I need the knowledge of you younger ladies or others out in that Mum's world. AIbu. I am getting on now, in fact flaming old. And I've come to needing home care. I know you're mainly concerned with the younger element of life, but I need some insight into what I would like. I am fully bedridden. Due to arthritis and being overweight. I want carers who can give me a decent daily wash, not just odd bits of me but more or less all of me. Change my bedding and clothes when required. Provide edible meals of the usual british mixture of tastes, therefore are able to read and understand the english written labels on food packaging, ensure what I'm being given to eat is safe, throwing away obviously gone off food, like mouldy bread, frozen food that's been defrosted and refrozen a couple of times because the freezer door gets left open. Knows the difference between food that's hot and cold, defrosted and heated to eat against still frozen halfway through. Knowing what is inside usual food packaging and how its normally eaten. Wash up dishes and clean up the kitchen things and areas, be able to understand how to use a washer/dryer to do the laundry. The room where i live in bed is the sitting room, keep it a bit tidy, not piling up the chair or small sofa with all and sundry. Keep the house reasonably clean and tidy, I do employ a cleaner once a fortnight to do a fuller clean, dusting, vacuuming, steam clean the kitchen floor. She has also taken on the task of checking the fridge for food no longer suitable to be eaten or to remove the half used packages left open and drying up or half used tins with the spoons still in them that should have gone into a sealable container. I'm visited by 2 persons 4 times a day, my one insistence was that I have female carers to see to me, due to past events. But for the oast 6 months or more the new company who have been given my contract only employ mixed sex teams, so it was decided by the company that this would be OK, that the male carer would stay in the kitchen and prepare meals, do laundry etc. I'd also like people who will have a conversation with, I don't see any family, and it's getting that I don't actually speak and talk with practically anyone. The council and care company think and say I'm being unreasonable in my demands. By the way my carer's are primarily of Nigerian origin here on a government funded sponsorship scheme. I have ascertained that the majority don't really understand English, they don't read English or even think and understand the general English spoken here in South Wales. When the majority arrived last September they had never come across anything we take as normal. I never thought I was racist I don't think I am, after a life of nursing mainly Psychiatric care and then teaching the subject, I was well used to working and being friends with all nationalities. Is wanting to communicate with the only people I have to care for me racist? I'm lost at understanding. Please give me your thoughts. The only family I talk to is a neice, also ex Psychiatric nurse and a Mum, who can't give practical support as she lives and works the other end of the country, and I don't mean Wales.