Welcome To Fife Young Carers

Fife Young Carers is a registered charity which support Young Carers throughout Fife.

What is a Young Carer?

A Young Carer is a child or young person under the age of 18 years, whose life has been affected by their significant caring role for a family member who may suffer from one of the following:

• Long Term illness
• Mental ill health
• HIV/AIDS
• Physical disability
• Learning disability
• Drug or Alcohol misuse

Being a Young Carer can be very lonely. Often, time is so taken up doing tasks that there is no time for friendships. Sometimes when parents have illnesses such as HIV/AIDS, mental health illness or siblings who have a learning disability it can lead to feelings of isolation. Young Carers may want to keep these things to themselves for a number of reasons, perhaps being worried about bullying.

What do Young Carers do?

• Domestic chores, cleaning, cooking, shopping.
• Personal care, washing, dressing, toileting.
• Family responsibilities - caring for younger siblings, managing money, paying domestic bills.
• Medical care, administer medication/injections.
• Emotional support for other family members and the person(s) they care for.

What is it like to be a young carer? Read  Emma's Story to find out more.

What to do in an emergency

The most important thing is to keep yourself safe - if you are not safe, you cannot help anyone else!

Next, if in doubt, call 999 for an ambulance, police or fire service. If you have a good reason for thinking that there is an emergency, it is okay to call 999, even if things turn out not to be as bad as you thought.

If there is an emergency that you think could happen to your family, maybe there is someone you can talk to about making a plan, just in case?