The Times Magazine 15SPINAL COLUMN
MELANIE REID
here are houses. And then
there are special houses.
For almost 30 years we’ve
lived in a place that wraps its
arms around you and makes
you feel good. People who
visit say the same. I don’t
want to sound woo-woo,
because I’m not remotely
like that, but somehow you sense it has a
benign soul. There are warmth and laughter
and love in these old walls.
Life in a 300-year-old cottage also has its
downsides. Especially for tetraplegics. Ours is
a typical Scottish long house – one room deep
and half the length of a football pitch, every
room built a step lower down the slope. And
things we shrugged off when we were younger
and fit – the cold, low lintels, draughts and
complete lack of insulation at the bedroom
end – have become pressing.
We should have moved after my accident,
but we simply couldn’t. It would have
destroyed us. Having lost so much, we couldn’t
bear to give up the charming, remote, quirky
place that had become part of us. So we made
it work as best we could. Seven ramps inside,
one of them at maximum acceptable pitch,
two more outside. My bathroom became a wet
room. The sinks got easier taps. Beyond that,
the house was unforgiving. I couldn’t access
the laundry room or go upstairs. So be it.
If growing old is crappy, growing old with
a spinal injury is off the scale, and about three
years ago I started to dread the uphill push tothe kitchen every morning (there isn’t enough
space for a power chair). My shoulders were
wearing out. Reaching up into the kitchen sink
made me squeal with pain. The lids on the
Aga, which I raise with my grabber stick,
weighed twice what they used to. I got tired
just living. At the same time, tending the
wood-burning stoves began to tire Dave and
the annual bill for central heating oil became
embarrassing. On the rainbow scale of
domestic energy efficiency, this house was
dark red, a G minus minus, worthy of its
own demo by Insulate Britain and utterly
unmortgageable. Plus the old wiring made me
fret about fires. The mice behind the walls
were intolerable. Should I ever need a hoist,
there was no room for one. This was the
opposite of future-proof.
It was a Catch-22. We needed to move
out so the house could be brought from the
17th to the 21st century with insulation
beneath, above and around. But that wouldn’t
solve the problem of the levels and make it flat
for me. There was no space to extend behind.
In front would ruin the outlook.
Equally unanswerable was the question
of where to decant to while work took place.
There’s a shameful shortage of accessible
housing stock to buy or rent (a “hidden crisis”
for disabled people, according to the Equality
and Human Rights Commission) and I
couldn’t, and Dave wouldn’t, slum it in a
caravan like couples do on Grand Designs
while they’re building their dream.
We considered plonking a disabled holidaychalet in the garden, a static caravan basically.
But they’re not roomy. Briefly, we discussed
moving. Supported housing even, but it was
agonising. We’ve been part of this community
for 30 years. It’s home. Besides, any move
meant neighbours. This much I know: Dave
couldn’t cope with that.
So we started to explore building something
ancillary, specifically for my needs and
environmentally faultless. Zero energy
consumption! Flat! Warm! No ramps! The
thought made me dizzy. After 18 months of
messing around with various ideas, we decided
the only feasible site on our very modest
budget was tucked in the far corner of the
front garden.
And that’s where we’re at: a planning
application for a small black tin shed, built to
passive house standards with all the essentials
plus a small tiny second bedroom/office for me
and a linked garage. For Dave, his own
bathroom and a walk-in cupboard called a
clothes dumping ground. Sorry, dressing room.
“Like what aristocrats have,” I told him.
Fingers and toes are crossed. If we get
permission and build, we will then slowly
upgrade our beloved, awkward, old home for
family and visitors to stay in and for a carer
when the time comes. Proper future-proofing.
And a serious contender for a new Channel 4
show, Very Modest Designs. n@Mel_ReidTimes
Melanie Reid is tetraplegic after breaking her
MURDO MACLEOD neck and back in a riding accident in April 2010
T
‘I can’t survive in
my house any
longer. I’m moving
out. To the bottom
of the garden’