 I care for a brother Jacob and he's got medication but he gets it changed so regularly that I don't know what's going on and it'd be nice to know what's happening and why it's getting changed so I could understand more about what's happening. When you're giving so much medication for the person you're looking after and you're not exactly sure what to do with it at first until you're shown by other people or how many to give, what days to give, what times, you know. It should be child friendly because I don't understand half the ways it's like on my brother's tablets and things like that so I'd kind of want it to be clearer and there should be someone like the doctors that should be able to explain it to you better so you can kind of understand without just reading something and being like what does that mean, you know. Also if we need to go pick up prescriptions at the pharmacies they won't let us do that if we're under 16. Instead of him having to drive up down there I could down drift walk because we've got local doctors in the village. It would be much easier if I could walk just prescription. Part of my mum first got diagnosed with a condition. I wasn't allowed in to appointments. I had to stay outside or I'd come up and see my mum when she was in hospital. It was only for about 10 minutes or something and I had to be shooed out so I couldn't see them checking out my mum. That bugged me because even to this day I still don't fully know what's wrong with my mum. I don't think doctors and nurses and people like that. I don't really ever see them because I'm always in school and if I'm with the doctor they don't really say much to me when I'm with my mum. District nurses, because I live in such a rural place I live in the middle of nowhere. They most of the time refuse to come and see my mum because we live so rural. My mum's got an ileostomy bag and she always runs out with them towards the end of the month and they don't like send her any more. They're trying to educate us more about health. If there ever was a problem in a house, the person would be careful, I was sick and there's no one else about. They're trying to teach us first aid so we might be able to stop or help. What would be nice is to get out to do one of my favourite sports, swimming, because it keeps my health right. It gives me a bit of stress free time. I'm still having counseling with the doctors to sort my anger out because sometimes I can't control it. I'm that bad, I just can't control it. I have to obviously go for my prescriptions as well and it does get horrible but at the time, sometimes I feel really happy about being able to help my dad. I don't think it's changing for the better if anything, we're being ignored and there should be a lot more medical support on hand. The teachers don't see that I sometimes miss a lesson or something to go sit in the in-carers office to talk rather than in a lesson because I'm stressed or I need someone to talk to. They don't see from my point of view why I'm there and teachers don't tend to understand. I think more teachers need to be aware that I'm a young carer because say if I haven't done my homework or say for whatever reason at home then they wouldn't know that it's because of him. They just thought maybe I'd be lazy or something like that. It is quite stressful at times because I've got my own work to do, like school work, GCSEs coming up now so looking after my mum is quite hard at the moment. I can't focus a lot at home. I find it really stressful all the time so I like getting out to do things every now and then when I can, young carers. It's great. The teachers do not understand where the in-carers come from, why they trwant but in actual fact they're actually trying to do things for their family and fit it all into the schedule with their education as well. Obviously I sit there worrying and worrying about how to concentrate for my work. I do worry a bit if I don't hear from her during the day or if I can text her and she doesn't text back. I don't think any of the teachers know and what I think could be an improvement is either they tell them or we have a little ID card just in general to show somebody that says it's like we're a young carer. I prefer people to understand what more I do for my mum. That's also an issue because I get the tension a lot for not doing my homework because of looking after my mum. I have a social worker called Mrs Clara and she's got a list of all the young carers and a couple of my teachers know because if you have homework and if you're late for a lesson they know why you might be late. That you have a reason like they wouldn't ask you in front of the class. I have to have a note and I would like to be able to just go in and say I've had to do this and this and that and they would understand that. I think there should be someone from a young carers project in all schools everywhere as much as possible. I'm in college now but when I was in school they had support there and people could talk to you about it. It would be good to have someone in college to talk to you about it and support you through it. They do quite a lot really. A week-silver comes in every couple of weeks to see how we're doing. It has a little session. They try to do that and take us out of lessons which aren't core subjects. They never take us out of English, Welsh, Signs or English lessons. So they don't want to effect that education as well. I think we should have a card of young carers to help us more with activities and other things we could do outside of school. There should be a bus pass for young carers so they can get to school if they need to, if they're late or something. Or they need to get back from school or they need to go shopping or something. I used to get really badly bullied and people take the make-out of the fact that I have to look after my dad and do his shopping and stuff. A few times I'd been jumped and I had the shopping and the money taken off me. And then all I've gone home with was like a nosebleed and black eyes or something like that. I'd like people to not take a make-out of us for going to young carers and I would like them to understand what a young carer is. To begin with I planned on staying at home and then just travelling to Wrexham University. But it really upset my mum and idea that she was holding me back from going away and living the uni life. So after some poking and prodding to go, I'm going but it's going to be difficult because more social workers are going to have to come in and help my mum. I feel sort of guilty believing a bit. I want to go to university but my stepdad looks after when I'm in school so I think you should be okay hopefully. Obviously I'll come and see her. I've got weekends or whenever I can come back and see her but yeah I guess I do worry when I leave. I can't go off to uni or anywhere like that because I won't be around much to help out my family. So it'll be a bit difficult. Yeah, things I've improved by access to the young carers project in school once a week. But other than that I don't think teachers are aware of the people situation at home. When social services were involved in me, they were there for me and my siblings but they tend to care more about the siblings and what my mum and my stepdad were involved in rather than me myself. I was pushed aside. I think it is important to have people there for you for the support and everything. But some people don't like it into other things and it's just easier to have people there to talk to and it's nicer because you can get through it a lot easier. It gives you an hour or a couple of hours away from what goes on in your house and it lets you know you're not the only one in the world that has to deal with these problems with other people you can't talk to and that is help available to help if needed. I think that's improved in a way that we can now get support from social workers meaning that we can sit down as a family, discuss problems, address solutions, things like that. Don't just shove young carers to the side. Don't put them into the dark, bring them into the light.