What is a Young Carer?
A young carer is someone under the age of 18 who helps out at home because a family member needs help in their everyday activities. The family member could be a parent, a grandparent or a sibling, and they may need help for all kinds of reasons. It could be they have an illness that makes it difficult to walk, or a brain injury that makes it tough for them to remember things. Some families need their children to help out because a parent struggles with depression, and others have a brother or sister with autism. There are all kinds of different reasons for children and youth to be young carers.
What do young Carers do?
Young Carers help their families in all kinds of ways. The caring they do is very important to families!
Personal care
· Bathing and dressing
· Giving medications
Practical Care:
· Cooking dinner and making lunches
· Cleaning and laundry
· Budgeting
· Taking care of brothers and sisters
· Being a translator for parents who are deaf or do not speak English
Emotional Care:
· Giving encouragement
· Being upbeat and excited for a sad parent, grandparent or sibling
Being a young carer is not something you planned to do. Sometimes you probably feel mixed up and confused. That is OK-there isn’t a lot of training given to young carers…
Upside of Caring…
· Caregiving can bring out the best in you-it makes you a better person!
· More responsibility makes you more mature and strong
· Compassion and caring become your middle name!
· Makes you feel good-builds self-esteem
· Independence means you learn many new skills
· Learning to cope with tough times
· Feeling closer to your family
The Other Side of Caring…
· Feeling alone, overwhelmed, and sad
· Schoolwork can suffer if you are too tired or stressed
· Less time to hang out with your friends
· Loss of childhood-sometimes it is hard to feel the freedom other kids do
How to Take Care of You:
1. Don’t forget about yourself-don’t feel bad about taking time to hang out with friends.
2. Understand your feelings-sometimes you will feel love, concern, happiness, anger, sadness, grief and embarrassment…it is normal and lots of other young carers feel the same way.
3. Talk, talk, talk-find someone you can talk to about how you feel.
4. Bounce back and be positive-being a young carer means learning to bounce back from the tough times…stay positive, and remember all the great things you are doing to help your family.
5. Be honest-with yourself and your family. Let them know when caring is too much or when it feels uncomfortable…ask for help when you need a break.
Dealing with Feelings
What are feelings?
Feelings are the emotions we have day to day about things that happen to us. When we are feeling a strong emotion, it is because chemicals are released into our brains. These chemicals change the way you feel. From sad to happy, angry to guilty, we can have lots of different feelings in one day.
Figuring out how we’re feeling . . .
If you’re feeling bad, the first step towards feeling good is to focus on your feelings. This means deciding what exactly is going on in your mind. For example, if someone is picking on you, how does that make you feel? Are you sad, annoyed, or angry? Figure out how you are feeling and give it a name!
Here are some ways to focus on your feeling . . .
· Write a list of all your different feelings
· Draw a picture of the event that made you feel bad
· Write some thoughts about how you are feeling in a journal
· Think about things that happened in the past and how that made you feel, this can help you figure out your feelings in the present.
Now that we know how we are feeling, let’s try to feel better!
If chemicals in our brain change the way we feel, then it is possible to change them into “feel good” chemicals:
· Exercise helps the feel good chemicals to your head and helps you feel happy. So, skip, dance, run, play a sport and be active!
· Music can make the feel good chemicals. Put on your favourite pop tune or make music of your own.
· Think happy thoughts. Make a list of all the good things in your life. You’d be surprised at how the smallest things can make you feel good!
How to deal . . .
1. Breathe deeply, be calm and centre yourself with oxygen!
2. Focus on your feeling. How exactly did something or someone make you feel?
3. Count to ten before you respond. Give yourself time to think.
4. Go away and come back to the problem if that helps.
5. Think about what it is you want to make things feel better.
Talk, talk, and talk some more . . .
· Talk about your feelings with friends.
· Talk about your feelings with those that you are upset or angry with.
· Remember not everyone feels comfortable talking about how they feel.
· At first talking is hard, but it gets easier!
· Find an adult you trust and talk to them.
· Talking helps you be the boss of your feelings!
· Talking feels good, like you relieve pressure!
· Talking helps you find advice and tips on how to do things differently or better.
REMEMBER . . .
It’s important not to feel ashamed or embarrassed about our feelings because everyone has them, they are normal and no feeling can be right or wrong. The important thing to remember about feelings is that they don’t stay exactly the same forever, very few things in life do! In fact, they will always pass or change over time.
Stress Management
What is Stress?
Stress is your bodies’ reaction to the problems in your life. When you are worried in your mind, your body can feel it! Ever have butterflies in your tummy when you have to give a speech? Or a headache after a bad day at school? Your mind can make your body feel bad.
Not all stress is bad though. It all depends on how you deal with it! Sometimes the stress before a soccer game can make you play like a superstar while the stress of having a fight with a friend can make you feel like you are going to be sick. Stress is both good and bad! Passing a test can be just as stressful as failing.
A lot of bad stress over a short period of time though is very hard on your body.
Here are some signs that you may be experiencing bad stress:
- lots of headaches, tummy aches or neck pain
- more, sadness, panic, anger than usual
- being more quiet than usual
- trouble relaxing or sleeping
- no energy, daydreaming, not wanting to do your normal activities
- more energy than usual or restlessness
- new nervous habits such as nail biting, hair twisting, thumb sucking, or sighing deeply
- trouble getting along with friends.
How to Deal . . .
When you are dealing with stress it’s important to make healthy choices on how you spend your time. For example, if you are busy all the time, maybe you need to drop some activities. If things going on at home stress you out, maybe you need to find ways to get out of the house. Be aware of what is making you feel bad and take actions to change it!
Once you know what is making you feel stressed, the best thing to do is to find balance in your life. This means that sometimes we have to deal with life events that cause stress. We can try to keep steady by doing things that makes us feel good and help us release stress, and keep the pressure off.
Here are some things we can do to stay balanced . . .
· Talk it out - sometimes the best way to release stress is through words.
· Find something you are good at and be proud! Next time you are stressed, think of how good it felt.
· Find the funny side of things –a good laugh makes you feel good!
· Take some quiet time just to be alone with YOU.
· Practice stress management techniques like yoga, deep breathing or meditation.
· Eat healthy and try new foods - when your body feels good, you feel good too.
· Exercise! When you exercise, your body releases feel good chemicals that help fight stress.
· Get lots of sleep. Sleep helps your body fix itself.
· Take time to just do nothing so that your mind and body can chill.
