Eldest daughter Emily has Down syndrome and will graduate from high school this year.

Her parents are two of 2.8 million informal carers across the country, according to latest figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).

The average age of carers is 55 years, and 96 per cent of primary carers were family and 68.1 per cent more likely to be female.

While Emily is high functioning, her parents work hard to ensure she has every opportunity to develop work and social skills. 

Besides school, there are dance classes, work experience at a hair salon, hospitality studies at TAFE and Zumba. 

“Between that our week is pretty full, my wife carries most of the load, she’s an amazing woman,” Mr Watt said. 

“She spends a lot of time taking Emily to and from places … a lot of our care is around social skills and getting her ready for that transition from school to real life.”

Next year will be full of changes for the Lake Albert family.

A prolific dancer, Emily will begin pursuing her dream of working in media or performance.

The National Disability Insurance Scheme will also be rolled out across the Riverina, a game changer which will tie funding around people with a disability.

“For us it’s exciting, because what it does is allow us to have a greater say in how the money is utilised,” Mr Watt said.

“We are fairly creative people, by pooling with other families and working with agencies you can come up with some pretty novel strategies.”

For the Watt family, National Carers Week was a moment not to think of their own situation, but for others who may not be as fortunate.

“There are a lot of grandparents, single parents supporting kids with a high level disability which must be really hard,” he said.

“We are very fortunate with the position we are in. “We don’t view ourselves as carers, we view ourselves as a family.

“But there are people out there through different circumstances their full time role is caring, and my hat is off to them.”