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'A carer, what is that?' I am a weight lifter. I am a nurse. I am a specialist. I am exhausted.

I care full-time for my son, who has Hunter Syndrome, as well as being a mother to my other two young boys – yet I am often looked down upon by others.

I DIDN’T REALLY see myself as a ‘carer’. I saw myself as a mother who happens to have three wonderful boys, each with their own unique needs and – let’s face it – demands!

I don’t work outside the home, because I can’t. That’s the truth.

I have been living in a secret world for about 12 years now. A world where I don’t know how to answer that question; “What is it you do for a living?” I normally say “I am an at home mom”, which is met with the usual nods and the smiles. When I feel braver I say “I am a full-time carer for my son”. Why is that answer braver? Because it is. There are always follow up questions, “Oh, what does he have?” or “I’d have never known” or the really obnoxious reply: “Really? Wow. So you’re on the social.”

I don’t get a break

My day is not spent sitting and watching day-time TV, despite what an awful lot of society thinks. I don’t get a break when my two eldest boys are at school. My mornings are spent cleaning, hoovering, changing sheets, washing clothes, trying my best to dry them despite the weather, thinking ‘if I don’t have that duvet cover dry by this evening I’m unsure if he will sleep’.

When I’ve done all I can do with that side of the housework, I’ve to start the dinner, get all the kitchen cleaned and interact with my youngest toddling son, who, like most toddlers, cannot be trusted for two seconds.

While dinner is cooking, I’m wary of the clock. It seems to speed up once 12 o’clock strikes! I double-check my white board to ensure I know when and where I have to be for the rest of this week. Appointments are a must, but boy are they an inconvenience – especially the ones that require me to bring Ethan along so his team can talk to me while he runs wild. They always have to send me an email to remind me about what ‘we’ spoke about during the appointment—trust me, there is no ‘we’ in that conversation, unless I’ve a point to make.

I’ve to get Ethan’s clothes ready so the transition from uniform to casual clothes goes smoothly. I’ve to run up to ensure my middle son’s desk is clutter free and ready for the daily torture that is his homework—J has ADHD.

Hectic and demanding days

The boys come home at 3pm. The toddler is still up and very cranky, but in his wisdom, refuses a nap at every opportunity. Dinner is served. I spoon feed Ethan and my toddler while my side of dinner gets colder. If I remember something like ‘the cooker ring is still on’, we all must get up to check (it’s not safe to leave Ethan and toddler alone, for any length of time).

J begins the daily ‘torture’ and spends most of his time coming in and out of the room informing me of the random thoughts that pop into his mind. I try not to get annoyed. I’m not always successful.

Ethan and toddler are having some sort of pooping contest. I’m the referee and the cleaning lady. I’ve no choice but to participate. While cleaning the toddler, Ethan will want my attention or be so engrossed in his TV that he will start yelping and screaming, which used to frighten the toddler. However, now the toddler thinks that’s a perfectly acceptable behaviour and joins in. I have a headache normally by 5pm.

The torture of J’s homework ends around 6.30pm after much arguing about what he has and has not to do for his English, Maths and so on. Then daddy comes home. I have my second warm cup of coffee of the day, in peace.

I prepare the tea while I listen to the radio. I get all the medication out and prepare it for both the boys. I make lunches for the next day.

We have our tea. The boys go to bed roughly at 8pm. J objects and refuses to go. Ethan happily goes up and finally falls asleep about 9pm. Toddler just got moved into a ‘big boy’ bed – need I say more?! J finally gives up and is asleep by 11.30pm.

We go to bed.

I am exhausted 

I’m up by 6.45am. I’m always trying to be one step ahead of Ethan, as Ethan is a ‘smearer’. I shower him slowly, trying not to upset him as his body is stiff from the night’s rest. He has just turned 13 and is built like a house, the last thing I want is to get a ‘smack’ from him, for not knowing he was sore. I dress him, which hurts my back as I’ve to manoeuvre him in order to get him dressed. I try to strip Ethan’s bed before the toddler announces that he is ‘weady for bekkie’ over his baby gate.

J leaves at 7.40am with his daddy. Ethan luckily has a bus collect him at 8.20am and I am very lucky to have remembered to have brushed my teeth by 10am!

I am exhausted. I am a weight lifter. I am a nurse. I am a specialist. I am a doctor. I am a teacher. I am an advocate. I am a mediator. I am a secretary. I am an occupational therapist. I am a speech and language therapist. I am a physiotherapist. I am a cook (not a great one). I am a children’s entertainer. I am a cleaner. I am clown, when I need to be. I am an encourager. I am a holder of secrets. I am a bottomless pit of information about children’s rights… Yet, I am insulted regularly by what ‘title’ is given to people like me. I am looked down upon due to being ‘just a carer’.

I am a mother to three wonderful boys; each have their own unique needs and wants. I am also a full-time carer… I am a writer… I am funny… I am sociable (when given the chance)… I am an optimist… I am far more than ‘just a carer’… I am everything to three little boys, while these boys are everything to me.

“So, what do you do for a living?”

‘I’m Ger, wife to David and mother to three wonderful boys, Ethan, J and baby D. We live in the city of the Tribes! Our world was rocked to its core in 2008, when Ethan was diagnosed with Hunter Syndrome, a life limiting condition. We are slowly learning to laugh and live again in our ‘new’ world.’ (Geraldine Renton blogs at www.geraldinerenton.com)

This week (8-14 June) is National Carers Week, with events happening all over the country to recognise the work of family carers. Check out the website (www.carersweek.ie) for details of events in your local area. 

‘Sometimes, I see fear in his eyes. I constantly reassure him but reassurance only lasts seconds.’

What’s life like as a young carer? Jamie has cared for his mother since the age of six

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20 Comments
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    Mute Onlyblowingsmoke
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    May 12th 2014, 11:13 AM

    These ads are ridiculous. The journal is riddled with them. Every time I reopen the app some weird ad pops up. The independent is worse again. To quote the late Bill Hicks… The United states of advertising.. Seems to be spreading anywhere and everywhere. The Internet is becoming a bit of a joke. I await the day I see an ad for the kitchen sink and all.

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    Mute Rick Grimes
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    May 12th 2014, 11:20 AM

    Just install Adblock, problem solved.

    61
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    Mute Onlyblowingsmoke
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    May 12th 2014, 11:24 AM

    Even on iPhone? Even installing Adblock doesnt prevent sites from tracking your data, location as Internet habits. Making it easier for Internet providers to target you with pre packed advertisements .

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    Mute Rick Grimes
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    May 12th 2014, 11:26 AM

    Well on my android, I have Adaway. It’s not on the store so just google it. It might be different for iphone, not sure. It’s a life saver. Being flooded with gaudy, tacky ads is bloody disgusting

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    Mute Simon
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    May 12th 2014, 11:30 AM

    Try disconnect.me or light beam to stop sites tracking you in Firefox.

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    Mute ipsum oleum
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    May 12th 2014, 11:31 AM

    NoScript, which works well on Firefox is now out for Android but I have not yet tried it on my tablet, will do so asp and report back :-)

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    Mute Chief
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    May 12th 2014, 11:33 AM

    What’s the problem with a free site displaying ads? This is how sites survive and how a large number of people are employed. Do any of you work for free? The less revenue a website makes the worse it gets. If you enjoy the journal why kill its source of income?

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    Mute Onlyblowingsmoke
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    May 12th 2014, 11:33 AM

    Always glad when issues are actually resolved on the journal rather than just resorting to the same old crap. Cheers guys will look into alternatives!

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    Mute Rick Grimes
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    May 12th 2014, 11:35 AM

    I suppose it is important to note that the site will not get revenue from people who block ads, so if there is a site that you really like, guy might want to consider disabling adblock so you can support the site

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    Mute Archtographer
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    May 12th 2014, 11:45 AM

    To be honest for a long time Mozilla have been providing a good open source browser for free, its only a few ads get over it. It would be a different story if we had to pay for the browser.

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    Mute Conn Rogers
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    May 12th 2014, 11:50 AM

    Well said, Chief and Rick… It’s getting ridiculous now how much everybody wants everything for nothing.
    “Gimme all my music, movies and online services for free and so help me if I have to look at an ad anywhere! I don’t care who invented/created/wrote/directed/performed this piece of work. I’m not paying for it.”
    Unbelievable.
    When Radiohead brought out their album “In Rainbows” and said people could decide themselves however much they wanted to pay for it; I thought it was such a cool idea and so worthy of support that I paid €10 for the 10 tracks. I still say that’s the best tenner I ever spent and I’ve never downloaded anything illegally since then.
    Artists/Writers/Coders/Everybody deserves to be paid for their work if other people get use out of it. Somebody has to pay. If you won’t, then at least let them earn something through advertising; which, as annoying as it can be, is the only reason most of the internet is free to use

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    Mute Byyys
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    May 12th 2014, 1:38 PM

    I don’t ever see ads on youtube, facebook, thejournal or other website. being using adblock plus for a good while.(google even payed off the coders so they wouldnt blocked google ads) my smartphone however is riddled with ads haven’t really looked into how to stop them. it does made me giggle seeing an Advert for Donedeal pop up when opening thejounral app seeing as Adverts.ie is owned by distilled media wouldn’t you think that would be advertised first on its sister websites and not donedeal?

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    Mute Chief
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    May 12th 2014, 2:00 PM

    They do advertise here, and Google doesn’t pay off coders. They allow adblocker on chrome, the news avast comes with adblocker turned on by default have Google done anything to stop that? Nope.

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    Mute Byyys
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    May 12th 2014, 2:03 PM

    @Chief before you say google dosent pay off codes… at least do a google search first to back up what you are saying!. http://www.businessinsider.com/google-saved-an-estimated-887-million-by-paying-adblock-plus-to-show-its-ads-2013-8

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    Mute Chief
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    May 12th 2014, 2:13 PM

    That’s not paying them off. What they did was pay to be on their whitelist as loads of other advertisers have also done.

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    Mute Ian Booth
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    May 12th 2014, 2:46 PM

    Ads pay for stuff. That’s where the internet gets it’s money. We get so much free stuff online, because ads pay for it.
    People need to stop getting so worried about ads. Jeez.

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    Mute Rick Grimes
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    May 12th 2014, 11:08 AM

    Those of us with Adblock won’t be seeing any ads thank flying spaghetti monster

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    Mute Dave Harris
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    May 12th 2014, 11:24 AM

    Ramen

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    Mute Ashling Fenton
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    May 12th 2014, 11:04 AM

    I say no to that

    38
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    Mute Mick Collins
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    May 12th 2014, 11:05 AM

    Ah lads, don’t mess with my favourite browser and force me to go back to the snails pace Internet Explorer.

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    Mute Jimbo
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    May 12th 2014, 11:05 AM

    I’m going to experiment with google chrome then.

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    Mute Dave Harris
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    May 12th 2014, 11:25 AM

    They should fix the constantly freakin crashing shockwave problem first

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    Mute Gerard Casserly
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    May 12th 2014, 11:23 AM

    Bye bye Mozilla.

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    Mute John Needham
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    May 12th 2014, 12:05 PM

    Mozilla employs over a thousand people, nearly all of its income comes from a deal with Google (90+ %) which expires this year, Google has a competing browser.

    It only makes sense for them to explore alternative revenue models to secure their future, its important to the web that we have options for browsers, and if they are (truly) open source all the better. I really don’t see the problem with them doing this.

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    Mute Charlie Mountney
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    May 12th 2014, 11:53 AM

    If the ads annoy you but there is awareness that the server or site needs revenue in order to continue then instead of blocking the ads or doing nothing and continuing to be irritated then why not take up mindfulness or look at other ways you can change your life so these intrusions no longer get to you. This will affect other areas in your life and perhaps improve it immensely. It is a lot easier to change yourself and then the world will change for you. It’s only perspective. Just a thought.

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    Mute Keith Wizzy
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    May 12th 2014, 11:40 AM

    Plenty of other apps to replace it so :)

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    Mute James Troy
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    May 12th 2014, 1:34 PM

    Edit the hosts file and no ads at all

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    Mute Brendan Rice
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    May 12th 2014, 1:46 PM

    Yes haven’t seen an advert in years.

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    Mute Darragh Hammond
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    May 12th 2014, 2:33 PM

    Firefox goes corporate- RIP open source browser

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    Mute Emily Elephant
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    May 12th 2014, 11:43 AM

    I wonder if they will accept ads from the Iona Institute?

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    Mute Darren Stephenson
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    May 12th 2014, 1:04 PM

    It’ll be easy to avoid these ads thankfully :). If, like me, you want to default a web page when opening a tab -instead of those 8 boxes- just type about:config in the location bar. Go down to browser.newtab.url and make the value beside it your website (www.google.ie) Job done, no ads :)

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    Mute SJ_IRL
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    May 12th 2014, 3:50 PM

    Just when I was going to swap over too, less work for me then.

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