A carer who started a support group for people whose partners live with dementia has brought her organisation to Braintree.

Jackie Fildes, from Chelmsford, has been her husband’s carer for eight years after his Alzheimer’s diagnosis, and says at times she felt invisible to those around her.

To help meet people in similar situations, Mrs Fildes set up charitable organisation Other Halves in 2015.

The group has been successful in Chelmsford and meets for crafts, boules, lunches and other activities.

Mrs Fildes said: “We are very popular in Chelmsford but we are trying to get it going in Braintree.

“I have been caring for someone for eight years and it is not easy, sometimes carers feel very invisible.

“The group is for partners and loved ones of people with dementia. It is their club not the person with the condition.

“It is very much a moral support group. Now it has really taken off. In the last ten days I have had three enquiries.”

Mrs Fildes says her ultimate goal is to have a group in every region to support those with a loved one from the moment they are diagnosed.

The group meets at the Archer Community Centre in East Street.

The organisation has now set up a card to be used in restaurants, which alerts staff the table is still in use if a carer needs to leave the table to support a loved one.

Debbie Gair, ambassador for Other Halves, said: “People are taking their partners in for something to eat, the partner wants to go to the toilet and is taking a while so the carer gets a bit concerned.

“They have to get up to go and find them, when they come back everything has been cleared.”

The Braintree craft group runs on the second Monday of the month.

For information phone 07955345290, email info@otherhalves.org.uk or visit otherhalves.org.uk.