Hi,

I have a few questions about Personal Care Attendant's that I was hoping someone here could help me
with.  In New Zealand they are called "carers", I think PCA is the term used elsewhere.

I posted a message here about 6 months ago asking for advice about making the decision to get help
with showering and dressing in the morning and got a fantastic response.  It has been working
really well and let me keep working without feeling constantly exhausted.  It helped having two
carers who really respected my space and dignity and knew where the boundaries were while I was
getting used to help in the morning.  They were both older than me, but close enough in age that we
could still relate well to each other.  I am a 29 year old male (with CP), by the way (-:

Unfortunately, both have left, and I now have a carer who is twice my age, and older than my
parents and I am struggling with it.  She does a reasonable job, mostly (I think I do a better job
shaving myself!), but it is the little things like trying to get her to use my name instead of
calling me "love" or "dear" that are getting to me.

There are other "mothering" type situations developing as well, which isn't something I want with a
carer.  If the carer starts doing favours, coming in on their own time to do extra cleaning and
stuff, inviting me to their home for coffee, I feel like I owe them or something, and I feel
uncomfortable asking for help with the things that I really need help with.  Does this make sense
to anyone?

I have explained what I expect in terms of using my name (preferably Jeremy, not Geoffrey, argh!)
instead of "dear".  She is good about which tasks I need help with and which tasks I do myself.
Some of the other stuff is harder to convey, I have thanked her for the offers of extra help for
now, but won't take her up on it.  Next time I will explain that I need her to be a carer, and for
me that means backing off the "friends" type stuff.

I admit that I am not comfortable having someone older than my parents help shower and dress me.
It is weird.  If that's ageist, fine, I can live with that label.

In a way it feels petty complaining about these relatively minor things, but, this is my house, my
body and my life, and right now I am not comfortable with this carer.  I have agreed to trial it
for a while.

Has anyone else had carers that were a lot older than them?  Did it work out?  If not, what did you
do?  Am I over reacting to the situation?  Any thoughts would be appreciated.

This has ended up being a long email, if you made it this far, thanks!
Cheers,

Jeremy
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Jeremy Persen, Nelson, New Zealand
Email: [log in to unmask]

Zaphod: "I'm a pretty dangerous dude when I'm cornered."
Ford: "Oh yeah, you go to pieces so fast that people get hit by the shrapnel."