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| Ian |
| Dale |
| Emily |
| Living with A-T - Ian | Change Text Size |
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IAN When I was diagnosed, my parents decided not to give into the temptation to wrap me up in the proverbial cotton wool. In hindsight this was a good thing but I did not think so at the time. Other things that have helped me are having a younger sister who I tried to keep up with and having a thing called a stubborn streak. Another thing that I might mention is that a specialist told my parents that I would always have to live at home – which just goes to show that you should never take what the experts say as gospel! I went to the local village school and then to a secondary school specifically for physically handicapped people. This meant there were smaller classes so we got the attention we needed. Duke of Edinburgh Award I then went to a college near Cheltenham where I got the Duke of Edinburgh Gold Award, and a City and Guilds Diploma in Horticulture. I also got a distinction in the Certificate of Higher Education, which was one of three spoken English exams that I took. After college I went on 'Expedition Hannibal', an expedition which lasted for three weeks, travelling in a party of 80 people to the place where Hannibal crossed the Rhone. When I got back, I worked for a while at my old college, teaching map work and compass work to Duke of Edinburgh candidates. Freespace At this time I decided to put my name down to live at "Freespace" in Edinburgh. Freespace came out tops for places to live because all the others in England and Scotland were either run as a hostel or were religious, and they were not the types of places I was looking for. Neither was independent living because in the independent living package you would have a member of staff round your house all the time, as staff would be live-in, but here we have our staff on call, in a separate base. The independent package would mean also that you, personally, would have to manage staff shifts and rotas, whereas at Freespace we employ someone to do that for us. For nine years I was a director of Freespace, and for seven of these I was a convenor, which meant that if anything went wrong with the overall running of the company then I was the one with the final say. Work I work as receptionist at the Citizens' Advice Bureau through an organisation called the Volunteers Exchange, who pay my travel expenses. I find I can do my job at CAB without writing anything down because during my school years I learnt how to memorise a lot of what I had heard and my memory capacity got a lot bigger after a time. Holidays Since I have been living at Freespace I have been to America three times, Canada once, Ireland, Holland, Germany, Italy, India, Nepal, Bangkok, Hong Kong, Australia and New Zealand. I have organised these trips in conjunction with one or two members of staff from Freespace, which has involved writing off letters to various charities – hard work, and sometimes dispiriting. One of the best was my trip to Nepal, which proved that anything is possible. The real highlight of this holiday was white-water rafting for three and a half days down the Trisuli river. The rapids that we were rafting were up to Grade 4 (rapids only go up to Grade 5). In the quieter stretches the scenery was quite breath-taking. All the luggage went by van when we were rafting – including the wheelchair, which met us at night where our camp was always set up on the beach. Later when we went to a jungle camp we had to ride in dug-out canoes, past marsh mugger (flesh-eating) crocodiles. Holiday Update China I have been to China where I was for three weeks travelling between Hong Kong & Bejing. Believe it or not I travelled in 30 different forms of transport in the three weeks they included things like 4 chaps lifting me manually in my wheelchair, to piggy backs & also a Sudan chair with two Chinese gentleman either end carrying the chair on their shoulders. They took off at running pace and kept the pace up all the time even though we were going down half a mountain and some of the steps were vertical so if you were a bit scared you would have been a nervous wreck by the end! Kenya I have also been to Kenya on safari for eleven days which was very interesting far better than seeing it on T.V. Sri Lanka Also since writing I have been to Sri Lanka which is extremely beautiful, because of this it is where my sister and her husband spent their honeymoon. Prague I have also been to Prague which is a bit nearer home and if anyone goes the architecture is spectacular. Madrid I went to Madrid for five days which was very interesting. Definitely one of my highlights was the Tapas. Vietnam & Hong Kong And then I was off to Vietnam & Hong Kong for two weeks. Vietnam is very busy and a total culture shock. The people are lovely, and needless to say I thoroughly enjoyed the food. When we left Vietnam we spent a week in Hong Kong where I have my best friend who lives & works there and one day he invited us to have lunch to his place of work which is Hong Kong Yacht Club. Ironically his name is Alex and the new power chair I have had to invest in is called The Alex. Paris & Rome I was then off to Paris & Rome where I spent a week in each place. The week in Paris I was visiting another of my great friends who I met on “Expedition Hannibal” which was 20 years ago. The Rome part of this trip was extremely interesting but my everlasting memory of Rome will be cobbles and more cobbles. Future Plans My next adventure is in 2010, which I am working on as we speak, so I will be able to update you in the future. I have booked to go on a Caribbean cruise in January 2011. The ship is called “Thomson Dream” and the itinerary is called “The Cuban Adventure”. SO WATCH THIS SPACE! Mobility I ride a bicycle which was partly funded by the A-T Society and I have it all over Edinburgh even though it is a city with a lot of hills. Last year I did over 1000 miles. It has a big luggage rack on the back on which I can fold my manual wheelchair up and carry it. I also drive an F55S electric wheelchair, which is legal for road use. This makes a big difference to my independence, and as an experienced cyclist I am not scared of traffic. This is a record of how I go about poking the eye of disability. A Poke in the eye for Disability – an Update I am no longer involved in the management of Freespace, instead, at present I am the vice chairman of E.C.A.S and also board member of Edinburgh young careers. I am a Trustee of the A-T Society and also chair the A-T adult and youth consultation meetings and I fit in time to contribute to Edinburgh access council which deals with the low level buses. In-between all of these committees, I try to do a bit of cycling and go to the gym. Leading on from my Duke of Edinburgh Awards, I went on to take a disability package round different groups and schools. I occasionally run a disability awareness training for some of our staff. On occasions I am also approached by other organisations who require me to train their staff. |
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