Florrie: my lockdown

Florrie lives at Minstead Lodge, our residential service offering round the clock support to help build independence.

During the most stringent measures Florrie spent seven weeks at home with her family, which helped her cope with the difficult COVID situation.

Now she has returned to the Lodge and this is her lockdown story. The fundraising from our emergency appeals means we have been able to help Florrie during the COVID situation and start to look to the future.

‘The whole situation with the virus has been very stressful. It was nice to be with my parents for a bit, we went out for lots of dog walks.

‘When it was time to come back to Minstead I had to have a virus test and that was horrible, it made me cry.

‘I haven’t enjoyed having less structure to my days or the fact I can’t hang out with some people. Our day opportunities is done in bubbles which means I can’t see some people or do some of the activities I liked before like dance and computer studies.

‘But now we can do more it is better, I have been to New Forest Wildlife Park and Longdown Farm. I like the wolves at the wildlife park and I fed a cow at the farm.

‘The whole situation has made me feel a bit down but I have a book where I write down my feelings and talk them over with my support workers. They have really helped me.

‘Now we can do more like go and do our food shopping at Asda it is good, I like visiting my parents too.

‘Lockdown has been very stressful and things are still difficult but I am getting happier.’

Find out more on our coping with covid hub.