Diagnosis & need
Au pair support for a child with epilepsy
Support for families with a child with epilepsy
When a child lives with epilepsy, this can affect everyday family life in very different ways.
For some children, seizures are well controlled and epilepsy plays only a small part in daily life. Other children have seizures more often, need closer supervision, or also live with a developmental delay, a disability or a rare condition.
For parents, this often means thinking ahead, organising and accompanying — while also fitting together kindergarten or school, siblings, work, free time and ordinary everyday family life.
An au pair for a family with a child with epilepsy can provide support in everyday life and create additional relief.
At Besondere Sterne, we place au pairs specifically with families with children with and without a disability or additional needs — including families with children with epilepsy.
Epilepsy in everyday family life
Epilepsy is not the same for every child.
There are different forms of epilepsy and types of seizure. How often seizures occur, what they look like and how much they affect daily life varies from child to child.
Some children attend kindergarten or school, do sport and are entirely independent in many areas.
Other children need more support or supervision because of their epilepsy. Others again also live with a learning disability or physical disability, a developmental delay or a genetic syndrome.
That is why our placements do not focus on the diagnosis of epilepsy alone.
What matters is:
What does your child's day look like, and where does your family need support?
How can an au pair support a family with a child with epilepsy?
An au pair can take on many everyday family tasks that are separate from the child's medical care.
Depending on the child's age, independence and support needs, an au pair might, for example:
- play, read, do craft activities or spend time outdoors together,
- accompany the child to and from kindergarten or school,
- accompany the child to leisure activities,
- support everyday routines,
- spend afternoons together with the child,
- prepare simple meals for the children,
- take on light everyday tasks involving the children,
- look after siblings,
- stay with one child while parents are out with a sibling,
- take on babysitting within the agreed working hours.
Which tasks an au pair can actually take on always needs to be discussed individually with the family.
When additional supervision is needed
Depending on the type of epilepsy, there can be situations in which a child needs more supervision than a child of the same age without epilepsy.
It is therefore important for an au pair to know which rules apply in the family's daily life.
Is the child allowed to play alone in the garden?
Which leisure activities are possible?
Are there situations in which an adult must always be present?
What does anyone looking after the child need to know about their epilepsy?
Parents know their child's individual situation and can explain to the au pair what needs particular attention in everyday life.
Open and precise communication before the placement is especially important here.
What happens during a seizure?
When an au pair looks after a child with epilepsy, they should know how to act if a seizure occurs.
The family should therefore go through with the au pair exactly what the child's seizures typically look like, which safety measures to observe, and when parents or medical help must be called.
In doing so, the au pair should act solely according to the parents' clear instructions and the child's medical emergency plan.
The aim is not to turn an au pair into a medical professional.
It is about someone looking after the child knowing what to do in an emergency and who to contact.
An au pair does not provide medical care
A clear boundary is particularly important when it comes to epilepsy.
An au pair is not a carer and not a medical professional.
Medical treatment and responsibility for medication, therapy and medical decisions lie with the parents and the treating professionals.
Tasks that require medical or nursing expertise are not part of an au pair's regular duties.
Before a placement, it must therefore be made transparent which medical requirements exist and which tasks must be carried out exclusively by parents or suitably qualified people.
An au pair can still be a great support — because alongside medical care, a whole family life continues every day.
A child with epilepsy is more than their diagnosis
When parents constantly have to watch for possible seizures, epilepsy can become very present in family life.
But for a child, life consists of a great deal more.
Meeting friends.
Going to the playground.
Listening to music.
Drawing.
Sport.
Baking together.
Watching a film.
Fooling around.
An au pair does not join a family to constantly see a child as a patient.
They can be an additional young person in the child's life, with whom ordinary childhood everyday life is possible.
When epilepsy is part of another condition
Epilepsy can occur on its own or alongside other additional needs.
Some children with a developmental delay, a learning disability or a physical disability also have epilepsy.
Epilepsy can also be part of the picture with various rare genetic conditions, for example with Angelman syndrome, Rett syndrome, Dravet syndrome or tuberous sclerosis.
Where a child has multiple disabilities or several diagnoses, we therefore do not look at each feature in isolation.
We look at the whole child and at what support is actually needed in everyday family life.
Which au pair suits a child with epilepsy?
This depends very much on the individual situation.
A child with rare, well-controlled seizures may call for different things than a child who has seizures regularly and needs ongoing closer supervision.
For some families, it is especially important that an au pair can stay calm and composed.
Others are looking above all for someone reliable for siblings, everyday journeys and ordinary family life.
Depending on the level of support needed, experience with children with a disability or additional needs can be helpful.
A sense of responsibility, reliability and willingness to get to know the family's individual rules closely are also important.
Relief can start with the siblings too
Doctor's appointments, examinations or hospital stays can take up a great deal of time.
For families with several children in particular, an additional person in everyday life can therefore be enormously valuable.
While parents attend a medical appointment with their child, the au pair can pick up a sibling from kindergarten or school.
They can go with them to sport, do homework together, or simply shape an ordinary afternoon.
In this way, an au pair can help ensure that the other children's needs are not overlooked, even in especially intense periods.
Finding an au pair for a child with epilepsy
At Besondere Sterne, we support families with children with epilepsy in finding a suitable au pair.
Together, we look at how your child's epilepsy shows up in everyday life, how much support is needed, and what tasks you would like from an au pair.
We also take any additional diagnoses or additional needs into account when looking for suitable au pairs.
You then get to know possible au pairs and decide for yourself who is the right person for your child and your family.
Getting to know each other
Looking for an au pair for a child with epilepsy?
Then get to know our au pairs and find support that fits your everyday family life.
Besondere Sterne is an au pair agency — not a special-education service and not an advice centre. For legal and specialist questions there is the EUTB: teilhabeberatung.de. Go to whichever advice centre you feel comfortable with.