The Past Caring Project: a carer-led narrative research project about carer bereavement

In the Past Caring Project, carers got together to develop research around carer bereavement from the people who quietly experience it. The Past Caring Project collected stories of people who have spent a long time (three to 30 years) caring for a person before they died or for a person lost to dementia. The project was about what comes next, their feelings and experiences.

The draft research findings are grouped around six key emergent themes: stress, death stories, positive perceptions of caring, experience to care, social world and money matters.  The research authors feel this project is a powerful and adaptable carer-led research model that can support and enable a larger group of bereaved carers.  They are interested in creating a platform to explore the best ways for carers to bring about change in their communities through their own research.

Get in touch if you are interested in their work or would like to share your own experiences of developing service-user led research opportunities.  Contact: Victoria Jones (Carer Researcher) or Wendy Rickard (Folk.us Research Fellow), email victoriashrubbery@btinternet.com or W.Rickard@exeter.ac.uk  or telephone  0139 240 3049 or 07805 420465.

Website:  INVOLVE The Past Caring Project