Archive for August, 2021

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The Last of the Mohicans

August 19, 2021

Twenty two years ago I stayed in a care home for six weeks following an operation to finally mend my broken collar bone. I can’t say I was really looking forward to the stay and never in my wildest dreams would I have imagined myself enjoying life in a home for disabled people. How wrong I was! I fell in love with the spirit of the place and the philosophy of its founder, Leonard Cheshire. Six months later I moved into the Lodge there; a run down old bungalow in desperate need of some TLC. I’d not just found a community to be a part of, but also an opportunity to put a roof over my head, for a price I could afford, by renovating and maintaining the Lodge and managing land. The combination of the opportunity of a life time and the love and care of an extended family was just what I needed to overcome a life changing accident that had left me a paraplegic. I’m not sure how I would have built a new life for myself without Heatherley Cheshire Home.

The Red Feather symbolises strength and vitality, courage and passion

Two world wars brought out the worst in mankind, but also the best. The camaraderie that Leonard Cheshire experienced led him to seek a new way of coming together in life and, having failed in his first attempt at setting up a communal living project, he set up the most fantastic movement to provide homes for disabled people. Many post war movements sought to capture the spirit of a new age, however, none were strong enough to survive the persisting onslaught of the ‘old order’. The hippies were far too hedonistic and wrapped up in drugs to last the test of time, but even the Leonard Cheshire homes, that were so grounded in a practical way, have fallen prey to an outdated social economic system, together with ever increasing legislation and bureaucracy.

It wasn’t long after joining the community at Heatherley that I realised all was not roses. Head office were starting to take control and the nature of the home was changing from a local community affair to a managed business. In many ways the change was necessary in order for the home to survive, however, you can argue that it hasn’t survived. It has been swallowed up by the old order it sought to replace and the spirit of the new age simply cannot flourish in such a climate. The volunteers are all but gone, friends and relatives are no longer embraced as members of the family and in fact there is no extended family left, no community. All that is left is a business that provides for existence. This is not life and not what those early pioneers began and if it continues we must fear for the future well being of disabled people. It’s not about blaming anyone or being angry, it’s about understanding what has happened so that we may have hope for the future.

The last remnants of spirit remain in the fabric of the place and in those disabled people strong enough to uphold that spirit. I feel like the last of the Mohicans waving the banner of a dying way, a way that I will continue to fight for until it is reborn, and reborn in a way that will last. The ‘old order’ must be defeated and not just in our Cheshire Homes. We must all find a new sense of coming together in community throughout this land and we have those wonderful post war movements of Leonard Cheshire, and others, to show us the way. This is the challenge of our time.

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To Simply Be

August 3, 2021

A friend of mine is such a doer. He goes from work to the golf course, to the gym, to the pub in a never ending drive to fill each day. He doesn’t stop! I on the other hand am happy to sit in my rocking chair, outside the back door, gazing up the garden and listening to the birds. I admire my friends energy, and often wish I had more myself, but I can’t help thinking he’s somewhat lacking in the ability to ‘simply be’.

One of the toughest things about being disabled is living in a body that can deny you the ability to ‘be’. Being is not just a state of mind, it also requires sufficient structure to the body to physically be, without effort. These days I have little trouble in that respect, but that has not always been the case. Sitting used to take constant effort. Muscular involvement was necessary to make up for the lack of intrinsic capacity and the need for muscular involvement takes effort and so an inability to switch off and truly relax …and that was from the waist up. Below the waist I had no usable muscles and the structure was very collapsed, so although there was no conscious effort, that paralysed part of my body very much contributed to the struggles in what I could still consciously use. Even if there is no awareness of paralysed body, and no feeling of aches and pains, then the poor structural quality will still have a negative affect on your overall physical health and it is that wholeness of health that is so important for the ability to simply be.

These days my body is so much better that I can sit in my rocking chair and very much relax, with maybe just a slight tension in the lumbar sacral junction. Having lost the ability to be and having now very much regained it, I may have more appreciation than many of the importance of simply being. Western culture is such a culture of doing. Not only is there a constant drive to work to provide for living, there is then the tendency to find things to do to fill the rest of our time. As a society we have gone from earning money out of the work that needs doing to creating work for the sake of earning money. We find ourselves more and more embroiled in a reliance on manufactured goods and with less and less time to enjoy the simple pleasures of life. Is it any wonder that nature’s turning round and saying enough is enough. Maybe we all need to learn the art of being rather than doing and good physical structure plays it’s part in this.

Native Americans are the epitome of being rather than doing. Did we miss an opportunity to learn from them?

One of the things I love about the therapy work I do is that, not only does it build up the capacity to ‘be’, in it’s way of achieving improvements in structure it actually encourages the art of being. No pain no gain does not come into it. The work we do is about delivering gentle inputs into the body. It takes hours and hours of repetitive work to make the changes, but the work itself is really quite relaxing. Perhaps my friend would be wise to do a little less rushing around and give up the no pain no gain work down the gym, after all gyms are for building up strength in a well balanced body and not for getting into shape once your body has lapsed. If he’d allow me to show him how to rebuild that root of weakness in his neck and shoulder girdle and alter his ways to a more gentle therapeutic approach then maybe he’d find more pleasure in the art of simply being.

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