For Carol, her support worker Fresa is an “absolute gem”. Carol is 76 years old and lives in her own home in Spencer, New South Wales. She engaged Fresa as an independent support worker on Mable 6 months ago. 

Carol’s daughter Pieta lives in Melbourne. So it was important to her that her mum had the support she needed.

“I moved to Melbourne three years ago and Mum moved to Spencer about 18 months ago,” Pieta explains. “Back then, her health was a lot better. But she has been unwell in the last 12 months, and now needs extra support.”

“There is no way I could feel as secure as I do about her living in Spencer unless I knew she had a great team around her,” Pieta adds.

How Carol found support through Mable

Pieta already has a support team on Mable for her daughter, who is an NDIS participant. So choosing Mable for her mum was easy.

Carol now has a self-managed Home Care Package through Homemade, so that she has more flexibility in how she uses her funding. 

The next step was to build a support team. Carol’s first support worker was Lynne, who she invited to join Mable.

Carol says, “Lynne drives me to appointments and things, she’ll even drive me to Wiseman’s Ferry for yoga, if I’m not having a good day.” 

For Carol’s second support worker, Pieta wanted someone who could help Carol in the home. “This was hard because she really didn’t want someone coming into her house and doing her jobs,” Pieta says.

“I didn’t want just a house cleaner. I wanted somebody who would talk to her, check in with her, and shared interests with her,” Pieta adds.

Carol met Fresa at a friend’s funeral. At the time, Fresa was caring for her friend. “And so, I think I inherited her. That’s how I feel about it anyway,” Carol says.

Getting support in the home

Fresa began working with Carol in 2022.  

“I’ve been working with Carol for 6 months,” Fresa says. “We became close really quickly. We talk to each other about anything. I like to listen and Carol likes to talk. We have the same sense of humour.”

At home, Fresa helps Carol with household tasks such as sweeping, checking her mail and folding the laundry. 

“We spend a lot of time chatting while I’m working and we always stop for a cup of tea at the end,” Fresa says.

For Carol, “Fresa is an absolute gem!” 

She says, “We all love Fresa. I’ve always said to Pieta, I was so lucky that we found her. She will turn her hand to anything for me.”

Independence through Mable

For Carol, the most important benefit is the choice and control she gets through Mable and self-managing her home care package. 

She says, “I get to choose who supports me. I don’t have to go with the person that the company sends. I don’t have to worry about who might be knocking at the door next week because they’ve changed the carers or something like that. It’s all worked out so well for me.”

For Pieta, it means that she is able to visit her mum as a daughter. She says, “I’m not always anxious and worried, I can come and visit her and have a great time with her right now.”

Benefits of booking support on Mable

For Pieta, the ease of using Mable has been important. She says, “You can just put in a postcode and look for support workers. You can see their profile, the services they offer and the rates they charge.”

She adds, “You can also see reviews. All of this starts to build a picture of who the person is, and really gives you a sense of trust as you start to talk to people.”

Pieta also finds it helpful to see checks that each support worker profile shows, such as a police check.

She says, “I can see if they have any qualifications, I know that they have their insurance in place and that they can only provide services they’re qualified for. I think that’s really important.”

You can find support on Mable too

Mable connects clients looking for aged care and disability support with independent support workers in their local area. 

By booking and managing support through Mable:

• Clients choose who supports them, when and where they are supported, and how much they pay for the support
• Clients are safeguarded by Mable’s strict verification process and the high-level suite of insurances arranged by Mable on behalf of support workers.