We chose to adopt children with disabilities! It could be arued we chose to have two home grown too...not sure how far I agree with that but wouldn't swap them for the world! Yes we chose to move from our previous inadequate home to another that still did not have everything in it we need to meet the needs of our children.
However, Our decision to leave our previous homw was fuelled by several factors! Our primary aim has been to enhance the quality of life for our chidren, in doing that to improve the quality of life for the family as a whole. On realising we needed to move from the place we called home for 9 years we searched the internet for properties we could adapt to meet the needs of our complex family! A family that has 3 children with very different disabilities hs complex housing needs. Add to that two healthy children and a need to be away from the main roads it is hard to find a suitable property for a price we could afford!
Having searched for weeks we discovered the only area where there were more than 1 property potentially suitable we headed off to look.
This house was the first we viewed, it had so much going for it! A large Garden, away from main roads space to adapt and a range of hospitals in easy traveling distance! A special school a Church primary School rural location, everything we were looking for! OK it would be good if it was already set up perfectly but that would be expecting too much!
We looked at many other properties, some had nice bathrooms, one had a downstairs bathroom, another had a wonderful garden, none had enough rooms for us to move into without needing immediate extenision. At least this house had the rooms even if they were not adequate!
So we put in an offer and moved 3 months later. We knew that he Social Services departement had an obligation to assess the chidlren's needs and arrange adaptations and so we started out on the long road of the DFG application.
we had a very good idea of how our lives could be made easier, how the children's personal care needs could be met, it was fairly simple really. Of course it is not ever that easy.
We are now over 14 months down the line and have been so frustrated with the arguments against meeting our children's needs. my own health has suffed seriously in the stress of the fight to get tose needs met, so much so that I am now registered as disabled myself! Life has becme more difficult! Life is at times almost uncopable with. Without my Fith in a perfect just almighty God I would never have managed to keep going, there have been times I have wanted to just curl up and let it all go away!
Of course my Mama Bear instincts to protect and provide for my children wakes m up from those moments! I get up, pick up a book on law, check my facts and tart writing letters, the frustrating part of dealing with a diverse group of professionals is that they all blm each other for the bits they don;t want to be drawn on. We are caught between a district Council and a County Council. Neither of them are prepared to see life from our view point!
Have we made a tiny tiny bit of progress this time? I think we have made it absolutely clear we will not accept their proposal to meet needs, what they refuse to accept is that their proposal does no mee need. However hey have agreed to allow us the proposed cost of their works towards our proposal! Accepting that we will continue to argue that their proposal does not meet the need and that they are liable to meet the needs of all the children and therefore to fund the whole project! we live in hope!
Of course nothing is so simple that they will now allow us to proceed with our works, we now have to wait for architect to come back and remeasure for the works they propose and for builders to come and quote on their proposal, before they will allow us to start work on ours!
More waiting, more delay!
Meanwhile my condition is geting worse again! I am now feeling drained and despondant! They I am sure will sleep with a clear conscince secure in the knowledge they have sfegurded their budget a litle longer!
I do not know what the future holds but I am glad I know who holds the future!
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1 comment:
Glad to hear there is some progress, however small. It's so exhausting isn't it.
Go get 'em Mama bear!
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