Peter & Olivia - Interview 46
Peter & Olivia - Interview 46
Age at Interview:
62
Sex:
Male
Background:
Peter is a consultant (heritage projects), married, father of Olivia and one other grown-up daughter. Ethnic background/nationality: White British.
Brief outline:Peter's daughter Olivia (aged 22) died within a year of developing pain and weakness in her leg, in late 2006. Diagnosis of MND remained uncertain, as aspects of her condition were unusual.
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He and his wife did a lot of lifting. It was hard physically, but as parents they just did whatever it took to make their daughter comfortable.
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And so we continued to have a reasonable quality of life, moving with the aid of the wheelchair, with the hoists, with personal lifting, right through until the time Olivia died. But to do that, my wife and I had to break all the rules. We had to lift her on all occasions. So there was no way that we could use the mechanical lifts to get her in and out of the car, to get her to a hydro pool. We had all the OTs and physios coming out of our ears and none of them could come up with a solution other than my wife and I lifting my daughter. I'm sixty-two, my wife is ten years younger, but in any of those cases I mean, I've got the strength and she hasn't, so I was finding it was quite - I suppose in a sense it was amusing - but also frustrating that we'd have a very able bodied helper coming in to assist, you know, the Social Services helper coming in to assist. But when Olivia needed to be moved from her bed to the wheelchair I had to come and lift her. Because we couldn't, the hoist wouldn't get in. We had one of these mechanical ones as well as the fixed one, and we couldn't actually get it alongside her bed to actually get her from the bed into the wheelchair. So whenever we were doing any lifts at all my wife and I would do it. We became quite proficient at it, but our backs did suffer a little bit, but they've recovered now. And to any parent I would suggest that for quality of life you've got to look at ways that you can do that. |
