Return Of The Blogger

I'm back.

Thank you for your patience. It's been a long, and for the most part pleasant, summer and I feel I owe an explanation for my absence from the blogosphere for it's entirety. Way too much has happened for me to cover in one post but I'll give a brief summary here and expand on details as time and my typing allow.

I left you back in June because the long decline in my dexterity finally reached a kind of tipping point and my typing became so unreliable, erratic and difficult to perform that anything otter than essential email communication became all but impossible. I have not yet found a satisfactory remedy for this but I have purchased an iPad which, with it's superior touchscreen keyboard, helps a little. It then took more time to find a suitable, but hugely expensive, stylus with which to poke at it with because my fingers are no longer up to the job. I missed blogging but the longer I left it the more things kept happening and less I felt able to catch up. Consider this post a kind of bull being taken my the horns sort of thing. I'm getting back in the saddle and mixing metaphors once more.

You may remember that long ago we started the long process of being rehoused which resulted in a slightly surreal meeting with, and letter from our MP, Tom Brake. (See Cometh The Man back in March.) Well the wheels ground awful slow but we were at last notified of a new development being built that includes wheelchair accessible accommodation complete with through lifts to move users up and down between floors. We were told, unofficially, that we were 'pencilled in' for one of these desirable properties. For weeks and then months we drove past the development and watched the walls going up and the roof being tiled. At least one extra bedroom was on offer as well as an extra bathroom and more space generally. All ideal. A few weeks ago an Occupational Therapist arrived to discuss our specific needs; hoists, bathroom adaptations and the like. He took notes, measured the wheelchair and then disappeared back to OT Land. Days passed. Then we received a phone call from him to say that lift that was being installed was too small to take my wheelchair. The lift shaft had been built into the fabric of the house and it was too late to change it. We wouldn't be moving after all.

We contacted Tom Brake again and stiff letters are being written but in the current climate of cuts it seems unlikely that new housing will get built in the foreseeable future. It seems a pity that no one thought to wonder what kind of wheelchairs might or might not fit in the house before they built them. I suppose they didn't want to waste precious space.

I will call it a day for now. Next time I'll tell you how I went yellow in August and ended up in hospital. Thanks for reading.

Until next time. (Soon, I hope.)

Cometh The Man

A few weeks ago we were assessed by a surveyor who came and told we have a condensation problem in out flat. We were aware of this because we had spotted the patch of black mold growing in the corner of our bedroom and behind various wardrobes. The surveyor, a nice woman, surveyed the BiPap, the electric bed, the air-mattress, the hoist, the wheelchair, the battery charger, the cough-assist machine and nebuliser, and explained that we have too much equipment in too small a space. The air, she said, could not circulate and we need more space. We are not, she said, adequately housed. Contact your MP (Member of Parliament), she advised. And, having exhausted other avenues and being very suggestible, that is exactly what we did.

To that end, last week, we were visited by Tom Brake, Liberal Democrat Member of Parliament for Carshalton and Wallington at home. He came and drank a cup of tea, declined a plate of biscuits, discussed the forthcoming general election and listened attentively while we explained the situation. We showed him a folder full of letters from medical type people saying we need more space. We presented to him two growing children. We told him of some the problems we face on a day-to-day basis. We explained how the cramped conditions made it difficult for carers to work safely and how they had to squeeze past the end of the bed to perform their duties. Tom nodded in all the right places and said that although he could make no promises he would see what he could do.

A few days later Tom sent us a letter summarizing our meeting. He asked us to grant authorisation to someone on the council to access our files and in addition to following up on our request for rehousing and, in the short term, a suitable hoist. made this rather surreal recommendation -

“allocation of carers who are small enough to squeeze into the currently very confined space.”

This is a splendid example of parliamentary lateral thinking. We don't really need larger accommodation we just need smaller people. Brilliant. It seems an odd thing to focus on but that's probably why I've never sought public office, I just don't have that capacity for problem solving.

Obviously I will keep you informed of any progress. I'll also let you know if I see any signs of carer shrinkage.

Until next time.