Feeling Totally Stressed ~*Sam Spade*~

Well, friend text me to come over tonight. I was seriously thinking of turning off my mobile to avoid that text because I had a feeling she hadn't seen my email as I haven't received a receipt from ReadNotify but I was too late in turning it off. So, I replied to her text asking her to check her email before she comes so we can discuss it. I'm bricking it again because she might not check her email and just ask me what it's about which basically means I'm going to get interrupted. Or she'll decide not to come which I actually prefer right now!

Then there's all the ho-ha about my eldest son. Toward the end of July I was late getting into work so I could take him to an assessment at the Wheelchair Service so he could be fitted for a new wheelchair (I filled out a Leave of Absence form for the time away from work). The guy at the Wheelchair Service said it should be ready in August. I asked when in August as we were going on holiday for a fortnight. He said he'd be on holiday too but it would be after then but before my son went back to school in September. Great! No problem.

Well, as typical as things move slowly, there was nothing from the Wheelchair Service until September when I get an appoitment for mid-September. Once again, I'd be late into work and have to fill out another Leave of Absence form. So, I get paniky. You see, where I work, the Headteacher is clamping down on absenteeism. I understand why they're doing this because there are some staff who take time off for just sneezing so we're encouraged to make appointments outside of school hours, which I do anyway with my doctor or dentist appointments where I can easily take my children to (usually they have appointments too). At the same time, the Head is changing people's jobs, piling more work on to already overloaded staff and expecting them to stay back after hours to do stuff. When these staff submit a genuine Leave of Absense, for instance, a woman who had an injury at home and had to have physiotherapy after she was well enough, was told to change her appointment until after school had finished. Just like that.

Someone put it very well, "The Goodwill is going." The Head is not being sympathetic to genuine cases of absenteeism and Leave of Absence. We can't even go on job-related training during the day and have to do so outside work hours (impossible for me). So here's me, as my disabled son's main carer and I'm paniking because of all the time off I need to take. Every year he has an Annual Review at his school because he has a Statement of Special Educational Needs. These meetings take place in school hours which means time off work for me. Then there's his annual visit to his Paediatric Consultant, also we see his Orthopaedic Surgeon which has been reduced to visits every 18 months now so the next one is in January. I'm thinking: If the head is clamping down on all the other staff, it's only a matter of time before he turns his attention to me in some form or another and may even begin to refuse my requests for Leave of Absence to see to my son's needs.

So seeing this appointment at the Wheelchair Service for during work time, I get very upset and my husband called to see if the Wheelchair Service can go into the school to do the handover and final adjustments to my son's new wheelchair. But no, they get arsey about it and refuse! Why they got arsey, I've no idea because in the past my son has gone to school in a run down wheelchair and come home in a brand-spanking new one! So, they CAN do wheelchair handovers in the school, they just didn't want to and, of course, they're not going into the school until January. They suggest I come in towards the end of clinic when I finish work. Well, that would be ok (same goes for other appointments) were it not for the fact that I have another child who I have to be at home for when he comes home from school. He's not yet old enough to have his own house key, let himself in and keep safe and occupied until I get home. I can't ask Mum to help out like I used to. It's just too great a debt for me to pay back. I could buy her a nice gift and say a thousand 'thank yous' but it wouldn't be enough. I simply cannot pay the debt back as in caring her and/or Dad in their old age because I'll still have my disabled son to care for. I'm already endebited to her with all the hours she's helped me so far and when I realised I couldn't even pay that debt back, I stopped 'borrowing'. I feel like a 3rd World country!

Oh well, my son's wheelchair will survive until then... But, ah, problem! When he was in respite last week, they somehow tore his 5-point wheelchair harness right down the middle and it is only holding together by a tiny bit of material. The moment that severed completely, the transport which takes my son to and from school have every right to refuse to transport him as it is deemed unsafe.

The respite home contacted the Wheelchair Service (as professionals have more clout than parents do) but it was reported back to us that the Wheelchair Service don't have a spare harness. Well, we KNOW, that's not true. My son has got a whole new wheelchair complete with harness in their clinic but they're not handing it over! We thought the school might help but they've hit a brick wall and ended up suggesting we call Wheelchair Service again. Hello?! We are just the parents therefore not important to be listened to, here! They've already been arsey with us!

So, we set about buying our own harness for my son and wrote to the school telling them of this. They said we shouldn't have to ask the Wheelchair Service will provide one. Err, no they won't! It's on the wheelchair they've got and they're not handing it over because I wouldn't attend the clinic when they wanted. I feel penalilsed for being a working parent and I only work part time!

Well, Wheelchair Service went into school today to fit a harness to my son's current wheelchair. It's rubbish! It just wraps around his torso and it's not the 5-point harness he usually has. He can easily unfasten it as he's a typical Houdini.

All this because I'm too afraid to fall under the Head's radar by taking too much time off work!

Before you ask about what my husband does. Well, he works full time and doesn't get home till 6pm. He takes holiday time off work to mind our boys when they're off because of PD Day.

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