Diary (4) -Would please still help The Little Family? Thanks to you, we are half way (or so I hope) – Continued

After a week, an answer came from the finance administrator. It is a weird answer, embarrassed, attempting to scold me for a lack of care or a wrongly dispensed care, and at the same time relenting on most points.

First of all, a telephone must be put back, so that talks may be conducted by ringing up.

My answer is that verba volant, scripta manent. It will be nice and convenient to have a telephone at home but no conversation that might lead to litigation or even misunderstandings should be held verbally.

The car with the broken exhaust pipe should not be repaired with Anne-Fleur’s money as it does not belong to her. But given the particular circumstances, with the agreement of the Court, if the agreement is given, then the car might be mended.

My answer is that Anne-Fleur will never own a car and that she will never drive. Nonetheless, she needs a car to be driven to the “socialising” functions upon which the French bureaucracy is so keen. There also needs to be a car at home in case of emergency, or to go shopping outside the hours of the “socialising/shopping lady.” A car is useful. And, of course, it is I, and not Anne-Fleur, who shall drive it. Being without allowance myself, it seems pure common sense to use her money to repair it.

The hours with the shopping lady are not for cleaning the house. The shopping lady is someone who should help Anne-Fleur to wash every morning, (and evening?), to dress, to help her eat, to take her to the pictures, for walks, for shopping for her own food and clothes and needs, etc. She is to deal with all things intimate.

My answer is that Anne-Fleur is able to wash, to dress, to eat, and do intimate things by herself or with my help – we belong to the same family and we are close; that we are not each shopping for our respective food alone as we are a family; and that with due respect to the “socialising lady,” I am intellectually more apt to know what film Anne-Fleur may or may not see, to explain things and generally to educate and instruct her. Moreover, what is to be said of a system that PAYS A SALARY to someone to go to the pictures or the library with the disabled person, meanwhile I / the carer is unpaid to care for all other needs? Where are the State finances going? Is this a rational economic decision?

It was decided in 2014 by the Board, and the MD who examined her, that Anne-Fleur needed no one to cook her meals, clean the house and keep the garden in good shape (clean).

My answer is that Anne-Fleur is absolutely not able to do all these things, and that I must do the cooking and help in the cleaning, but not assume all the cleaning of the whole house.

It will take months to allow someone to do the house cleaning. Therefore, exceptionally, money will be allowed to do, (at last), the great spring cleaning, (summer or autumn cleaning).

As to the garden, there will be money allowed ONCE to clean it, but nothing afterwards.

My answer is that a garden grows. Grass grows. Trees grow. Shrubs grow. A gardener came unofficially a month and a half ago and we cannot not see any more where he stopped cutting the grass. As the garden is wide, it will need more than two hours to put it to rights. And in a month, the grass will have grown again. What are we to do then?

So, here we are.

Paradoxes of the French administration and bureaucracy exposed. Fortunately, all this is written. I shall transmit it to my legal advisor. And I shall be able to show it to the local Agency which provides the effective services. There is a direct correspondence between the finance administrator and the Head of the Agency, and I have seen several times that the requests made by the finance administrator are not the same as those she tells me she will make. Then there is the interpretation by the Head of the Agency that is again different. Verba volant, scripta manent.

We have come almost half the way in a week, thanks to you. Now, I shall state the situation in all its absurdity to the minister of health and the minister for disabled people who are both responsible for Anne-Fleur’s wellbeing. I shall also ask why carers like me have no status and no payment for the job they do all year round.

We still need your help, please, to show that people care; that I am not a lunatic asking for impossible things but, on the contrary, using common sense and resources as best as I can.

Please, show you care. Please, help us: click and comment, show that you are with us. Please.