A week of ups and downs

Mark loves his new car, but getting used to driving it hasn't been quite as straight forward as he thought it would. Getting in and out is still a major task, but is getting a bit smoother, even with the bigger doors it's still a struggle sometimes to get his long legs in. Other than the fact that I'm a nervous wreck beside him, it's odd because it feels such a normal thing to be driving around, I almost forget he's not going to just jump out when we get to where we're going. I'm also having to get faster at getting chair taken apart and into the boot or I get rather wet!!

Since getting the car our days have disappeared at a rapid rate. We've spent as much time as possible out house hunting, which when considering what is needed with a wheelchair makes the whole job more difficult. It's amazing how differently you have to look at every property. So far we've just looked from the outside, the photography skills of the estate agents has improved and what we see when we get there is often VERY different from the photo online. We have found a couple but have to work out how we'll get Mark into them to look around and rely on some hard bargaining to get the price down to our budget.

Mark has had his first journey out on his own. I packed him into the car at our end, he went over to his friends workshop and they had to get him out there. It was worrying, it's like letting your small child out on their own for the first time, knowing they'll forget things like take their drugs because they're all giddy about being out, but you know you have to do it.

We've also been over to Cyclone at Hull again to get more bits for his wheelchair. As soon as Mark got the car we found his wheelchair wouldn't go in the boot, it will go on the back seat but what a struggle it is to get it in there and he'll never be able to do that on his own. So, Stuart leant him a different chair and he took bits off his hospital chair to build something else. He then decided the wheels from his hospital chair wouldn't do the job and the back wasn't working properly so now we have new wheels and a new back. While we were there Mark had to get out of his chair so they could put the new wheels on, so he transferred onto a sofa under the watchful eye of another wheelchair user, not only that but he did it without his slide board, both firsts, a bit scary but another experience. He now has a 'discussion' going on with Wheelchair Services because the chair they were to supply is very similar to his hospital chair, and that won't fit in the boot either. So, he's trying to negotiate to get just the back and the seat, but they're not happy about that even though his chair hasn't been built yet. That 'discussion' will be ongoing for the next week or so. My money is on Mark.

Friends fill in as wheelchair mechanics under Marks direction and it's slowly coming together. Getting a chair to fit properly is really important and it's a time consuming job. Every time something is changed it feels weird for a while and takes time to decide if it's more comfortable or not. This could go on for some time yet.