved. It was heartbreaking and I can't call it 'caring'.

I worked as an HCA in hospital and liked that. I had no problem with the personal care, or the patients who were difficult etc.. that was all fine and something I have the skills to manage well. I did not feel like a carer when doing dom care. It felt like a conveyor belt.

However, my mum did dom care many years ago and loved it. Her visits were all 2 hours and in a very close distance to each other, so didn't spend most of her time travelling and rushing around to get to places on time. They were a great company; I imagine it has changed for the worse since she left.

They all seem lovely at first. Give it a week and they’ll be pestering you non stop to pick up extra shifts. You have to learn to be very firm or you’ll burn out quickly.

I won’t say it’s not a nice job. It has some really lovely aspect and you do feel like you’re really helping someone in need. You build a lovely rapport with service users and many become like family.

It is however, tiring, at times very stressful and I always found I couldn’t help but worry about my service users. I felt so responsible for their well being. You have to give a lot of meds that you’re not really sufficiently trained to handle. You build a working knowledge of them over the years, but it’s a lot of responsibility. For example oramorph which two nurses would have to sign for in hospital, you are expected to give out by yourself.

I did it for about 13 years though, so it can be that bad. I was burnt out and ready to leave by the time I left, but I did find it very rewarding and flexible while my kids were small and I cried when I said good bye to many of my long standing service users.

My advice is definitely don’t give into to pressure form the managers to Work more than you feel able. Good luck.

I’m a care and support worker

I love it. It’s exhausting and mentally can rip your heart out at times.

I wouldn’t swap it

My daughter received domiciliary care via an agency. The carers were regularly not given enough time to get across town from one client to the next, travel time was ridiculously inadequate. A lot of staff are on zero hours contracts which is rubbish.
The work can be very hard and sometimes the environment can be awful. A wonderful carer we had for a long time said some calls were very difficult because of abusive, scary family members etc ... and smelly, filthy homes.
Care is so important but it is underpaid and progression is often lacking. As others have mentioned, the best carers often move on to nurse training or social work training and I don’t blame them.
I don’t think most care agencies are raking it in either, insurance and training costs will be very high and there is a massive admin burden to be financed.
I assume working in a care home could be very rewarding if there is a good culture and it is well resourced.

I work nights as a Senior Carer in a Dementia unit. Every night is different not all residents go to bed, never a night were there is none. I'm responsible for 20+ residents as well as 2 other carers. It is both physical and mentally draining, but I love it.

As others have said it depends on the setting. If you're in a position to spend time with the people you're caring for an really get to know them then it can be really nice.

Some jobs, like cleaning up after an enema, will never be lovely though

Can you do caring work without personal care?

@EddyF

Can you do caring work without personal care?

If you are private then you could provide a companionship type of service, helping people with every day task, but not personal care. But If you work for an organisation on the whole there is lot of personal care involved. You do get used to it very quickly though. I didn’t even mention it in my first post as it didn’t cross my mind. Poo is really nothing to me now.

I’m now training in an AHP profession which being a carer really introduced me too. (Still have to deal with a reasonable amount of poo though)

Some of the comments on this thread make me really , especially about 'nasty' clients. We none of us think we will get old and lose our ability to care for ourselves, I can't imagine how difficult it must be to have strangers in your house, seeing you naked, washing you and cleaning up accidents etc. Of course, no one should be abused when they go to work, but being particular about how you want things done, when you are paying for a service (not the clients fault the frontline workers don't see much of it) is hardly a crime.

I personally think the government (although the current one won't, obviously) should limit the amount of profit that can be made in the care industry and stipulate that a set % of fees must be for staff wages.

Anyway, OP, your attitude is lovely and I hope you have a fulfilling career for a long time!

@ChocolateSantaisthebestkind

Some of the comments on this thread make me really , especially about 'nasty' clients. We none of us think we will get old and lose our ability to care for ourselves, I can't imagine how difficult it must be to have strangers in your house, seeing you naked, washing you and cleaning up accidents etc. Of course, no one should be abused when they go to work, but being particular about how you want things done, when you are paying for a service (not the clients fault the frontline workers don't see much of it) is hardly a crime.

I personally think the government (although the current one won't, obviously) should limit the amount of profit that can be made in the care industry and stipulate that a set % of fees must be for staff wages.

Anyway, OP, your attitude is lovely and I hope you have a fulfilling career for a long time!

Some people are just not cut out to be carers. You need to have a thick skin and not take things personally. Most of the time people who are rude are just doing it to vent their own frustration at their situation or because their cognitive faculties have declined and they really can’t help it. Very rarely is it personally directed at you. Though it can be hard to be shouted at because of the companies planning failures several times in a day.

You can built a rapport with even the most difficult service user if you try hard enough. Though some like in every walk of life are more likeable than others.

Definitely not sunshine and rainbows. I remember when a resident was on peg feed and she would be covered in pee and feed. Her arms were also all locked up and she would scream and cry everytime you tried to move her or clean her. I remember going into the room and being hit in the face with the worst smell ever. I was only 17 at the time and decided I couldn't do it anymore. Also because none of the residents were getting the care that I would have hoped for. You see so many lovely people being left in their rooms, I know there's only a limited amount of staff but I would always find time to have a 5 minute chat with them.

Can you do caring work without personal care

^^ absolutely, I worked in the community supporting young people with learning difficulties and more moderate disabilities. I'd take them to meet their mates, pubs, hobbies ect. They were young adults that didn't want their parents following them around all day.

Personal care is fine though after the initial shock (which I definitely experienced). As a PP said there is real satisfaction in leaving a client clean, comfy and safe. I honestly thought I could never ever do it, I used to work in offices in nice marketing and office manager roles and I always admired people that could do care but very much thought I wasn't the type. It's the most rewarding thing I've ever done and if it wasn't for the terrible pay I would stay at my little care home forever. I will be graduating with my AHP qualification this summer with a hospital job lined up and I'm already tearful at the thought of leaving.
I've learned so much about myself and I genuinely feel it has made me a better person, I definitely have improved self esteem now. Best thing I've ever done and as I said earlier I went into it very grudgingly!

I found agency heart breaking. I want to help but I didnt feel like I was helping. I now only go to 2 people privately and I can now give better care and chat and get to know what works and what doesn't. X

In care homes you have other staff around though, in the ops situation is she going in on her own or is it always two carers at once?

I hated double up calls when I worked in dom care, I was always the driver and had to leave half an hour early to pick them up, get home half an hour after dropping them off and never even got time to eat a sandwich while they would stuff their faces in the passenger seat. My days were a solid 18 hours of working and driving and I got paid for maybe 11. Bullshit horrible job which I will never do again! Loved the clients, hated having to cut their calls short to travel to the next. Care home work is a different world, it gets a bit groundhog day at times but I can give proper good quality care

If you are coming to my Mum and Dad then yes, you will have a lovely time with a nice big house that is easy to manoeuvre a wheelchair around. They are friendly, polite and lovely. And you have everything you need to do your job well.

Unfortunately not all clients are like them

Never groundhog day looking after dementia residents. Always something different going on.

@EddyF

Can you do caring work without personal care?

That would be classed as support work which is similar. Support work sometimes involves a small amount of personal care for example if you're supporting someone with learning disabilities in sheltered housing they might need help with shaving or putting cream on dry spots or dying their hair, but would be ok with feeding, toileting and bathing.

I will never forget when I worked in a residential service and we got a new staff member who said ' I don't do personal care, it makes me feel uncomfortable'. I asked her what how she thought it made the individuals feel.

She never came back for a second day.

How did they get through the interview travellingspoon 😳