Yesterday was not only my dads birthday. In 2016 the 3rd of October became a memorable date for me for another reason...It was the day I moved into my own house...so yesterday marked 4 years for me living in my own house. (It was the best birthday present my dad got that year, seeing me start a new chapter in my own home)
Moving into your own home is a significant milestone is anyone's life. Its a step that confirms you are definitely an adult and that you now have responsibilities. However as some of you know, i had a bit of a battle to get my own house so not only was this a step that every adult should take in life, the 3rd of October 2016 also marked the end of a 6 month stay in a dementia care unit, where I had been inappropriately placed in my bid to find accessible housing
Cutting a very long story short, until the April of 2016 i had lived in Red Cross Options for Independence, a transitional residential unit where the ethos was that disabled people lived there until they were found accessible housing with the right support in the community, by which time we would have learned skills and built our confidence to live independently. However, due to the lack of accessible housing as well as other contributing factors, rather than living in this unit for a short time. the reality was that people actually lived there for significant periods of time. I lived there for 7 years and another person had lived there for 16 years prior to the units closure in April 2016
News of this imminent closure came in November 2015, meant that 21 individuals with a range of disabilities from various local authorities had to be re-housed and over 70 staff were loosing their jobs. Not only that, but also a much needed respite service used by disabled people all over West Central Scotland would also close. I was the first person living in the unit to be told the news because my 6 month review fell in the middle of the news of redundancies being broken to staff. This meant that my Social Worker was the first from a local authority to be informed too.
There were some people who lived in the unit who loved it and who believed that they would live there long term, even before the closure was announced. For me I always knew it was a stop gap and already had my name on multiple housing lists. Even so, I still felt like my world had turned upside down when I was told and needed time to process the news but also what this could potentially mean for me....
I very quickly had my answer....It meant another personal battle. It became abundantly clear that the local authority just thought I would go back and live with my dad. All they could see was that my dads house was accessible and probably that if I lived with him he could fill in gaps in my support so they wouldn't have to provide it. It would have been the easiest option for them.
I understood that the closure of the unit in such a short period from when we were told was putting multiple authorities backs against the wall, with some having to find suitable housing alternatives for more than one person with additional support needs. This is where I had to be a little bit selfish and advocate for my rights and fight for what I needed to live my life and be as independent as possible. The local authority were choosing to overlook what going back to live with my dad would mean for me, the fact that I would loose my independence, my business that i just established at this point and the life I had built. My dad would have taken me back to live with him in a second if I had said I wanted to go and 4 years on still would if I said to him that wanted to move back in with him. According to the local authority the only other option at this point was for me to move into a nursing home. I was 30 years old.
Despite it being difficult for my dad he knows that moving home with him wasn't an option for me. His house might be accessible but that's it. Kilbirnie where he lives has no choice of accessible shops, uneven pavements and non existent accessible transport links. This is only a few of the reasons why the idea of returning to live in Kilbirnie filled me with dread. Despite my dads unconditional love and support as well as the support of others around me, If I'm honest I only existed when I lived in Kilbirnie, I didn't have a life.
I was also fighting this battle for my dad. He's 'old-school' in that being born in a different era, he would've been more inclined to just accept that 'it would only be temporary' when the local authority were trying to convince me to return home with my dad. I knew this wouldn't be true and deep down so did he. If I had agreed to move home the local authority would have forgotten I existed because I was safe with my dad and potentially i would've still been there now
For me it wasn't just about me and my life. it was about my dad and his life too. I wasn't the only one who had built a life in the 7 years that i had already lived independently in the Options For Independence unit, my dad had too. He could go out without having to worry about being back incase i needed anything and he had been away on holiday with his partner by this point, something he wouldn't have felt able to do previously when i lived with him as i only received minimal support from the local authority, It was more than that though...living independently meant that my dad was no longer my carer...he's my dad and that was and still is so important to me. We now have a father/daughter relationship and phone each other for a chat as opposed to him always being there as my main carer which resulted in limited conversation between us because whether it was at home or going out socially, he always had to be there up to a point. During my battle for accessible housing my social worker told my dad that he had 'a very vocal daughter'. When my dad told me this it made me laugh, Did my social worker expect my dad to say that he would tell me to shut up??? Instead my dad said 'Yes, and she will continue to be vocal until she gets what she needs'.
And that's what I did, giving my story first to the local press which ruffled a few feathers but didn't get much of a response. I decided i had nothing to loose and gave my story to the BBC. That's when things started to change. I already had a pre-arranged meeting with the local authority the following day as the closure of the unit was drawing closer and i had yet to agree to move anywhere without assurances that it would be temporary. By this point i had enlisted the support of the local provost who supported me through-out my housing battle.
We attended the meeting the day after my story was reported by the BBC and although it started with Kilbirnie or a Care Home still being the only option by the time it finished I had been offered a house, my house which i accepted later the same day. Personally I think the Kilbirnie/care Home conversation was a way of buying them some time as it was during the meeting that they received a call advising them that a house was available. Please don't be mistaken, I am in no way advocating that you should go to the media when you have a disability and find yourself in a position where you feel you have no other choice but to challenge the system...what i am saying is that you don't have to just accept what you are advised by the system. if my battle for housing highlights anything it's that it's amazing what a bit of pressure from the media and your locally elected members can do.
The battle didn't end there. I spent the next 6 months inappropriately placed in a dementia care unit until my house was adapted which brought further challenges with it, ensuring the right adaptations were done. I can only describe this time as 'soul destroying' but i also knew that I had to do it to get to where I needed to be... and that's here, in my own house on Sunday afternoon writing this blog, one of the many things I do through my business Your Options Understood (Y.O.U) to highlight issues faced by disabled people but also how these can be overcome.
Four years on, when I look back I wonder how I actually managed to get through that time. Many times I nearly admitted defeat but somewhere inside me I found the fight to carry on. My house isn't perfect with other adaptations required but it's my space and I've slowly put my stamp on it with my love of colour etc. My house gives me the independence to live the life i want to lead and with Y.O.U slowing growing Y.O.U and I will strive to ensure other disabled people have the right support to overcome challenges they are faced with
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