Scared for the future

Hi Cuddle 01,

I'm so sorry to hear this.....and totally understand how you feel.

You must get some support from macmillan, I'm quite new to this but there are sorts of forums on here&lots of support for carers. Make sure you get some as you need to look after yourself in order to be there for your Mum. Do you have any other family/close friends that you can lean on for support? 

Hopefully someone on here will be able to point you in the right direction, but just wanted you to know you're not alone.

Take care. Xx

Hi Cuddle01,

I don’t have any answers as such for you but, as the other person replying to you, I wanted you let
you know that you are not alone in this.

Getting some support sounds like a good idea and Macmillan can hopefully point you in the right
direction; a young carers group, or Pen Y Brohn offer free counselling if there is a centre near to you
or you can do this via phone too. pennybrohn.org.uk/ You can email
them to ask about counselling and they will send you a form to complete.

In terms of feeling scared, I think this is a totally normal reaction to your situation. I think the key is
thinking about how you can manage that feeling as best as possible and how you can build up your
own resilience and support around you. So self help techniques when you are feeling a strong
emotion – whatever works for you – like taking a walk, calling a friend, having a bath, journalling, breathing exercises.

If you can talk to your Mum about being scared that might help too; sometimes we try and protect
the people we love by not saying anything but the more you can talk about it, in my experience with
this journey so far, the better it makes it for both of you.

Perhaps having some discussions about support so that you know that if your Mum is poorly there is
a plan to help with that, and that there are other people to help, not just you. Maybe your Mum
could help you make that plan, to involve other family and friends if you have some around, or a
local care team.

And also trying to take time out for you as well as much as possible. It can be hard to carry on one’s
own life when someone we love is poorly, but I do think that’s what they would want to and they
would want you to be as happy as possible whilst going through this and not to stop your life for
them. So keep trying to see friends – I find booking times in in advance works well so that I can’t
change it if my loved one is a bit poorly. Try to do your study as much as you can – but also it can be
hard to concentrate when there is a lot going on so you could also check out what college can do to
help if you are not able to do as much at the moment. It’s important, in my view, to try and keep on
having as much of a normal life as possible, as well as looking after your loved one.

It is really tough to navigate and I’m sending you lots of care to get through it. One day at a time. X

And sorry there are weird gaps! I pasted in my reply and it seems to have glitched the formatting :).