Euan has been volunteering with VOCAL as a peer mentor for 10 years. He took on the role after receiving 3 years of support from VOCAL while caring for his dad, who had Alzheimer’s and vascular dementia.
While managing family affairs after his mum’s unexpected death, Euan found letters from VOCAL in his parents’ post. Seeing that his mum was registered as an unpaid carer made Euan think more about his own role in looking after his dad, now that she was gone.
After registering with VOCAL, Euan started coming to Carer Training events to learn more about dementia and how to support someone with the condition. This helped Euan understand how to help his dad and how to cope with the challenges of caring, as did speaking to the paid carers who looked after his dad at home
Euan also attended social events for carers, where he enjoyed meeting people and sharing stories. Caring is often an isolating journey, and many carers benefited from meeting those in similar situations. In autumn 2014, our Peer Mentoring service was created to help carers share advice and support with each other.
When Euan was offered the chance to become one of our first peer mentors, he was happy to give something back to VOCAL and support others. He had an initial period of training and then started to meet carers he was matched with.
As well as helping other carers, Euan found it cathartic to speak openly about his own caring journey. “Speaking to someone in a similar situation made it easier to open up,” he said. “And it helped me to keep my dad’s memory alive.”
Euan continues to meet new carers through the peer mentoring programme, being matched with someone who does not live with the person they care for.
Thank you to Euan for all the time he has put into helping us support carers!
