Today I want to talk about carers. These are people that care for those who are chronically ill, disabled through age or bodily problems, or through mental illness. The most recent statistics (2009 ABS Survey of Disability, Ageing and Carers) put the number of carers in Australia at 2.6 million. (!!!!) Of these, more than 770,000 are referred to as primary carers, or, those that provide the most caring responsibilities for an individual. Now opportunities for respite are low now and with the govt changes, they maybe will be even less. This to me creates a cycle of mental health issues such as burn out,depression and PTS. Now I am very close to a number of carers- all of which work to provide an income and in addition are primary carers. Their lives, to put it mildly, are tough. One, because the person they care for is mentally ill and for the most part looks and acts normal until they dont, often is the target of gossip about claiming a carers allowance when the mentally ill person could go off to work. It is a no-win situation. Another person I know has just turned 19 and is the primary carer of a mother who is mentally ill (and there is no one else to look after her), who simply wont get diagnosed so the carer has to juggle work and uni but has now decided to give up uni because its all too stressful. If we are actually a compassionate country, we will look to better ways to support our carers because chances are one of those almost 3 million people may well be you one day.
Posted on: Mon, 12 Jan 2015 21:02:23 +0000
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