If you are a young person who is caring within your family, you might not realise that you are a Young Carer. If you provide your family with emotional support or practical support including shopping, cooking or money, this can have an impact on your own health, social life or education.

As a Young Carer you can get extra help and support with your caring responsibilities. The Young Carers Service is a free and friendly service, offering support to young people who are caring for a parent or sibling.

If you are aged 7-25, live in Croydon and are caring for someone with a physical disability, mental health issue, long-term illness, learning difficulty or substance dependency, then our service is here to support you.

We offer a wide range of activities to support you, including:

• Trips and Activities during all the school holidays; we organise a whole load of trips for all ages so that you can have a break from your caring role and have fun meeting other young carers of a similar age! We do things like trampolining, horseriding, cinema-trips, Nandos, Brighton and London-trips.
• Mental Health Support and Art and Play Therapy are opportunities for you to have some regular or occasional sessions of 1:1 mental health and emotional support so that you can have some time and space to help you with any issues you may be facing.
  > Self-care newsletter series
• Educational Support for those of you who'd like some support or advice around any issues around school or college, like attendance or coursework or friendships.
  Read our education newsletters.
• Family Support - although we don't have a specific family support worker, where possible we will try to support your parents, or signpost them to other places for support where we can.
• Young Adult Carers - if you're aged 17-25 then there's support as well, from 1:1 emotional support to supporting letters for bursaries or CV-writing or supporting around your independence.

Making the first call

Anyone can contact Young Carers to find out more information or to make a referral. You reach our Young Carers Service on 07522046395 and by email youngcarers@talkofftherecord.org

If you are a young person caring for someone and would like to know what kind of support is available then contact the Young Carers Service. When you get in touch, we will be able to offer you a Young Carers Assessment to let you know what kind of support is available, what activities are happening and also find out what would be helpful for you.

If you are a parent or professional and would like to make a referral, then please ask the potential young carer to complete the MACA form which can be downloaded from this page.

If you are a school professional who is looking to refer a young carer, it might also be helpful to look through this document which includes advice in identifying and supporting young carers in your school.