Winter Wonderland

We promised our son a trip to winter wonderland this winter and fulfilled this promise at the start of the new year, a couple of days before the fair closes. 

We were able to park on double yellow lines outside the fair using our blue badges and get our wheelchairs to the entrance. For some reason Winfer Wonderland was all set up on a platform this year so our first obstacle was the entrance itself, a sheer step up which took two run up attemps in my electric wheelchair and a lot of heaving for the manual chair. The bouncers offered to help me but there wasn't anything they could realistically have done without a ramp being present.

Once inside we wandered around, past the fire pit and food stands, past the ticket booth and bar and down another step to the rides. My son wanted to go in the fun house and see what else was suitable. My son chose three rides to go on and with the way the tokens were priced it was cheaper to buy enough tokens for 4 rides rather than just 3. This meant two goes on the favourite ride...the fun house. Luckily my son can still stand and walk just enough to be able to manage the fun house with a break afterwards and before. I hope that will be the case for years to come but honestly I don't know. 

The last ride of the three was a wild  choice, a bouncing and spinning ride that went very fast forwards and backwards. Very unlike my son to go on  something like that but off P went. Watching the ride was torturous, I filmed it all, knowing P probably wouldn't go in it again. At the end I asked if P was OK with thumbs up and got thumbs down as a response. Not ok. Thankfully P was alright, just a bit shaky and unsteady but not sick. 

In between the rides we toasted some marshmallows, bought candy floss, had a hot drink and shared some chips too. The second fun house trip allowed time for that to all go down a bit. I offered ice skating as an option but P didn't fancy it that day so we will go to the ice rink one day instead.

Getting down the step to exit the fair was terrifying, my chair tipping down and forwards on its way down.

Graveyard Squirrels

On the advice of my carer, my husband and I went to our local grave yard to walk my little dog Bella this weekend. There were so many old graves, obviously from rich families of the past. Some graves were sinking near trees, cracked, lifted up off the floor and falling over. There were small graves the size of a shoe box, huge graves so tall I wondered how they were still standing and everything inbetween. Some were for multiple people in families, children, babies and adults too. Some had verses, pictures, crosses and windows on. Some stood straight up and others lay flat with railings or raised stone details marking their borders. One was decorated for Halloween.

My carer says the squirrels nest under the lifted gravestones.

We parked up and got out of the car. Before we had even put the ramp away there were atleast 7 squirrels gathering from near and far across the way from us. People obviously feed them, not just us. They were all over the graves, trees and grass, leaping like newborn lambs towards our car. Everytime we stopped along our walk the same thing happened. At one point two squirrels had a quarrel that alerted my poorly sighted dog to their presence. 

Later on in our walk amongst the gravestones from long ago and more recent, my husband stopped and patiently waited for a squirrel to feel confident enough to eat out of his hands.

I videoed the squirrels for my children to see, a nice thought that even in death you aren't alone. Even if you feel your loved one is abandoned in a far away cemetery there will be company for them. 

We have already been back there once and plan to make it a regular area to walk Bella and maybe ponder life ourselves.

Flu and Covid injections

I booked my flu and covid jabs using the NHS App after the doctor surgery messaged me to tell me I was due them both. 

I selected the options for needing step free access and wheelchair access.

The appointment was at a local pharmacy easy to park near with my blue badge.

My husband took me for the appointment on a cold autumn day. Knowing I woukd be going inside a pharmacy and having to expose my arms I chose not to wear a coat, putting a cardigan, scarf and gloves on. 

When we arrived this is what we saw

 Not step free.

Not wheelchair accessible.

My husband went inside to ask if they had a ramp? No.

So the ogarmacisf looks at me and asks if there's any way I can just get inside. In my 150kg electric chair. No.

Can he lift me inside? No.

So I sat on the pavement in my chair, outside the pharmacy door answering medical confidential questions whilst moving out of the way for the other visitors to the pharmacy (of which only 1 said thankyou) and then had one injection in each arm, whilst outside the pharmacy on the street.

Surely this isn't right?

I had to be there for 10minutes after the injection so he said for my husband to move the car to infront of the pharmacy where he could see me. Then, with me sat inside privacy glass and locked into the car restraints he called my husband into the pharmacy for his injections. Leaving me along in the car. It is a good job I didn't get ill or react to the injections because noone would have heard or seen me.

Why are disabled people treated this way? Such a large organisation as the NHS must be accurate for all. Having this pharmacy listed as step free and wheelchair accessible is someone's mistake that has not only caused me, but other people to be treated on the street. The pharmacist told me some other people had turned up in a wheelchair too when I told him about the booking system for the injections. Surely one wheelchair user telling them this should have been enough to cause a change?