Jane Pierce spent three years waiting to be told the real reason for the massive pain in her jaw. In the end she gave up on her doctors and went privately to a dental surgeon on the south coast, some 50 miles from Jane’s London home. He diagnosed a rare and serious bone disease, and the correct treatment followed.
In the meantime, Jane had to let her job go. The excruciating pain and medication meant that she was making mistakes. The loss of income and long search for relief from the pain placed a tremendous strain on Jane’s savings.
That’s when Elizabeth Finn Care stepped in. We offered Jane a financial safety net that enabled her to relax in the knowledge that she would always have sufficient reserves each month to pay the bills, freeing up hard-pressed savings to pay for her unique dental treatment, and travel costs.
Jane has now had a successful operation on her jaw and while the pain will never fully subside, she leads a less stressful life, “I used to wake up in constant pain and found that I was isolating myself from friends and colleagues. When I eventually learnt the reason for all the pain and that it might be curable I also learnt that treatment would eat into my savings. Elizabeth Finn’s help enabled me to use my savings on being cured, not on rent, food, and heating, as important as those things are.
“I can never thank you enough.”
Enid Burnett suffers from multiple sclerosis but thanks to Elizabeth Finn Care – and her trained assistance dog Echo – she leads an active life where ‘freedom’ and ‘independence’ are writ large. A jet black Labrador, Echo’s ‘food and keep’ are paid by Elizabeth Finn Care. Without Echo, Enid’s horizons would indeed be very limited, and she’d have to scrimp and save on other facets of her life, eroding her cheery outlook and wellbeing.
Echo helps with many day-to-day activities that Enid often finds difficult – from fetching the post and unloading the washing machine to getting dressed. When necessary Echo can even assist Enid in making an emergency call.
When it comes to Echo it’s nothing short of hero worship for Enid, “Once Echo saved me from serious injury. I was out on my powered wheelchair when I slid into a ditch along side the path. I managed to crawl out from under the chair but it was Echo who pulled the chair up onto the path after I’d wound his lead around it.
“Thanks to the financial support given me by Elizabeth Finn Care I can keep Echo and get out and about for trips in the special powered chair they also helped fund. I’m a member of the local multiple sclerosis society, wheelchair users’ network and disability appeals tribunal, so get to help others and put something back into my community.”
Gerry Hayter wasn’t ill or incapacitated when he asked Elizabeth Finn Care for help. After a long career of standing on his own two feet he suddenly found himself with an unsympathetic social services, reluctant to provide any support. Gerry’s story starts when on retirement from a long military career in the Rhodesian then South African air forces he came to Britain to work for a series of airlines. The last of these made him redundant so he and his wife returned to Zimbabwe where Gerry established a management consultancy. Then the political situation there worsened and he and his wife returned to the UK, minus his savings and belongings.
“It cost me my savings, I lost my business, my wife lost hers, and my in-laws were thrown off their farm which they had assiduously built up since the early seventies. On my return to the UK I found that social services were very reluctant to help despite my having paid national insurance contributions while out of the country.
“That’s when Elizabeth Finn Care stepped in to provide us with the financial support to help us pay many of the important bills while I got on with an appeal to a tribunal to get social security assistance, which I eventually won, some nine months later.
“Thanks to the support from Elizabeth Finn Care, it enabled me and my wife to lead a near normal life at a very trying time. With the grant I was able to search for a job, which was eventually successful.”
When it’s needed Elizabeth Finn Care is a partner for life. Just ask Phyllis Hilton who has been supported by us for over twenty-three years. Back then Phyllis, recently divorced, was 44 but had just gone through a devastatingly harrowing time. One of her daughters, Debra, was 17 when she died of a rare, life-threatening skin disorder. Although Phyllis had managed to raise £26,000 to found a charity to help support families suffering from her daughter’s ailment, a cruel twist of fate meant that when Debra finally succumbed, Phyllis was unable to give her own daughter a proper burial. As if that wasn’t enough, Phyllis – by this time existing on benefits just to make ends meet - discovered she was suffering from Chron’s disease, an inflammatory bowel disorder.
Then thanks to a friend, Elizabeth Finn Care heard about Phyllis’s dire straits and we stepped in with a modest but effective package of support.
Today, Phyllis receives a weekly allowance to help with the rent, household bills and car expenses, the car guaranteeing her independence and ability to visit her daughter and collect her grandchildren from school, while our extra needs grant has allowed Phyllis to enjoy the occasional special treat.
Looking back at those dark days, Phyllis is grateful for all the twenty years-plus support from Elizabeth Finn Care, “Life without them would have been radically different. I’d be lacking in so many ways and wouldn’t be able to see my daughter and grandchildren as often as I do.”
It’s been eighteen years on full-time duty for Pamela Siejok who has cared 24/7 for her son, Will, since his birth. According to the doctors Will should not be alive. He was born with a very rare auto-immune deficiency disease and the professional predictions certainly didn’t have Will living to become a teenager. That he has outwitted death is as much the product of Pamela’s industrial-strength tender, loving care as it is the medication Will regularly receives.
Comments Pamela, “My whole world fell apart when the doctors gave me the news about Will. They said he’d be lucky to see his seventh birthday but I was determined to do my best.
“Will suffers from asthma, eczema, and herpes and is very susceptible to all kinds of viral and bacterial infections. I take him to hospital frequently, sometimes five days a week, and one time he was bleeding internally so his spleen had to be removed. It saved his life but has compromised his health further.”
But the intense care was not without its own personal cost to Pamela. She had to abandon her career as a nurse to devote all her time to Will and, while doing that, her husband decided he could no longer take the strain and crumbled under the weight of the situation. He became erratic and irresponsible and on one occasion Pamela and Will had to flee to a refuge.
That’s when Elizabeth Finn Care came into Pamela’s life. We very quickly appreciated Pamela’s unique situation, the household’s lack of income, and the complication of paying off credit card debts run up by her husband.
Today, Pamela doesn’t have to worry about paying household costs, nor wonder if she can afford the petrol for the numerous journeys to the hospital for Will’s treatment. Says a much relieved Pamela, “The first thing I brought with my grant from Elizabeth Finn Care was a new vacuum cleaner to replace one that had broken down. Will’s weak immune system means it’s absolutely critical I vacuum two or three times every day to stop him falling ill.
“I was totally bowled over at the empathy and sincerity of the of Elizabeth Finn Care volunteer who came to see me at the very beginning. I felt very at ease - the kindness and friendliness was blinding!”
Alex Scott never dreamt he would find himself in need of financial help. He enjoyed a successful, rewarding and varied career, ranging from work with some of the UK’s leading arts organizations, setting up new theatres all over the world, along with being a university academic and consultant to a government department.
He was the textbook ‘workaholic’ - and he paid for it. Without warning Alex suffered a ‘double whammy’ of a joint physical and mental breakdown, then developing glaucoma that Alex ignored until it threatened his eyesight.
The high flyer was laid low and found it almost impossible to comprehend how and why his career had run so calamitously into the sand. As Alex comments, “Millions of people live below the poverty line but I never believed it would happen to me. I was ashamed and embarrassed. My whole life had been turned upside down.”
Alex spent four years wandering in a poverty wilderness before his solicitor told him about Elizabeth Finn Care. By that time Alex was facing repossession of his home, had lost many of his friends, was distant from his family, and too ill to keep proper records of his finances.
“The people at EFC understood and helped me in very practical ways. The monthly allowance I receive enables me to meet every day costs and unexpected expenses such as getting a boiler repaired or a new pair of glasses.”
Thanks to Elizabeth Finn Care, Alex is on the road to a full recovery and rebuilding his life.
Jane Dawney was a nurse working in a hospice when her marriage broke up and she was left to juggle the demands of her career and raising her three children. Occasional night-shifts were becoming increasingly taxing and Jane noticed that it took days for her to recover. Then she discovered why – she was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. And as the illness took hold so Jane had to abandon her career.
“It was the unpredictable nature of this disease that was the most difficult aspect to come to terms with,” commented Jane. “In time I had to use a wheelchair and make quite fundamental changes to the way I led my life.”
Because of her changing abilities Jane’s home needed adaptations. But with no income, and means-tested state benefit, the funds just didn’t stretch.
Enter Elizabeth Finn Care. “Elizabeth Finn Care initially helped me with the cost of a new hardwood floor in my home which helps me enormously in getting around indoors in my wheelchair.
“I also received a grant towards a power-trike that transforms my wheelchair into a tricycle. I can now go out independently as I would’ve done before my illness.
“Over time I have received the occasional extra gift that has assisted with purchasing labour-saving equipment as well as a few days’ holiday with my daughter.
“Elizabeth Finn Care is like a friend who is there in times of need and I’m really grateful for that.”
Francine Smith was a psychiatric nurse and mother of three when her relationship broke up. She became the breadwinner for her family then fate struck a cruel blow. She contracted acute sciatica, diagnosed as a result of her nursing work and pregnancies. In time the illness deteriorated, forcing her to abandon her career.
Francine found herself in mid-life without any income, raising three children, two of them under ten years old, and with the poverty line beckoning.
Thanks to her mother, Francine discovered Elizabeth Finn Care and made contact. She comments, “Raising my children on state benefits barely stretches to covering absolute basics such as food, clothing and meeting household bills.
“Once I’d explained my situation to the Elizabeth Finn Care lady, my life suddenly changed. With their financial help, we could afford a climbing frame, a scooter and a bike, and play equipment my son and daughter absolutely enjoy.
“We’ve also been on ‘cheap and cheerful’ camping trips during the summer holidays with a tent bought from the little extra money we’ve received from EFC. It keeps the children very healthy and the trips form a very necessary change of scene for a few days.
“Without Elizabeth Finn Care life would be a complete dread. We’d be back in the situation we were before with nothing to give to the children at Christmas and on birthdays.
“Thanks to EFC, I can ensure both my children don’t miss out on a presents and that, like other kids, they can enjoy simple but rewarding things like birthday parties.”
Alice Bennett from Exeter used to work in the NHS as a manager but a degenerative disease forced her into a reluctant early retirement and now she is too ill to work. “I enjoyed my career but my illness became too much, causing long periods off work.”
Alice cannot hide her illness. Her skin is inflamed. Two fingers have been removed and the others are badly deformed. She is also very susceptible to extremes of temperatures, being too cold or too warm producing uncomfortable muscle spasm. “My hands, feet and legs are in constant pain and my kidneys have started to complicate things. I’ve got to have dialysis three times a week.”
In addition to her health worries, Alice’s husband of twenty-four years left her when coping with her illness became too much.
Dependent on a small pension and income support, Alice knew that replacing the draughty windows, that aggravated her condition so much, was a ‘pipedream’. Until Elizabeth Finn Care came to Alice’s help. After a visit by one of its volunteers, Alice got help with the cost of much needed double-glazing.
“The new windows are a godsend! Thanks to Elizabeth Finn Care the draught in my house has stopped and it’s much warmer.”
Former teacher Linda Maycock received help from Elizabeth Finn Care after an operation forced her early retirement and consequential loss of her home. It was the end of a financial nightmare that started some ten years earlier.
Back problems rapidly deteriorated forcing Linda to seek medical help. It never came and a ten-year struggle with doctors and consultants ensued, all failing to diagnose the problem. Comments Linda, “I kept working as long as I could but there were days when I simply couldn’t move and in the end I had to retire on medical grounds. But getting help was an awful struggle and one of the consultants I saw told me to give and get used to being a cripple!”
Fortunately for Linda a specialist recognized her symptoms and after ten years she had the first of a series of much-needed operations. Virtually housebound Linda was denied liability allowance and her enforced early retirement led to the loss of her flat when she couldn’t meet the mortgage payments.
Then she discovered Elizabeth Finn Care who provide a weekly allowance that offsets many of the major domestic bills, along with an annual emergency grant. “Living on a basic pension barely pays for food and utility bills,” says Linda, “but thanks to Elizabeth Finn Care, I can stay in touch with friends and family over the phone and do not have to worry about paying for public transport to do the shopping when I’m too ill to walk.
“Thanks to Elizabeth Finn Care I can also afford the fare to see the specialist. Knowing that I now have someone who can address my medical condition, and not have to worry about costs traveling to see him, has restored hope in my life.”
