Helping to care for my brother-‘there’s only one thing I don’t like’

We are very grateful to Rhona Matthews for sending us this moving blog.

‘‘I met with Katie, the worker at Perth Young Carers who did the Talking Mats training and she told me this story:

It is recognised that there are many positive outcomes from being a carer.
For some young people helping care for a sibling can bring confidence, develop feelings of closeness to family and increase self esteem. However it can also add stresses and strains. Expressing frustrations or anger can be difficult and feel like a betrayal.
Using Talking Mats can make it easier to say the things that might cause upset. Using the Children and Young Person’s resource, a young person disclosed to a worker that the one aspect she was not happy about when helping look after her brother, was administering medication. She had seen this being done in hospital by injection and did not like the thought of having to do it. She was happy with all other aspects of helping with his care. The worker fed this back to her parents and they all agreed not to expect her to do this.
The worker felt that this issue would not have been highlighted without the Talking Mats.”