I didn’t sign up for doing more than 48 hours a week.. I took them at the interview I wanted to do about 3 days a week. but they still kept hounding me to do more hours.. I have 4 children, and it felt like I couldn’t make any plans. I once worked 12 days in a row, so was looking forward to a day off, the night before they called me and asked if I could work it. I told them what days I could work and they still called me on them days to work them. My children used to get upset because some days I would be out of the house most of the day. I looked forward to what little days off I had, I would take my children out for the day and they would be ringing me while was out.. I had to put my phone on silent. I ended up giving it up as it wasn’t good for my mental health or my children’s. Some client calls would be more than a couple of hours apart.. and you don’t get paid between calls.. I felt like I spend more time waiting in the car than anything. The mileage for petrol is so poor. I was out of pocket by the extra I had to put in the tank. One shadow shift and then you are left to get on with it.. and expect to know it all. I had to fit a convene and change a catheter.. I had never done that before, ended up looking on YouTube. At interview I said clearly I only wanted to work in my area, they agreed. Then when I was assigned clients every single one of them was in a different borough! Stressful, demanding. Not allowed a social life.
