Talking with Jayne, an ex-carer, for International Women’s Day

Jayne White is a mum to four boys, a business woman and an ex-carer of elderly relatives.

I spoke with Jayne to find out more about how life was for her as a carer and what she’s up to now.

Tell me a bit about yourself.

I was a Customs officer for almost 20 years, and during that time I got married and started a family. I then took a career break and our family expanded. At one point I had four boys under six and was helping my husband with his business. At the same time, I was a carer for my dad who has now passed away.

I did not want to go back to customs as I wanted more flexibility in my life so I started my own business as a cake maker, making wedding cakes. It was a side hustle so I could be at home with kids and help look after the older members of my family.

In 2009, mum had a heart attack, it was left to me to care for her and the business took a back seat. She recovered, and so did my business. I have also done a lot of other things over the years, helping friends with bookkeeping etc.

Over last decade I have been looking after mum and her elderly brother. Caring has been the centre of my life for a long time, from being a mum to caring for illness, to where I am now. I have learnt a lot of things.

Tell me 5 things about you:

• I love 80s music, love everything about music. It gets me through a lot of stress, as it’s upbeat.

• I like football and am a credited national league photographer, so can go and take photos at matches.

• I am a grandmother, with one grandson and another on the way. All boys again, I am outnumbered by boys and men.

• I have no living elderly relatives; they have all passed.

• My nick name is wonder woman, because my life was rushing around tending to everyone else and forgetting about myself.

Tell me more about how you managed work and caring

Because I have been self-employed since 2008, for the last 20 years, no one else needed to know I was a carer. The whole reason I went into cake making was it was something I could build round the children - my life was always flexible - I would work early hours of morning, afternoon etc.

When my mum was sick I disappeared off wedding scene, so it impacted my business. The wedding industry near me is small, so they noticed. My clientele did not know however, whatever I was coping with I had to get on with the cake and not worry them. No one wants a worried bride!

How did the pandemic impact you?

Covid stopped my whole business, there were no weddings, so no money, as there was no work.

But it gave me the time I needed to look after my mum and uncle – as they had become poorly. He passed away near the beginning of lockdown. It meant I could move in with my mum for that whole year. If I had to work at the same time, I don’t know how I would have coped.

In a way the pandemic released me from the pressure of making wedding cakes and delivering them - I would not have been able to manage as I could not leave my mum. It was a blessing in disguise.

The biggest problem I faced was the money, or lack of it. I did not know how to pay the bills and like many, we were on universal credit. I also left my boys alone to move in with my mum and had to keep two households going.

It was one of the beauties of being self-employed.

What’s the Biggest challenge you face?

It’s quite isolating being a carer and lack of time. There is not enough hours in the day. I am always rushing around, trying to do everything at once, especially when I had weddings on. The lack of time was a real challenge with four kids, my mum, her brother and my husband’s epilepsy.

I had to be mindful of how many orders I took.

Now it’s different as they have passed away. I still have a caring responsibility for my husband, and one of my sons has been quite unwell. But I stay as upbeat the best I can.

Caring is just so unpredictable. You have to be able to drop everything if you get a phone call, and you have to go. It’s been challenging over the last 10 years and I have burnt out, the last person I ever thought about was me. But you just have to get on with it and worry about the consequences later.

Where do you get support for you?

From my family. My husband is supportive when he’s having a good day. My youngest son was great though, he looked after the older ones, he’s very capable. That’s all I have really - a couple of friends I can speak to when things are getting me down.

I found it challenging to get any other support. Locally to where I am there is nothing for people who are looking after adults. Adult services were useless – and there were no local carers forums.

Tell me about your new business

It took me over a year after my mum died to ask - is there life after this? All of this led me to my business venture. Because of my journey I took no notice of my own needs, I was always bottom of the pile, running myself ragged all the time and was very burnt out. There was no one else there to keep an eye on my mum - she would get up to mischief if I was not there. She could not be left. 

Looking back, I did not even take an hour for me, I stopped talking to my friends, I was very isolated and got no break.

Carers need the encouragement to take time out, it does not have to be massive. I thought self-care meant spas and getting your nails done etc and that’s not me. What I learnt is self-care is as simple as eating a proper meal. That’s the one thing I did not do - I would go all day and not eat and then eat something quick – whatever snack was in the cupboard. 

I would cook for everyone else and then go over to mum’s to do hers, I would not even eat with her. 

I really did not look after myself, and did not eat or drink enough. It took over a year to recover from my lack of care. I was suffering with aches and pains, and not sleeping properly. I would awake hearing my mum calling me.

Because of this I create a ‘Time for You’ subscription box for carers. The idea is to encourage cares to take self-care is importantly. Even if its half an hour a day. That’s just 2% of your day, so what will you do with it? I want to encourage them to just spend half an hour of doing something just for them – like making a smoothy, reading a book, taking a power nap, or eating a proper meal.

Its launching early summer. Carers can subscribe and get a monthly box, with treats and lots of ideas for self-care. There is a Facebook community for connection as well. There are so many wonderful things that happen but we often just see the bit that goes wrong. I want to make people smile - one of the ways I coped was to laugh at it all. 

I don’t want cares to end up suffering or burning out like I did - there was nothing out there for me three years ago. I just wanted to have a bit of fun with people who understood. I did not want to always talk about caring.

There is also a free booklet, ‘10 warning signs of carers burnout’ If you carry on and ignore these signs it will get bigger and bigger and cause problems.