Catherine Goswell, Independent Living Partner, shares a story of how she supported one of our customers to tackle the cleanliness issues in their home. Not only did she support her to have a clean home, but her help also meant the customer could get her social life back.
Miss A is a 61-year-old resident and has been living in supported housing for over ten years. She has multiple health conditions as well as mental health problems. She finds it very difficult to engage with professionals and her house was in a cluttered and unclean state, with lots of repairs needing to be completed. This resident also had a history of having multiple, free roaming rabbits in the property. When I began to work with her, she only had the one.
Her previous Independent Living Partner had tried to engage with her and clear the property and was unsuccessful, especially once the pandemic hit.
I started work with Miss A in September last year and managed to build a professional relationship with her. She expressed that she felt comfortable working with me, as she felt that I didn’t judge her. Once we had built a level of trust Miss A began to engage. We started by having a large amount of furniture/rubbish removed by the grounds team, which encouraged her to make further progress.
She started to engage with a Social Prescriber from the local GP surgery after I referred her to this service and then started engaging more with her GP. We successfully applied for PIP (personal independence payment) to help her financially, she used the initial payment of this to purchase a new rabbit hutch to keep the rabbit contained in the property.
Miss A went to stay with family for several weeks which was the ideal opportunity to conduct a deep clean. She allowed us to enter the property in her absence as long as I was on site overseeing the clean. It took a team of five people six hours to complete a thorough clean. After the clean we made an agreement that states that she must keep the property in the condition we left it, and fortnightly checks are carried out to ensure the property stays in a manageable condition.
Since the clean Miss A has started to engage with more neighbours and have more of a social life. With these changes, she is much healthier and happier! She is more self-motivated to keep things clean and has grown in confidence.
Quote from Miss A
“I was in dire need of help to get on top of my living conditions. Work was started but lockdown stopped things and I was left feeling unsupported and lost. With support from my new Independent Living Partner this fresh start has given me a positive mental attitude. It has hugely improved my breathing and COPD. I feel able to keep on top of things and even now have a cleaning routine. My Independent Living Partner has made an agreement to keep on top of things and she visits me regularly to keep me focused and motivated. She will even have a coffee now things are clean which no one has done for years! “
