Roll-on the future

I don't want to sound rude, resentful and ungrateful but I am getting completely fed up with the loss of dignity, privacy, autonomy and spontaneity that goes along with being a disabled person, reliant on homecare and personal assistants for my every need. It's horrible and I hate it so much. I would give so much to be able to have a lie-in because I feel like it, not think about what I'm going to have for my lunch until I'm actually hungry, do something without having to plan it days in advance and have a wash and get dressed without an audience, but I can't. Just for once, I'd like to be able to be left alone and to chose to do things, because I want to do them, without anyone else being involved, but it's not going to happen.

After a year of frustration, with agency staff looking after me, I now have a team of lovely carers, whom I employ myself, who come in three times a day, and they do everything for me. Which, don't get me wrong, is nice, but, just for once, I'd like them, if to were possible, to just go away and leave me alone. They come into the house first thing in the morning, often when I am still asleep, and wake me up, even if I don't want to be awake. They bustle around, opening and shutting doors, making idle small-talk and turning on the lights. They go to the bathroom, get a big bowl full of water and then strip the bedclothes and my pyjamas off me, wash me and give me a bed-bath. Whilst they do this, and whilst I am still half asleep, trying desperately to get back into the lovely dream I was having only minutes before they came, they ask me what I want for my breakfast and for my lunch and then one of them goes to fetch it. I'm hardly fit for anything before I've had my morning coffee but I have to go through the morning routine every day before I even get a glass of water. Forty-five minutes of frenzied activity every morning and then, just a quickly as it started, I'm on my own until it all happens in reverse in the evening when they come to get me ready for bed. And this is my life. No frivolous conversation about what was on the TV last night, no questions about what I did the day before, no talk about what I'm going to be doing next month or next year, or my plans for the future, just the same thing, day in, day out. No variation. Well, I am completely fed up with being poked, prodded, turned, talked to, flustered and disturbed all the time. I would like to be able to wake up when I want to wake up because I feel like it, have a wash in a bathroom with the door closed, without an audience, change my mind about what I'm going to wear when I'm halfway through getting dressed because I don't want to wear whatever I got out of the wardrobe after all. I want to be able to go to the kitchen and choose what I want to eat for my breakfast by looking in the cupboards to see what's there rather than having to choose from the supermarket delivery note. I want to get to look out of the window and THEN decide if I'm going out or staying in rather than make all my plans for the day in advance. I want to be able to do what most people do and live a 'normal' life. I want to make simple, little decisions about my life, on my own, without comment, but I can't. Don't get me wrong, I really do appreciate the dedication of all the people who help me on a day-to-day basis but, just for once, I want it to be like the old days.

Having the autonomy to do my own thing was never something I truly appreciated when I had it but, now that I don't, I really want it back. Being able to do something spontaneously was never something I really thought about but now I can't be spontaneous I really miss it. In the past I have just gone to the station and caught a train to the other side of the country because I felt like it, now I can't even change my mind about my sandwich filling without having to ask someone else to deal with it for me. Privacy when it came to being seen naked or in my underwear was never something that really bothered me. Changing rooms in clothing stores and leisure centres didn't bother me and if someone wanted to look at me or stare then so be it. Once you have given birth, with an audience of doctors, nurses and midwives, you get to realise your body is not really your own. Even so, that was years ago and I thought it was something I could put behind me but no, it's back and it's not likely to go away now.

I so wish I could just be me again and have my old life back but, unless someone makes a medical breakthrough and finds a cure for me, I'm going to face the fact it's not going to happen. I am just going to have to grit my teeth and get used to being the new me. It's not the life I envisaged for myself when I was younger or the life I would have chosen but it is the life I've now got. Spontaneity, privacy and dignity as I knew them are now for other people, not for me. My life is now different and there are many other people who are involved in it so, I suppose, I had better knuckle down and get on with it.

Roll-on the future, let's see what happens n