Donna's story - Video transcript

Donna talks us through her experience of support planning. Donna:

"When I was born and my mum found out about me condition, she said to herself she needs two parents that love her, and then I ended up at Great Ormond Street Hospital, where they diagnosed me with a form of dwarfism.

It's got a very long name; it's Spondyloepiphyseal Dysplasia Contenita. Basically it's a disorder in the growing part of the long bone.

So each of your bones has a growth part called the effertist, and in my case there's something wrong with that, so that's why I'm small. I've grown but I've not grown at the right level.

Ok so this is my, well a blank one, but this is like my support plan that I had.

Basically for me one of the most important pages for me was writing down what's important to me. So in this area I write down in big letters 'independent' so that's the most important thing for me. I wrote down 'going to church' as that's very important to me, and going to work; being able to pay my rent, pay my bills and earn my own keep.

Next thing was looking at my assessed needs, so I kind of looked at what help will enable me to be independent and I realised that for myself it was more practical things that will enable me to be independent.

So the practical things were housework; so if I've got someone to do housework for me then I can then go to work and not use all my energy doing the housework.

So the thing that I wanted to achieve was to have someone come in a couple of hours a week to do the housework. For example, I needed help with food preparation and my idea was I didn't want ready meals or anything like that: I don't think they're healthy enough and they don't really fill you up either. So my idea was that I would have a PA to prepare meals for me. So they would do two meals a week, which is about four portions for each meal, then I'll put them in the freezer then I would get them out I can when I needed them.

My PA went on holiday last year and I thought that I could kind of do it all myself.

My mom offered to do the housework, which was great, but I did all the shopping myself and that was a big mistake because I managed to do it, but I was in a lot of pain and I really struggled. So that is a risk to me. Because my support needs were not met, I was in a lot of pain and it was really hard for me to do those things.

I was obviously given a personal budget, so I'm given a certain amount a month which goes straight into my Kent Card account. Because I decided to use Kent Card because it was much more convenient for me.

So my PA does an invoice for me once a week, he does for 5 hours a week so he writes down five hours and the total so I'm able to pay him a certain amount every hour. I'm able to pay him a higher amount than normal because he is self-employed, so I'm not having to do the tax.

Basically my budget covers the support needs that have been identified for the housework, food preparation and food shopping, and in making sure they've been covered I am being made safe and well in the fact that I'm able to maintain my independence. Because without that I wouldn't be safe and well.

All the things I do to socialise, like travelling and meeting up with friends I don't actually need support for, because I'm able to do that myself so I don't need someone with me or something like that.

So for me my support plan isn't to do with hobbies and interests and such, it's to do with the more practical side like cooking, shopping and cleaning.

I spoke to the coordination team via Kent County Council and then I was told that I could ring the coordination team if I needed to, which I did to check out a couple of things that I wasn't too sure about.

For example, I wasn't sure if my PA went on holiday or went off sick, I was a bit worried about what could be put in place. So when I rang them they were helpful; they gave me a list of agencies that could help out and when I actually rang one of them and explained, you know my PA might go on holiday what's the procedure? They said to ring us a week before to let us know the times and the date that you want someone and then we'll make sure that someone's available for you. So it was all very smooth.

My goals in doing my support plan if to remain independent and I feel that I've done that through meeting the support needs for I've got.