Gwen has been married to Ken for 61 years. Throughout their married life, Ken had traditionally been the head of the family. The shift in who had the dominant role was initially hard for Gwen to adapt to.
“When we got married in 1952, we were both young and it was great. My mother taught me that you have the table laid for when he gets home, even if the dinner’s not ready, so that he’ll think it’s ready. But 99% of the time, I had the dinner ready to put down in front of him. That was our life, that was how we worked and then, you see, now we have come a full circle.”
In 2006, Ken was diagnosed with prostate cancer, which was shortly followed by the first of three strokes.
“Ken and I did very well together as modern, older people with the grandchildren running around our legs. Then, all of a sudden, when he was 75, he got prostate cancer.
“Ken had a course of radiotherapy. Soon after that he had three strokes. So, from me being the ‘little wife’ and he the man of the house, all of a sudden this happened.
“I didn’t even know what a lawnmower looked like! I had never been outside, I’d always had hobbies indoors. All of a sudden I was in charge because he had three strokes. I have to do the banking – I knew where the money was, there’s no problem there, but I now make every decision.”
Gwen never considered herself as a carer until she went to attend a routine eye test and was concerned about getting home to Ken.
“The optician said to me when I got in the chair ‘how long have you been your husband’s carer?’ I said to him ‘Oh, I’m not his carer’ and he said, ‘well, if you’re not his carer and you’re having this panic attack because you can’t be there, then what do you think you are?’
“Then he said to me ‘you’re not very well you know, you must ring Carer Support Wiltshire’s number, I’ll just go and get it’.”
Becoming a carer is not always planned.
Some people, like Gwen, may become a carer very quickly due to a sudden onset of illness. Thanks to another professional knowing about the support that is out there, Gwen was able to be put in touch with us at Carer Support Wiltshire.
Gwen has been registered with Carer Support Wiltshire for a number of years and has benefited from the services that we are able to offer her. She particularly enjoys the regular creative groups that we run to provide carers with some time out.
“Before one of the groups, I’d had a bad week at home. When I went out to the group, we didn’t sit and talk about our caring role, we just did our artwork. We talked about music, about books and had a real laugh. It was two hours of real tonic. It’s just wonderful.”
To find out when our next creative groups are, take a look at our What’s On.
