Tag: Personal Care

Cacoon

On By Katy DalyIn My Disability TruthLeave a comment

As I write this, I am underneath two blankets, one is heated the other is not, the nonheated one is over my head.

Image Description: A closeup selfie, cut off at the nose. I am looking slightly off to the left of the camera, a white blanket covering the top right of the shot.

The heated blanket under the quilt helps to warm me faster. It gets pretty hot under here. But the heat helps enormously with pain, after being out in the cold.

I have not long gotten back after an over night trip, which has required me both to sleep in my wheelchair and to not get changed for more than 24 hours. Rail replacement buses and the joys of travelling on a Sunday, were also part of the, adventure.

I plan to write more about this in a future post, because it’s been an experience, as it usually is. But right now, I need to try to chill for an hour or so until the carers come and I can get into bed and properly relax. I just don’t have the energy, unsurprisingly, to go into detail about all this right now.

Trips

On By Katy DalyIn BlogLeave a comment

So today I finalised some plans for upcoming short trip with family. And when I say short trips I mean short the longest one is overnight.

Now going to the majority of places leads to some element for an inaccessibility for me, I actually think that’s being generous. I don’t have the time energy or willpower to write down every instance of an accessibility I face. Honestly I think I would get bored. But the point being whenever I go anywhere I have to make the decision as to whether I’m willing to accept the inaccessibility that that will inevitably involve. There is ultimately something I have to sacrifice, if I didn’t I would never get to do anything. I’ve decided that it is worth it for these trips.

Most of the sacrifices I make surround my incontinence and personal care, for one particular trip it is no different. For the overnight trip I have to go without care for 24 hours, experience unknown inclines and access to properties, sleep in my wheelchair, and tackle the public transport in an area unknown to me.

The final part of this might not sound like much of a difficult thing to do. However growing up and an inaccessible world I know that it is possible that I may not be able to use the public transport that is supposed to form part of the journey I will be taking. In this instance this is actually the backup plan to getting a taxi, which I’m even more concerned about being accessible to me.

Now as I’ve said these are all things I’m willing to do, and to be honest there are things I try not to think about too much. I tried to focus on the fun I will be having, particularly this time, as both of these are for family parties. It is difficult though, and in many ways I am not looking forward to these events as much as I am looking forward to them.

Just remember you can never be sure of how much effort someone has made to attend something. What inaccessibility they might have faced? What they might be giving up? I’m not writing this to spread guilt. They have made the decision fully knowing what it would cost them and they still wanted to come. Consider it a privilege that everyone who can attend has. And don’t blame those that can’t, for not.

Sometimes the internalised ablesim hits later

On By Katy DalyIn BlogLeave a comment

So you may recall my post from late last week exploring (all be it briefly) a night out with my family. At the end of the night, one of the people outside of my immediate family that was present helped to get me into bed.

While they were helping me, it did not bother me as I knew that I needed their help at the time. I even let them have a go in my wheelchair and hoist. Any OTs that stumble across my blog, you did not read that last sentence.

In the days which followed, I began to feel guilty about the way they had to help me, even though they were the one to offer to help me.

Sometimes I wonder if the guilt of needing help will ever leave me alone you know. I don’t think needing help is bad of course, but sometimes the reality of just what I need help with is hard.

However I will still take the help which is an improvement from the complete avoidance, which is where I used to be at with needing help from outside my immediate family. In other words, I would just insist that I didn’t need the help, because of who it was coming from. At least now the guilt comes later, and it doesn’t prevent me from getting the help I need.

Remember you deserve the help you need, no matter how you feel about it. Your feelings can lie to you.