Anyone has a stair lift at home ? (Moving, part II)

With my POTs and the lifetime dyspraxia, I would definitely not be able to do that. I haven't had an OT out yet, but I did get the guy out from the company the council used to arrange the works, so he could see what I could 'reasonably' ask for, given the construction of the house (this can be a limitation on what they will agree). He clearly didn't understand my problems, but then he wasn't an OT (rather a surveyor).

Anyway, my district council has recently combined with the adjacent one (which was bankrupt) so it looks like there may be a completely different company (another nearby district council) administering the grants for the combined county (LA) area now. I will have to find out how this affects me as a council (rather than housing association) tenant.

 

I followed the link to your previous thread. How did your stairlift work out?

I had stairs that 'turned a corner' like the ones in your photo, in my previous house. Even though my M.E. wasn't as severe during my 2 years there (14-16 years ago) I had a number of bad falls due the odd shape (narrow at one end) of some of the steps. In my current house the stairs go straight up and (I don't want to speak to soon...) I haven't had any major falls going down them in the 14 years I have lived here, just the odd stumble which I've been able to recover from as the staircase is between two interior walls.

Seeing your photo reminded me that the construction of stairways is definitely something that needs careful thought when moving with M.E. (or other health condition which causes dizziness or POTs).

 

Hopefully it should make it a bit easier (fingers crossed, anyway). I'm now a council tenant, and was lucky enough to be offered a newly built bungalow. It has a pretty small back garden, but that's the only real drawback – otherwise, it's lovely. Spacious, too, as it's designed for a wheelchair user.

When I moved in, I asked if I could move a radiator three feet further along the wall, to allow me to put my big American-style fridge freezer in a better position. They said it would be easier to process it as a disabled adaptation than for me to get permission to do it myself, so that's how they worked round it.

I didn't need anything other work doing, but neighbours with more complex needs have had various adaptations done under DFGs, all of them sorted out pretty quickly. An elderly lady who's a bowel cancer survivor, and whose hands have been very severely damaged by rheumatoid disease, has the most amazing loo – it washes you whilst you sit there! All the neighbours are so impressed with it that she's joking about charging an entrance fee to have a go.

I really hope you manage to make progress on getting adaptations done.

 

Unfortunately my council landlord is terrible - they treat their tenants like second class citizens, it would have been easier for me to get the adaptations I need (which aren't straight forward) if I had been a private tenant. I exchanged here from another council, who were far better landlords. It's the only down side of living where I do.

It may be better if it's not my own district council (my landlord) administering the DFG, but since they combined with the adjacent one their website is pretty much unusable and contains none of the information the old one did! I've just sent an email to the 'new DFG service' to enquire about this, but it's very confusing because they have the words 'privatesector.housing' in the email address! There's no information on my landlord's website about the DFG or how to apply - I only learnt about the change in how it's being administered across the county when I saw a news article via Google, written by the local County Gazette!

Of course local residents were assured that my district council taking over the bankrupt one would lead to better services, due to the 'efficiency' savings they could make. Well, the new council is so difficult to contact (only one central number for everything, whereas you used to be able to contact different services directly) that they are certainly going to be able to save money because residents just give up with trying to get anything done (speaking from experience)!

 

It’s working out really well. I don’t have balance problems, so I try to climb up the stairs as much as possible, to try and maintain a little muscle. But when I have trouble walking because of weakness, it’s really nice to have it to rely on.

 

Btw I already had a bag that fits over the arm of stairlift to carry up eg hotties, ipad etc, but was looking in vain for another one to put bits of washing in that fits over the rather fat arm and doesnt keep bumping or catching on every step.

Then found the solution recycling a 9 roll toilet paper pack, made holes in the top that fit over the arm - it is the ideal size, plus scrunches up so goes in other bag to take back upstairs - space is at a premium.
It was an Andrex one that has a reinforced top - dont know if they all do. I took a pic but must have deleted it. Can take another if anyone wants it but cant atm as it is upstairs today.

 

NB the Andrex quilted pack I used has a gold reinforced top. I opened another today, also Andrex quilted and the top is not gold or reinforced so doesnt work as well though the old one is still going strong so dont need a new one. I wonder if they are using less plastic to save the planet

 

When I had my stair lift, I found the issue of getting dirty washing down fairly straightforward – I just hurled it from the top of the stairs. Even sheets and duvet covers, which, although they never quite went down to the bottom because my staircase had a steep turn in it, nevertheless just draped themselves over the lowest three steps and didn't snag the stairlift. Anything that couldn't be thrown down would be plonked on the seat (strapped on with a motorcycle bungee cord 'spider' if necessary), and I'd bump my way down the stairs on my bottom and then bring the stairlift chair down using the remote control.

Certain things could only be taken upstairs if I felt up to walking up the stairs. I only had one vacuum cleaner for both floors of the house, but on a good day I could strap that into the seat, haul myself upstairs, and then bring up the chair.

I was offered a through-floor lift instead of the stairlift, which, whilst much more useful for things like this, would also have taken out a lot of space in my second bedroom. I'm relieved I didn't go for it, as in the end I had to sell the house a couple of years later because I could no longer work. I'd have had to reinstate the bedroom floor, as well as all the other complications of selling up and moving into rented accommodation!

 

Bump. I’m sick of planning life around minimised stair journeys, and of arms aching from being used as auxiliary legs.

Has anyone with ME ever regretted having a stairlift fitted? @Forestvon or @Louie41 - has anything happened since 2019 which has changed your mind about your stairlift?

I hit a brick wall on finding useful online advice on rival UK stairlift vendors until I stumbled upon Gransnet, which was a veritable motherlode, and I have now shortlisted Thyssenkrupp’s Flow 2 with Handicare’s FreeCurve. Now I need to search for shady stairlift technicians who will fit unapproved aftermarket acceleration enhancers.

 

No never as couldn't go up without it. Now I roll up washing and hold it in my arm while bag containing ipad etc hooked over the arm - if cant do that, have to revert to bumpy big plastic bag as the Andrex one split and new ones have no strong gold top, or else ask carer to go and get it
If anyone missed it, leaning forward rather than sitting bolt upright makes it easier and can even put my feet up on edge of seat to make me less vertical

 

Mine did make it significantly harder to get anything bulky up the stairs, including the vacuum cleaner. If I'd needed a new mattress or piece of furniture, I'd probably have to had to get an engineer to take the chair off (the call-out fee alone was £120). It also made it harder for other people to go up, because it forced them to walk up the narrowest parts of three or four of the stairs.

This is because the staircase had a turn in it, though, and of course not all do. At my previous house, which had straight stairs, that problem wouldn't have been quite as bad, but it would have been harder to get bulky stuff round a sharp bend into the top hall. If I'd had a Victorian villa with wide stairs and a big hall there'd have been no issues at all, but I always lived in fairly small places.

The other thing was that it did take ages to make the journey. I mean, ages. Even with my ropey muscle control I could usually get down the stairs fast enough to answer the door for a delivery, but the van would have been in the next parish by the time I got there on the lift. I also often had to walk up anyway when I needed the toilet, for the same reason.

If I'd had a bigger space, I'd definitely have gone for the through-floor lift instead. The occupational therapist encouraged me to choose this, but I decided against because it would have meant I'd have had to take the big chest of drawers out of my smallish second bedroom. Knowing what I know now, they were 100% right—it would have been much better to live with slightly less storage space, but be able to get a small powerchair upstairs, and easily carry up bulky stuff, and only need a third as much time to make the journey. I didn't really understand this until I'd lived with a stair lift for a while, and then had to move to a bungalow with an even smaller second bedroom (which nevertheless does the job perfectly well).


ETA: Might be worth adding that I was lucky in not having to commission my stair lift myself, otherwise I might have have made some key errors. The biggest would have been not realising that you definitely need two-way remote control, with one controller kept upstairs and the other downstairs. These mean you can send the chair to the other docking point unoccupied, and bring it back again. Sometimes you just need to move it out of the way for cleaning or moving stuff; on other occasions you might have needed to come downstairs on foot and left the chair at the top.

 

Yeah, I needed either a downstairs loo or an upstairs kitchen! The annoying thing is that it was a Victorian house that still had a big outside closet on the end of the kitchen offshoot, but although the water supply was still there, the toilet had been removed long before I moved in. I wanted to reinstate it and knock through from the kitchen, but discovered it would have involved putting in RSJs to support the old kitchen chimney, and that made it too expensive.

If I'd owned the house outright or been closer to clearing the mortgage, the through-floor lift would have been a no-brainer. They're a lot more flexible than stair lifts, both in terms of being able to move and carry stuff and increased needs as you age, and because the stairs were curved, mine wouldn't even have cost any more. But the adaptations were paid for in full under a grant, and obviously they weren't going to leave equipment there when I had to give up work and sell the house. I'd have had to faff about getting the gap in the bedroom floor re-boarded and the dining room ceiling re-plastered, which wouldn't have been a massive deal, but you don't need more things to sort out when you're moving.

 

If things go to plan and we manage to acquire one, I'll report back in the coming months.

 

I haven't changed my mind, except that I perhaps appreciate our stair lifts more than I did in 2019. We bought ours from a manufacturer in Wisconsin, and they've held up remarkably well.

My only dissatisfaction comes from the amount of time it takes to get service. But I think that can be corrected by buying batteries before they conk out. And of course, after the pandemic, all the services and equipment people like us need are in short supply and patchy. I assume the same is true in the UK.

 

I havent needed one as had to get a new one at start of pandemic when old one packed up for lack of electronic parts but may do this year so will find out!