Midway through last year, I decided to take a chance and possibly move out to a different city to see what it was like to live on my own. Originally, I planned to get a semi-independent flat in Birmingham or into a flat in Birmingham city centre. The more that I thought about it, the more I realised how much we would have to prepare. One would include telling the council that I wanted to move, the finances and the extra adaptations we’d need to put into place. I realised how many hoops I’d have to jump through just to get the flat or apartment set up for a trial period that may not work out. I wouldn’t want to put all that effort in to then decide to move home again after all. My family and I have a flat in Southampton and we’ve got quite a few family friends who live locally so I decided that the flat would be a happy medium. I could experience what it would be like to live on my own but still in a place that was already adapted and in a city that I already knew.
I thought about it a lot on my own first, considering the positives and negatives of the move. I weighed up everything in my head before I considered telling my dad. I had recently finished my studies and I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do next so this was the perfect chance for me to do so. When discussing it with my dad, he was generally impressed by how much pre-thought that I had about the possibility of moving, before I started talking to him. He thought using the flat was a perfect halfway house. The two of us started to put a strategy into place but he still gave me room to consider the choices behind the move without giving me too much pressure either way. This was one of the big reasons that I didn’t tell the rest of my family at first. I could come to the conclusion myself without too many people telling me how to do it and playing down my fears about the move in general and what it would mean.
My current PA decided to leave the job and go back home so this gave me another push to move out and hire PA’s that could possibly be local to me. If I had recruited PA’s local to Birmingham, it would be another year or so before I could entertain the idea of moving out again. But now with a deadline, I had to decide whether I was going to tell AskJules about my decision. After a few weeks of thought and talking it through with my dad, I decided to verbalise my plan to AskJules, solidifying the possibility of the move. They started to ask me to update my job description and job advert and I had to edit it in accordance with the flat in the city of Southampton where I’d be living. AskJules, my dad, and I decided that in an effort to keep things simple, I would keep my home address in Birmingham so that my appointments remain there as I would still come up and down quite regularly. From here, we began to look for potential PA’s and carers. It was a long process but I think we were able to get the right combination of qualities, capture the seriousness and also the fun side of the role.
I’ve always generally liked Southampton, with the harbour and marina close by, with the local shopping centre being so close. I felt that it would be the perfect place for me to have a fresh start. In Birmingham, I had been struggling to find a suitable job so I hoped a new place would help me get in that mindset to be able to find a job that I would be happy in. Unfortunately, I am yet to find a job but I am still looking. I’ve also seen the opportunity to come to Southampton for a fresh perspective on my creative fiction worlds. I was still writing in Birmingham but I think this would be a great opportunity for me to have a fresh take on life and see if I could get my creative juices flowing again after finishing university.
I am currently living in Southampton now and will see what comes for me in the next few months.
The Life of Sophie 