Rachel works at Carers First as our Counselling Coordinator for Essex and Southend. She has personal experience both being a carer and being cared for. She shares her story and explains how caring has taught her a strength she didn't know she had.
"If you’d asked me as a teenager whether I was a carer, I would almost certainly have laughed and said no. Like many young carers, I didn’t have the language for it. I just knew that from the age of 13, a large part of my life revolved around helping to care for my siblings. While my friends were worrying about homework, sleepovers and who fancied who, I was collecting a toddler from nursery, preparing food, soothing tears and making sure everyone was safe until Mum was available. At the time, it simply felt normal. Heavy, frustrating and lonely at times, but normal. What I remember most is how invisible it was. Nobody at school could see the responsibility I carried. At home, it often felt as though everyone expected me to manage without recognising the impact it was having. I couldn’t always do the things other children did, and although I understood why, that didn’t make it any easier.
As I got older, some of that frustration came out in ways that weren’t always healthy. Looking back, I can see I was trying to make sense of responsibilities that had arrived long before I was ready for them. But caring also taught me something invaluable: how to look after someone else, how to keep going when things were difficult, and how to be dependable when another person needed me.
It wasn’t until I joined Carers First that I realised I had been a young carer all along. Suddenly, so many experiences from my childhood made sense.
My late twenties brought another chapter of caring. This time it was my dad, as he navigated cancer treatment and everything that came with it. He died at just 51 years old. Nothing really prepares you for watching someone you love become seriously ill. The practical demands were significant, but the emotional impact was even greater. After Dad died, I found myself supporting Mum through her grief and helping my siblings again too. It felt as though caring had become a permanent thread running through my life.
Then, in my early thirties, Mum and I cared for my grandfather as dementia gradually stole pieces of the man we knew. One of the hardest decisions we ever had to make was moving him into residential care when it was no longer safe for him to live independently. Like many families, we desperately wanted to keep him at home, but caring has a way of confronting you with impossible choices.
Life, however, has a habit of surprising us. In my late thirties, I experienced something completely different: I became the person being cared for. Following a cancer diagnosis, I suddenly found myself relying on others for physical and emotional support. My mum, siblings, partner and our children all stepped into caring roles at various times.
If I am honest, accepting help was one of the hardest things I have ever done. When you are used to being the person who fixes problems, organises appointments and worries about everyone else, it feels incredibly uncomfortable to be the one needing support. I was especially conscious of the impact on our children. I knew first-hand how responsibility can shape a young person's life, and I never wanted them to carry burdens they didn't need to. The guilt was enormous.
In trying not to burden others, I often pushed myself too far and eventually burnt out. Thankfully, I learned an important lesson: caring is not something we should do alone. With support from family, friends and wider networks, I gradually found a healthier balance. Seven years into remission, I can honestly say that being on both sides of caring changed me. It gave me a greater understanding of the courage it takes not only to provide support, but also to accept it.
Today, in my early forties, caring remains part of my life. Alongside my mum and aunt, I support my 93 year old paternal grandparents. My grandfather lives with dementia and has recently moved into a care home where he is safe and settled. My grandmother is recovering from her third heart attack and lives with heart failure.
My role is less hands-on these days, but the emotional demands are enormous. Caring often looks like phone calls, hospital visits, advocating with professionals, asking difficult questions and refusing to accept decisions that don't feel right. Sometimes it means finding the confidence to speak up when loved ones no longer have the energy to fight for themselves.
It can be exhausting. The systems can feel overwhelming and frustrating. There are moments when it seems as though families have to become experts overnight just to navigate the support available.
Yet despite all of this, I feel incredibly fortunate. Caring has given me some of the deepest relationships of my life. It has taught me resilience, compassion and the importance of showing up when people need you most. The people I care for trust me with some of the biggest decisions they will ever face. That trust is humbling, and it is a privilege I never take for granted.
Of course, caring comes at a cost. There is the constant worrying, the second-guessing, the wondering whether every decision is the right one. There are times when you feel angry that others aren't helping or frustrated that the responsibility falls on so few shoulders.
But there is also love. And when I look back over the decades, through all the challenges, losses, difficult conversations and impossible decisions, that is what stands out most.
I didn't choose caring as a life path. In many ways, caring found me. But it has shaped who I am, taught me strength I didn't know I possessed and connected me to the people I love in ways I could never have imagined. For all its complexity, that is something I will always be grateful for.
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