Care assistant interview - David

David has worked in care for two years and joined Bluebird Care having left a role in residential care. Before swtiching careers to home care, David worked in aviation as cabin crew. He offers his honest opinion of working in care and what he enjoys about his role. 

How long have you worked in care (and for Bluebird Care)? 

I have been in care for almost two years now. I originally started in domiciliary care but there were a few issues with the business, so I went into a nursing home to gain some experience with the other side of things. I didn’t like that. I prefer the domiciliary side of care to the nursing side of care because I feel you get to learn more and understand your clients better in domiciliary. I started at Bluebird last October, four months ago. 

What did you do before you joined care? 

I was cabin crew. I did that for two and a half years. 

Can you describe a typical day in your role? 

It all depends really. I’m up in the morning and off to visit client number one, who is quite local to me. That’s an hour-and-a-half call. Then I’m here, there and everywhere to see the others. In a way I am unfortunate because I live on the outskirts of our area. There are only two customers who live local to me so my commute to my first visit us 30-45 mins. Although Bluebird Care do pay you from a certain distance of your first call.  

Because I am the closest, it means that my day starts and in finishes with the same customers - once in the morning to get them up for the day, and then in the evening for their bedtime routine.  

Some of the ladies I see are brilliant and I have a good laugh with them. My average calls are about 30 mins each so I see quite a lot of people throughout the day. I have a few calls that are 2 hours long but one that is usually 3 hours to my day can really vary.  

What is it that you enjoy most about your role? 

I love every minute of it. All of my family worked in care, so I’d also resisted working in the profession professing ‘never to work in care’. But now I find it brilliant. It is so rewarding, and it makes my day. A lot of those we see are quite lonely so it’s great to see the smiles on their faces. 

What was it like working in care throughout the pandemic? 

Working during the pandemic was enjoyable in parts, mostly as the road were clear for travelling between visits. A lot however was quite hard.  When I first joined home care (before Bluebird Care), the pandemic meant that training was delivered via zoom or via videos. But my preference is for hands-on training so that aspect was tough. 

The restrictions could complicate the role itself as well, especially when I was working in a double-up (two carers looking after the same customer, at the same time). The carer I was working with had been with the company for a long time, and I was still trying to get used to all the rules and regulations. I had to find a way to make the role practical to do, whilst also staying true to what the government guidelines required.  

What advice would you give to others considering a job in the industry? 

Try all aspects out before you make a decision about what you want to do. Everyone has different views about things, and they work differently. Domiciliary care is hard, heavy and tiring work and you spend a lot of time on your own, especially when you are driving. Make sure you know what you are going in for and what you want to do.  

Can you tell us a little about the people you care for?

There are quite a few people who stand out. The woman I live round the corner from has got dementia and she is lovely. She’s non-communicative but we manage to have a laugh with her and her husband when we are doing her personal care. It’s good to see it and it’s nice to see how her husband is with her as well. However, many of my client so do suffer from significant issues. They mainly need mainly companionship. I see another woman who can’t walk but is still mobile to a degree, with our help. She’ll eat, drink and do whatever she needs to do without a problem. She just can’t move, and that’s what we help her with.

Everything else is companionship or helping them out with bits and pieces, like making their lunch or helping with shopping. With some, we just go and chat for half an hour. Sometimes we take over from the live-in carers, so they can have a rest. Normally just one of us is working on our own – we are lone workers at the end of the day. We have a few double-up calls, when the patient requires a lot of manual handling. So, the woman I was just speaking about would be a double-up call. The one round the corner from me is a double-up call as well because we have to manually move her around to carry out her personal care and to get her comfortable. 

Could you tell us about a specific example of a positive or meaningful experience you’ve had during your time in the care industry? 

Everything, for me, is quite positive. I walk out of everywhere knowing that I have done what I can do. As long as I have made them smile, that’s my job done at the end of the day. That’s how I look at it. I see one woman quite frequently and she’s not very well at all. We have had a very difficult time with her over the last few months. There was one day that I went in there and she smiled, and she laughed, and I was like ‘hang on a minute, what’s gone on here? You’ve been a completely different person’. I had put her hearing aids in, and it completely changed her. It didn’t last long, only about 24 hours, but she was smiling and laughing, and she could hear the television. We had been trying to get her to put these hearing aids in for months and she had refused point-blank. I met her when I first started, and she wasn’t so bad. She went on a downwards spiral, but now she has evened out a bit. We are at an alright stage at the moment. She suffers from dementia.