Supporting young carers

Last week we heard from Mike, who shared his experience of being a young carer. We spoke to Alyson Leeks, Family Intervention Coordinator, to find out more about young carers, and what the Trust is doing to help.

Who do young carers care for? 

A young carer is anyone under the age of 18 who provides physical or emotional support for a family member or loved one.

Young carers may be involved in caring for a parent, grandparent, sibling or other family member with a range of physical, mental health difficulties or intellectual disabilities. Many do not identify themselves as carers.

Young people caring for loved ones with mental health difficulties or substance misuse issues can be “hidden” carers. They carry out a caring role unnoticed by others, and this can have an enormous impact on their own development, education and opportunities.

What challenges does a young carer face?

Young people taking on responsibilities for the health and welfare of a loved one can experience a negative impact on their own health, education and social opportunities.

If a young person has to attend to someone else in the night, their sleep may be affected and then concentration at school impacted.

Young carers may experience financial hardship if parents are suffering from ill health. This can limit their opportunities to attend school trips, after school clubs, even having friends round for tea or attending parties. This differs from the experiences of an older carer as the physical, emotional and social impact of caring at a young age can affect long term life chances.

What does the Family Intervention Team do?

We work within Adult Mental Health at Nottinghamshire Healthcare.

Our role is to train and supervise staff to deliver Behavioural Family Therapy (BFT) to families of service users seen by secondary adult mental health services. These services include inpatient wards and community teams. Service users may be experiencing a range of mental health problems including psychosis, bipolar disorder, depression and anxiety.

We link with carer groups, involvement groups and charities across Nottinghamshire. We support staff in the Trust to consider families at each stage of the journey through the mental health service.

How do you work with young carers? 

When working with a family we offer the opportunity for all family members to take part in the sessions. This can include working with children as young as 7 or 8. We meet with each family member to look at their own needs and concerns and this can result in referrals for carer's assessments and young carer's assessments.

We encourage each family member to set their own goals. These can range from spending more time with friends, to taking up a sport or having a meal out. The family then work together to help each other achieve their goals and recognise each other’s need for time, support and space. This can work well for all family members, including young people.

If a young carer in Nottinghamshire is looking for support, where should they go first? 

A young carer’s assessment is a good starting point. This assessment is done by social services, and helps to looks at what the young carer needs.

There are also great teams available to offer support to young people with a caring role.

In Nottingham city, people can contact the Carers Federation. In Nottinghamshire, there’s the Notts Young Carers Service at notts.youngcarers@family-action.org.uk.

Supporting young carers is really important, and something we take seriously. Everyone deserves to have a childhood, and with the right support this is possible for young carers, too.