The aim of my writing is to attempt to raise awareness of the enduring effects of severe and prolonged poverty and deprivation. There are currently 175,000 children in the UK alone who act in the caring roll for a family member with a physical disability or illness. These children are known to the authorities and there is some support available. However, many children care for parent/s with mental health, alcohol and drug related problems and remain invisible to the system. Marginalised and abused children are often overlooked even today, and risk becoming marginalised and abused adults who may never receive acknowledgment or respect for the immense physical and emotional burden they carry from childhood, or indeed have their full potential realised. 'The social, psychological and physical impact that caring for an adult can have on a child is starkly presented in Breath in the Dark.' University of Nottingham.