Caring Self

L. Stacey Clare

Description

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, there were approximately 1.7 million home health aides and personal and home care aides in the United States as of 2008. These home care aides are rapidly becoming the backbone of America's system of long-term care, and their numbers continue to grow. Often referred to as frontline care providers or direct care workers, home care aides-disproportionately women of color-bathe, feed, and offer companionship to the elderly and disabled in the context of the home. In The Caring Self, Clare L. Stacey draws on observations of and interviews with aides working in Ohio and California to explore the physical and emotional labor associated with the care of others. Aides experience material hardships-most work for minimum wage, and the services they provide are denigrated as unskilled labor-and find themselves negotiating social norms and affective rules associated with both family and work. This has negative implications for workers who struggle to establish clear limits on their emotional labor in the intimate space of the home. Aides often find themselves giving more, staying longer, even paying out of pocket for patient medications or incidentals; in other words, they feel emotional obligations expected more often of family members than of employees. However, there are also positive outcomes: some aides form meaningful ties to elderly and disabled patients. This sense of connection allows them to establish a sense of dignity and social worth in a socially devalued job. The case of home care allows us to see the ways in which emotional labor can simultaneously have deleterious and empowering consequences for workers.

Sujets

• Sociologie, société et politique
• Sociology
• Medical sociology
• Industrial relations
• Health

Informations

• Publié par: Cornell University Press
• Date de parution: 07 juillet 2011
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780801463310
• Langue: English

Extrait

The Caring Self

A volume in the series The Culture and Politics of Health Care Work edited by Suzanne Gordon and Sioban Nelson

A list of titles in this series is available at www.cornellpress.cornell.edu.

The Caring Self

The Work Experiences of Home Care Aides

Clare L. Stacey

ILR Press an imprint of Cornell University Press Ithaca and London

Copyright © 2011 by Cornell University

All rights reserved. Except for brief quotations in a review, this book, or parts thereof, must not be reproduced in any form without permission in writing from the publisher. For information, address Cornell University Press, Sage House, 512 East State Street, Ithaca, New York 14850.

First published 2011 by Cornell University Press First printing, Cornell Paperbacks, 2011

Printed in the United States of America

Library of Congress CataloginginPublication Data Stacey, Clare L. (Clare Louise), 1973–  The caring self : the work experiences of home care aides / Clare L. Stacey.  p. cm. — (The culture and politics of health care work)  Includes bibliographical references and index.  ISBN 9780801449857 (cloth : alk. paper) —  ISBN 9780801476990 (pbk. : alk. paper)  1. Home health aides—United States. 2. Home care services— Social aspects—United States. 3. Home care services—United States—Psychological aspects. I. Title. II. Series: Culture and politics of health care work.  RA645.35.S68 2011  362.14—dc22 2010052641

Cornell University Press strives to use environmentally responsible suppliers and materials to the fullest extent possible in the publishing of its books. Such materials include vegetablebased, lowVOC inks and acid free papers that are recycled, totally chlorinefree, or partly composed of nonwood fibers. For further information, visit our website at www.cornellpress.cornell.edu.

Cloth printing Paperback printing

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

For my parents

Acknowledgments

Contents

Introduction: On the Front Lines of Care

1. The Costs of Caring

2. Doing the Dirty Work: The Physical and Emotional Labor of Home Care

3. The Rewards of Caring

4. Organizing Home Care

Conclusion: Improving the Conditions of Paid Caregiving

Appendix: Methods Notes References Index

ix

1 24

43 85 137 156

171 177 183 193

Acknowledgments

Meeting and talking to nursing aides over the last ten years has given me a very real appreciation of what it means to care for another person. Watching aides interact with elderly or disabled clients opened my eyes to the stresses associated with care, and also convinced me that caregiving— especially when carried out in the right conditions—can affirm social ties and give lives meaning, whether we are on the giving or receiving end. I am indebted to the paid caregivers who agreed to talk with me and share their daily experiences. I thank them for opening up their homes and sites of work, and for their candor in talking about both the rewards and con straints of the job. It is my hope that the reading public will take note of their stories and begin to question the low wages and lack of labor protec tions afforded these workers. In writing this book, I benefited from the care and support of many peo ple. At the University of CaliforniaDavis, mentors, friends, and colleagues read through rough drafts, listened to inchoate ideas, and supported me un conditionally, even during my most neurotic and disorganized moments.