Give up work to become carer?

2nd Girl

Hello,

I really hope someone reading this can offer me some advice. My Mother requires 24 hour care and is living at home. She will not move to a nursing home and I think that she deserves to be at home if that's where she wants to be. I need to start paying for full time care, I have a couple of carers lined up already but I need to make sure of how to pay PRSI etc. with the Revenue.

Anyway, the reason for this post is that I am thinking of giving up work to become one of the carers. At the moment I am spending a lot of my spare time with my Mother and a good proportion of my work day is spent sorting out things for her. I am in full time work but I'm not on a career path. I'm in my late thirties and I don't see myself going anywhere in this job. I don't mind caring for my Mother, everyone knows it's not always the nicest work to do but overall we have a really good time together and I know more than anyone what needs to be done for her and how to manage everything. It struck me that I will be paying someone else to do a job that I could have. I'm not talking about caring full time on my own. I know a lot of people are doing that and I think that's great but that would not work for us. It's just that I'm going to be paying 3 or 4 people to work shifts caring for her anyway so why not be one of those people myself? I feel like this is a huge decision as I would be giving up a full time job to do this. Also, the job I have now is Mon-Fri but I would obviously have to work weekends etc. if I was full time caring.

I suppose I'm looking for anybody out there who has done this to tell me what they think? Does anyone have any advice?

I appreciate any advice given, thanks.

Frito

I haven't given up work but I've taken carers leave to care for my sick and disabled relatives, so I'm caring informally.
You don't go into details regarding the funding so I'm assuming your mother is paying privately. Is she your employer or is she purchasing a service fom you as a self-employed carer? Would you need qualifications and registration to work as a carer? What happens if you are sick and unable to work your shift? - the responsibility to arrange cover would either fall to you or your mother. What about pension contributions? What protection would you have from accusations of financial exploitation, or if your mother decided she no longer wanted you to be her carer? -would you get an employment contract drawn up?
I realise I'm posing more questions than offering advice but they are important things to consider. Given the fact you would be caring for someone you love, you might find it very difficult to 'resign' from your job in future, should you need to.

molltrot

you can take 2 years off work and get the carers benefit if you have stamps ( .it works de same as the unemployment benefit,) your job has to be kept for you for those 2 yrs, and if and when you go back you should get your 2yrs stamps marked up, Hope this is of some use to you, I did it for my dad, when he was dying, but then he got better again, so I applied for carers allowance which is means tested, That takes a long time to come through ,but you get back payment. U should also get some free help from the health board, not much , but every little helps, ,all the best.