St Leonard’s Court is a Blackwood housing development situated on the south side of Ayr which provides specifically designed accommodation and support services for people with physical disabilities and their families. Elliott Hume has been a tenant here since the scheme opened in 1995; “I’m in with the bricks” he chuckles. Before moving into one the downstairs flats at St Leonard’s Court Elliot had lived all over the country, but never by himself, so he has really enjoyed spending the last 17 years living independently in his “wee house”. The Blackwood staff come in to help Elliott with cooking and so forth 2 or 3 times a day, and someone always assists him when he goes shopping in town, but apart from that he is very self-sufficient and able to go out and about on his own as and when he wishes. Elliott has cerebral palsy so he uses a power-assisted wheelchair and therefore he travels via pavement. He has not encountered any problems with pedestrians other than that the button on his chair, which when pressed is supposed to signal to others on the pavement that he is approaching, lets off no more than a “pathetic” beep, so quite often people do not hear him coming, which is a worry for him - “I need a foghorn!” Elliott has very few complaints to make though, and he is very happy with the care he receives and the community he lives in. “The staff are great here” he says, “(they paid me a back-hand earlier to say that!)” he jokes; “- no honestly, we get on fine”.
Elliott grew up in Glasgow before his parents moved to Ayr. In his early twenties Elliott attended a College of Further Education in Lancashire for 2 years, after which he returned home for a while before moving to a Red Cross unit in Inverness where he lived for 6 ½ years. He “loved it there”, but could not stay forever so was re-located to the Red Cross unit in Irvin just north of Ayr for 18 months before securing a place at St Leonard’s Court. It was at Corseford School in Renfrewshire, that Elliott discovered his love for sport. Corseford is a specialist day, residential and respite school for 7-19 year olds. When Elliott was there it was run by the National Spastic Society, which has since been renamed Scope and the school is now run by Capability Scotland. Elliott competed in many local sport competitions and just after he left college he was chosen to compete for Great Britain at the 1984 Paralympic Games on Long Island. Elliott says he will never forget what it felt like to wheel around the stadium at the Opening Ceremony with his team and hear the cheers of 15,000 spectators.
He was due to compete in the Height, Position and Distance Bean Bag, and the Boccia – a game that is similar to bowls but designed specifically for people with disabilities. However, the night before he was due to compete, Elliott was watching a table tennis match when he had a severe seizure; he was rushed to hospital and remained in intensive care for several hours. Unfortunately this meant he missed his two main events, which was a huge disappointment. Two weeks prior to flying to America, Elliott had an EEG to check if his brain pattern was normal and the results apparently showed that he could stop taking his medication. So Elliott can’t help wondering “what if”; if he had not stopped taking his medication he might not have not had the seizure and therefore he might have brought home a medal. But despite these regrets, Elliott still savoured the whole experience of just being there at the Games, and he remembers it with as much excitement as if it happened yesterday.
