My Sister, Elaine

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Part of this page was edited by my mother, Ruth Saulnier, in April 2009.

There's a lot that can be said about my sister, and the struggles my family has faced with keeping her over the years. This isn't a subject that comes up in every day conversation, and even when it does, I usually don't have enough time to explain everything in detail.

Since the story is interesting to some people, I have presented it here on my web site for you and everyone else to read as you like.

Overview

Perhaps you're intrigued by the fact that I do have a special web page for my sister, and that I allude to some mysterious struggles over the years. Basically, my sister is mentally and physically challenged, and has been confined to a wheelchair all her life. Her speech is not normal, and she cannot walk or use her hands very well. We can understand most of her limited vocabulary, and she has a fun personality overall. My sister has Cerebral Palsy.

Early Life

My sister was born in 1982 at the Saint John General Hospital without any problems. At 6 ½ months of old, things took a turn for the worse. She developed asthma and had troubles breathing. She went into respiratory distress and the doctor told my parents that she needed to be sent to Halifax. The arrangements were made for her to be flown by Air Sea Rescue. On the flight to Halifax in the plane, my sister cardiac arrested and was clinically dead for 9 ½ minutes. They brought her back, but not before serious brain damage had occurred.

My parents drove to Halifax, and made the journey in exactly 4 hours, in the pouring rain. The normal time for this trip back then was 5 hours on a nice day. They had no idea what had happened on the plane and were not told until much later that she had suffered brain damage. My mother was in Halifax for 2 ½ months and my father, after a month of leave, traveled back and forth on his days off. While in Halifax my parents stayed at the Ronald McDonald House on Tower Road. This was a God send, because they met a lot of other parents who understood just how they felt and what they were going through even if the illnesses were not the same. They laughed and cried together. Everyone in the House was going through that same kind of struggles, emotionally and financially.

When Elaine finally came home my mother realized that Elaine could not see or hear, but after a couple of weeks went by, her sight and hearing came back. She sees and hears everything now.

Household Renovations

The title sounds expensive and daunting already, doesn't it? Since my sister cannot walk on her own, we have to wheel her everywhere. My parents also have to lift her in and out of wherever she needs to go. For years, my parents even brought her up and down the stairs twice a day for the school bus. This wears you out after a while, and my parents renovated the house in 1993 at a cost of over 50 thousand dollars. A new garage was added, and on top of that cost, a 10 thousand dollar lift was installed. The government chipped in to buy the lift.

Or did they? As the elevator was being installed, my parents received a phone call from the government telling us that they were no longer going to pay for the lift and that the cost was up to us. My parents had not planned for this. Numerous letters were written to the premier of the province, and we only got replies like, "We are sorry to inform you that nothing more can be done regarding this matter."

It seemed hopeless, but after a few years of phone calls and letters, we actually won. We got a phone call one day stating that we would be receiving a cheque for the cost of the elevator in a few days. The cheque did arrive as promised. Although that amount was taxable and therefore not the true full amount of the eleveator, it was indeed better than nothing.

School

Elaine began attending public school at the very young age of 3, and graduated at age 20. Imagine that for a second. She went to school for nearly 16 years. School was always a great enjoyment and benefit to her. She even loved riding the bus. She's adored all of her bus drivers.

The last day of school was a very sad day for everyone in my family except, ironically, my sister. There was not much different to her to indicate that this day of school would be her last. I don't think she realized it until the following year when the school bus didn't come for her anymore.

Elaine's School History

Summer Camp

For many years, as long as I can remember, Elaine has gone to Camp Rotary near Fredericton, New Brunswick. She enjoys her time there, and knows exactly how long camp is supposed to last. She wouldn't speak to us for days when we had to pick her up early one year due to an illness infecting all of the counsellors.

I don't know when she has to stop going there. She takes home the award for giving the most hugs many years, and her fellow campers wish her goodbyes and hope to see her next year.

The Future

Elaine's future right is uncertain, to say the least. Now that school has ended, she is always home. There are no programs out there for people like her, and her abilities are too limited to allow her to work anywhere. She does not have the opportunity to meet many other people and the focal point of her day is often talking to my grandmother on the telephone. We try our best to entertain her, but this isn't always possible, and she isn't always in the mood for it either.

The only relief for my parents is 1 week of the year when she attends camp. For the other 51 weeks, she is always home and always with us. For reasons that we don't entirely understand, she is often impossible to please when she is in one of her moods. This creates a lot of stress for everyone.