Our innovative peer-to-peer approach supports people who are caring for a loved one who is ageing. Lifewise Weavers are people with lived caring experience. They’ve been there, and they get it.
Hi, I’m the Weavers Local Connector
“My role is to support the Weavers program in many different ways from bringing Weavers and Carers together to networking with service providers.
“I work with the Weavers to create opportunities for learning and sharing that enables them to provide focussed support within the match.”
I’ll help you get started
“Through connecting and sharing knowledge with local services, I can build relationships in support of us working together for Family Carers.
“I’m the face that a Carer you refer to me will first meet. In hearing their story, I am able to connect them to a Weaver who can provide support.
“I work with the Weavers to create opportunities for learning and sharing that enables them to provide focussed support within the match.”
“Caring is hard, it can help to have someone show you different ways.”
Hi, I’m Penelope, I’m a Weaver
“I am involved with Weavers because it allows me to make a significant difference in a difficult caring journey for other people while at the same time providing me with a group of wonderful peers and support from an innovative and proactive organisation.”
“When you are caring, life is pretty full on. It can feel like your head is spinning.”
Hi, I’m Dean, I’m also a Weaver
“I am involved with Weavers because I am keen to use the experience gained in caring for my wife to assist others who find themselves in a caring role, working through with them the emotional and practical issues associated with it.
“An essential aspect of Weavers to me is that the group consists of people with significant long-term experience as carers who support each other on a teamwork basis.”
“Caring for Mum and Dad was a huge learning curve. I wish that I had someone who knew what it was like to share what they had learnt.”
Why Weavers is needed
Weavers is an innovative peer-to-peer approach supporting people caring for a loved one who is ageing.
Weavers are people with lived caring experience, they’ve been there, and they get it. They are supported to use this unique knowledge and hard won experience as a resource to support Family Carers, one to one in their local community.
Weavers was designed by The Australian Centre for Social Innovation (TACSI). TACSI exists to develop, test and spread innovations that change lives for the people who need it most. At the heart of TACSI lies the fundamental belief that people are the experts in their own lives. We believe that the best innovations come from working alongside the people who face the very challenges we’re trying to solve.
How Weavers works
The Lifewise Weavers programme works by providing support along the caring journey.
We find and train people with lived care experience and match them with people who are currently caring for a loved one who is ageing. They work together to help tackle some of life’s toughest challenges.
We refer to those wanting support as: ‘Family Carers’ and those volunteering support as ‘Weavers’, the professional who guides our matches is known as a ‘Local Connector’ providing indirect support.
Weavers works through four key challenges most Carers face in their role with the aim of equipping them with tools and ways of looking at problems that enable them to adapt to the growing needs of their loved one. The four challenges are best understood framed from the Carer perspective:
Help me to involve family and friends.
“I want people around me to be more helpful”
Help me to navigate and negotiate the services maze.
“You just don’t know what’s out there and how to get it”
Help me sustain things for myself
“People tell me to look after myself, but how?”
Help to make sense of my thoughts and emotions
“I feel like I lost my best friend.”
Safety is a priority in this essential service
While Auckland is at COVID-19 Alert Level 1, please continue to keep hygiene front-of-mind. Track where you have been and wear a mask if you can. Our teams will continue to work with our existing clients.
If you are an employee who needs to register with Healthline for leave payment due to self-isolation, please register at https://healthy.org.nz. Do not ring Healthline.
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