Douglas is six and lives with his Dad; his Dad is ex-military, has a slipped disc disease and sciatica, this has meant from an early age Douglas has undertaken small tasks for his Dad. When Dad’s health has been poor and he has been unable to get out of bed, he has needed to contact Douglas’s Nan to take him to school. Douglas’s Dad was finding it difficult to play with Douglas and take him places to enable him to have a normal childhood and that’s why Douglas’s Dad called us for support in June 2019, when Douglas was 4 years old. Douglas was the youngest young carer we have become involved with. At that time we were able to offer support with a view to inviting Douglas to our trips and outings as this was also the element that he missed out on as Dad was unable to play football or do any activities with his son.
During the Covid-19 pandemic we have built a relationship with Douglas as he is isolated and we have managed to build up trust with Douglas and allowed him to express himself. We saw Douglas in school for one-to-one mentoring during the period of October to December when the children were back in school; he is still a little boy and he has a very short attention span and has not been able to meet us since the latest lockdown started.
Due to the financial situation within the family, he did not have access to a device that would enable him to access our support and enable him to become less socially isolated, as well as supporting him with his school work especially during the current lockdown situation. Having this device is going to enable Douglas to have an opportunity to see us, his family and friends and will be able to play games on the device to keep him mentally active.
To protect privacy, Douglas is a pseudonym.
