Surrey carer: "Unpaid carers in this country are on their knees"
A carer from Surrey says that unpaid carers across the country are in desperate need for more support.
A carer from Guildford says that unpaid carers in this country are in desperate need for more support, both financially and mentally.
Janice Clark has been an unpaid carer for over 60 years after she had to look after her mum following a stoke.
She says that it took her a while to realise that what she was doing for her mum was beyond what is normally expected of family member.
"That was way beyond what families would be expected to do, you know, providing 24/7 care, including nursing care, physical care, everything care.
I had to give up my job in the NHS to do that and I thought this just isn't right and I thought, you know, I'm not really well supported in this."
Janice added that for many people, they can take several years to realise that they qualify as an unpaid carer.
"I think there are estimates that it kind of takes a someone about 10 years to realise that they are an unpaid carer.
They probably will only recognise they're an unpaid carer when a clinician, a professional in health or care actually points out that that's actually what you're doing.
For many, many years, you just see yourself as a mum or a wife or whatever, and you do what you think all families do.
But there comes a point when you think, no, actually what I'm doing is more of a professionals job here"
She says that being a carer can have a serious toll on someone's mental health.
"Many carers have worse emotional and mental health and and people who don't provide care, they're quite often extremely stressed.
They on average they're less better off, their finances are worse off than than other people because they've obviously quite often given up jobs."
She adds that a reason for the worse mental and emotional mental health can come down to the lack of breaks for unpaid carers.
"It's really, really hard for carers to get any kind of break at all. And perfectly honest, the unpaid carers in this country are on their knees.
So there are some big, big changes that need to happen in the way that carers get supported.
We want the NHS to properly recognise unpaid carers because as I said before, caring can affect a carer's health and well-being, so it's really important that they look after us so that we can continue doing our caring role."
Janice Clark has been nominated for the Individual Campaigner award at the Carer UK awards night, happening later this month.