Voluntary work. — Scope | Disability forum
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Voluntary work.

DavidJ
DavidJ Community member Posts: 55 Pioneering
I am a young man of 70 years and I have been disabled for about 20 years now .
I lived on my own but I had a good job a nice  car and my own house .
Everything changed for me in about 1nano second when someone ran a redlight and hit my car at about 30 mph .I had to restart my life after this and due to the illness I lost everything because I got no help . It was a long road to go down and now I live with pain 24/7 I use a wheelchair to get around and have a Motability vehicle. I now live in sheltered housing in a bungalow in the Leeds WYorkshire area.
When I recovered enough I got so sick of wallowing in my own self pity and so did my neighbours !
I still had my brain that works most of the time !
I also knew that I was stuck inside 4walls going stir crazy !! 
My next door neighbour was the chairman of the local council disability group and he got me to go along and meet other people .
That was the catalyst to give me a kickstart:-
I no longer stare at 4 walls all the time because I am too busy .
I ended up being the chair of the group and went on to sit on the sheltered housing panel.I chaired that too for a while . The council made changes to its housing and I had to reapply to volunteer !
So here we are in 2018 at the age of 70 and I do the following all voluntary :-
Chair of housing advisory panel (my local area) with a budget to spend on work within the community.
I sit on the repairs and investment group 
I sit on LCC Disability hub and pass information to another panel regarding disability and access to infrastructure.
There are two others but would take too long to explain.
I sit on West Yorkshire Police Independent advisory group and hate crime panel too.
I do all this and more with constant pain including a permanent headache ,plus all done from a wheelchair 

Comments

  • Pippa_Alumni
    Pippa_Alumni Scope alumni Posts: 5,793 Disability Gamechanger
    This is brilliant, thank you for sharing this with us @DavidJ. I'm so glad to hear you found your calling!
  • thespiceman
    thespiceman Community member Posts: 6,388 Disability Gamechanger
    Hello @DavidJ Great to hear this well done to you. Like the positive attitude.

    Every one has talents, skills and a calling it is finding where to go. Have the qualities and confidence to move forward.

    I started volunteering about when just at school a long time ago. Been on and off mainly due to finding what I need.

    To fit in, found it here as community champion at last.

    Good to talk to you wish every success in what you do.

    Take care.

    @thespiceman
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