My name is Marie, also known as Ree.

I am a disabled wheelchair user with an L4/L5 spinal cord injury, late identified autism, ADHD, alexithymia, hyperlexia and substantial mobility and access needs.

I am raising funds for practical capacity: help making my kitchen usable, repairing my mobility equipment, accessing transport, and completing the administrative and evidence work needed to address outstanding safeguarding concerns, resolve serious housing, benefits, healthcare and social-care problems.

I am not asking to be rescued.

I am asking for practical capacity.

The immediate practical problem

I have kitchen counters, tools, materials and a pre-fitted sink ready to install.

What I do not have is the physical capacity or reliable practical support needed to install them safely. I can no longer lift the drills or manage the heavy work myself.

My bungalow also still requires basic access and safety work, including safe entry, a usable fire-evacuation route, garden access, wheelchair storage and changes to fixtures that obstruct or injure me.

My Triride power attachment is broken, significantly reducing my mobility and independence.

These are not decorative improvements. They determine whether I can cook, move through my home, attend appointments and continue the work needed to resolve the underlying problems.

The administrative problem

Universal Credit and housing-cost issues have remained unresolved since April 2024.

I have repeatedly tried to obtain an accurate fit note and appropriate support through appointments, emails, telephone calls, visits, a Jobcentre disability support worker and requests to attend with my own support worker.

At the same time, housing, adaptations, social care, healthcare, benefits and safeguarding concerns have been divided across different departments and organisations.

Each organisation sees its own fragment.

I have had to become the missing interdepartmental communications system.

Why I need outside support

I have historically been the person who helped other people with technology, childcare, benefits, education, mental-health problems and practical crises.

I no longer have the physical or administrative capacity to continue doing that while also managing this situation alone.

My mother now 70 and needs extra support herself. I do not have a reliable informal support network able to provide the practical installation, mobility, advocacy and paperwork assistance required.

I have quietly accepted that reality rather than continuing to ask people who are not available to help.

This is not blame and it is not a request for pity.

It is the current capability map.

How donations will be used

Funds will be used flexibly, according to urgency, for:

safe practical help installing the kitchen counters and pre-fitted sink;

repair or replacement of my Triride power attachment;

transport to medical, legal, advocacy and housing appointments;

paid administrative or advocacy support where free support is unavailable or delayed;

scanning, organising and analysing evidence;

digital tools needed to complete the evidence project;

safe interim access equipment and household adaptations;

basic household stability while Universal Credit, housing-cost and related problems remain unresolved.

Practical help is also valuable. In particular, I would appreciate contact from appropriately skilled and reliable people who could help install the worktops and sink safely, or help locate an accessible tradesperson.

This fundraiser is not about replacing public services.

It is about surviving and working through the gap created when services delay, divide responsibility or fail to communicate.

A donation buys something concrete: a mobility repair, a journey to an appointment, an hour of skilled practical work, an advocate’s time, evidence-analysis capacity, or enough stability to continue without another part of the system collapsing.

If you cannot donate, sharing the fundraiser directly is also useful.

Thank you for helping me keep moving, practically, analytically and legally.