Together you and Carers Network can help extend our unique Carers Time Bank to reduce the isolation of so many people who look after a family member or friend without pay or respite. Our project will give 50 carers the chance to re-discover their talents and share their skills with other carers in the neighbourhood.
Taking on a caring responsibility can consume all areas of a person's life. Unpaid carers make incredible sacrifices, often giving up work and friends to support the person they care for. Often taking on a caring role is unplanned and can remove carers from their support networks, careers and interests, forcing them to put their own ambitions on hold. Too often they forget that they have valuable skills and potential, and become isolated in their community.
Our Carers Time Bank is the only time bank exclusively for carers who look after a family member or friend. Through it carers rediscover their self-worth and develop valuable new friendships. Time bank members help each other by exchanging skills and experience: for every hour of help one carer gives to another they receive a 'time credit' to spend on training or help from another time bank member. Skills exchanges include form-filling, clothes alterations, cooking skills.
The Carers Time Bank will develop a long-term community of carers who are able to help one another when other forms of support may no longer be available. Our experience of delivering the initial stage of the project shows that the carers involved have improved wellbeing and confidence. In addition they have developed strong long-term bonds with each other through their shared experience, which will continue to have significant impact into the future. Can you help us achieve this?
This project has provided additional documentation in a PDF file (projdoc.pdf).