Sometimes being disabled makes me angry. It's usually when I'm in a situation where I feel vulnerable, looked down upon or exploited. This week has unfortunately seen such a situation arise.
The fact that I am also a female came into it too, so I'm doubly exploited and so twice as angry.
It's all to do with some work we had done at a family property. Work that didn't come up to standard. Work that we may yet need to officially complain about. And treatment when we tried to tackle the firm involved that fell only a hairs breadth away from outright abuse.
I don't need to be made to feel vulnerable and frightened in a house that once held many happy memories for me. To be made conscious of the fact that I am a female, on her own upstairs with a stranger, conscious of the fact I have limited brain capacity to try and reason with the towering, raging hulk before me let alone the physical strength to fight him off if things turn nasty.
Things didn't turn nasty, but only because the cavalry arrived. And yes, one of them was a bloke. How pissed off do I feel that I had to be 'rescued' in such a manner? That I thought of all the smart answers hours later? That I know we've been ripped off big time?
Very, very pissed off indeed. But I won't say any more just in case I need to get the big guns in and go legal. Which, considering another family member had to be checked over by paramedics following the incident, could well happen.
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A sustained attempt to bring beauty to blogging by recording those fleeting things that may otherwise go unnoticed.
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- seahorse
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5 comments:
Very sad to hear of your ordeal but even more sad when you mentioned you felt exploited because of your disability. What you did in addressing the matter in the way you did, leaves me to say that you are a lot stronger than you give yourself credit for more so than the weaker party who did you wrong.
As Kacy says, this is no reflection on your weakness, on the contrary. I'm still very sorry to hear you went through this.
Raging hulks are often deeply inadequate people. Part of me hopes that you can kick his arse through legal channels, but mostly I just hope it is all over with for you all.
I like what they say but yes, I have to say I do know the feeling of being scared and vulnerable and having it in your own home and it is a really horrid feeling because it poisons all the security and sense of firm self that at least I had about what is "my space" - which it turns could be invaded at will, and while glad at least SOMEONE would rescue, doesn't exactly ease the feeling. I hope you get some satisfaction as if there was physical confrontation involved, I would expect so - am very sorry this happened to you.
This is a horrible, horrible feeling, and I'm so sorry you've had to deal with it.
It's a scary thing, to know you're so vulnerable. I've been dealing with it recently, with the PUS, and it's one of those things that you don't realize how vulnerable you actually are. How sometimes you can't protect yourself, and need people to come and help you.
It sucks that it's true, that's it's especially true for people in our situation, and I wish I could do something to help you out.
Need some righteous indignation? I'm totally here for you. :)
So, so sorry.
Kacy: Thanks, it's taken a few days to calm down but I did feel strong when I returned to the house on Thursday to get the work checked over - by someone else obviously. Just going back in there got me over a psychological hurdle.
Goldfish: We've arranged for our token 'bloke' to deal with him in future. This still pisses me off, but we have a warranty with the company and so if anything goes wrong someone has to contact him. And it won't be me. It just isn't worth the stress.
Elizabeth: I felt violated, as it was a house with many happy memories like I said. But not my own home, thankfully, and as I said to Kacy, going back there - deliberately on my own - on Thursday to meet a safety check guy sort of undid the nastiness. Business as usual. Feel the fear, etc...
NTE: Thanks for the righteous indignation :-) It helps. But it also helps to remember the good outnumber the bad. By a long way.
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