For Pam Travis, there are benefits to being a stay-at-home working carer, but getting free time for yourself is not one of them.

“It is just busier, with no natural lulls in the day,” said Pam, the manager of an internet-based computer business and mother of a 32-year-old daughter with autism who lives at home.
 
“When you work from home you feel like you are on call 24/7 for almost everything. You actually work harder and longer. Because I am physically in the house, I naturally get more involved with whatever my daughter is doing and offer her and any support worker more of my time and guidance. You get interrupted more and get asked more questions and of course, if there is an issue or a crisis to be dealt with, you stop everything and attend to it.  

“When working from home you tend to multi-task more - putting on a load of washing or preparing the veggies for dinner while also finishing reviewing an on-line job, or preparing an account for a client, that sort of thing.”

Pam, who used to teach adult literacy at TAFE, finds another difference between having an outside job and working from home is that you lose a ready-made social network.

“One of the things I miss the most is having a group of work friends with whom you can just talk about a wide variety of topics. I miss the shared lunch or the occasional coffee over morning tea, or just running into people as you go about your job and having the opportunity to say hello and to catch up,” Pam said.

“Working from home means you have far fewer social connections. There is no real reason for people other than close friends and family to call in.

“But on the positive side, you are your own boss and can keep your own hours. You can get away to an appointment when you need to and can take leave at the time that suits you. It is great having more contact with whatever my daughter is doing and being able to ensure she gets the best quality of care and life experience I can give her.

“She enjoys doing crafty things with me and it is nice to have the time to spend together in this way. Also, through working alongside me in the house, I can teach her independent living skills which might otherwise slip.”

Pam, 58, said working from home and setting up a computer-based business had been ‘a very steep learning curve’.

“I wasn’t particularly computer-savvy and had to learn a whole new language,” she said. “I paid a fantastic computer programmer to help me set up my web site and do all of the coding for it, so we can update it ourselves as we need to.

“But it has cost a large amount of money and I am yet to recoup my establishment costs. I am very fortunate to have a wonderful, supportive husband, who has very much been part of the vision for the business we have established, which is an on-line support service for people with higher support needs - whether they have a disability, or are unwell, or are just ageing. You can learn more about the business at www.support4living.com

“It has helped enormously that he has had full-time work throughout the past few years when I have been setting things up. We wanted to set up the service so our daughter could have the security of having all of her care needs properly managed if anything happened to us, and it just grew from there.

We feel very lucky to have had enough financial ability to take on this project and hope it will benefit many hundreds of individuals and service providers.”