How do you project your health and wellbeing needs for the future? What goals do you have for your personal use of time as an adult who has been in a caring role for an extended period of time (decades)? Support to transition out of this role relies on the presence of good services that provide support to your loved one(s) and stability in those services. Families who ‘give up’ care may still be highly active in their loved ones lives but just not involved with the physical and emotional direct care on a day to day basis. With the provision of out of home support in terms of accomodation or employment does that meet enough of ‘your goals’ as a parent? Does that give you back enough of your time during the day so that you can take care of others tasks and of yourself and others differently? Would you prefer to keep managing the day to day care of your loved one(s) but the physical and emotional workload / toll are having too much of an impact and your age and health are declining.
Who do you talk to about your personal support needs as a parent / carer? Is there enough time in your programming to provide access to ‘therapy’ services for your loved one as well as direct access to the therapist that you need for yourself or do you have to sacrifice your time for others. Planning with your Occupational Therapist to have these discussions is important as there are strategies that can be used to support your health and wellbeing now and to balance how funds and resources get used.