Monique's Story

At the age of 18, Monique was faced with a choice about what direction she wanted to take in life. The decision she made led to a vibrant life filled with work, travel, sport and dance.

Comments (0)

Please verify your action

Comment (maximum 3500 characters) (required)

Add a picture

Notify me when someone makes a comment

First name (required)

Last name (required)

Email (required)

Which country do you live in?

Postcode (required)

Address line 1

Address line 2

Town or city

Keeping In Touch

We'd love to keep you posted with our news, activities and how you can help in other ways. We'll never sell or swap your details with anybody else. You are free to change your mind at anytime. Please indicate how you would like to hear from us by using the tick boxes below

Via email

Via telephone

Via SMS

Via post

Which country do you live in?

Postcode (required)

Address line 1

Address line 2

Town or city

Your Privacy

We will always store your personal details securely. We'll use them to provide the service that you have requested, and communicate with you in the way(s) that you have agreed to. Your data may also be used for analysis purposes, to help us provide the best service possible. For full details see our Privacy Policy

By submitting this form you are agreeing to our terms and conditions

1. Introduction
1.1 These terms and conditions shall govern your use of Changing Our Lives website.
1.2 By using our website, you accept these terms and conditions in full; accordingly, if you disagree with these terms and conditions or any part of these terms and conditions, you must not use our website.
1.3 If you register with our website, submit any material to our website or use any of our website services, we will ask you to expressly agree to these terms and conditions.
1.4 Our website uses cookies; by using our website or agreeing to these terms and conditions, you consent to our use of cookies in accordance with the terms of our privacy policy.
2. Credit
2.1 This document is an SEQ Legal document from Website Contracts (http://www.website-contracts.co.uk).
3. Copyright notice
3.1 Copyright (c) 2018 Changing Our Lives.
3.2 Subject to the express provisions of these terms and conditions:
(a) we, together with our licensors, own and control all the copyright and other intellectual property rights in our website and the material on our website; and
(b) all the copyright and other intellectual property rights in our website and the material on our website are reserved.
4. Licence to use website
4.1 You may:
(a) view pages from our website in a web browser;
(b) download pages from our website for caching in a web browser;
(c) print pages from our website;
(d) stream audio and video files from our website; and
(e) use our website services by means of a web browser,
subject to the other provisions of these terms and conditions.
4.2 You may only use our website for your own personal and business purposes, and you must not use our website for any other purposes.
4.4 Except as expressly permitted by these terms and conditions, you must not edit or otherwise modify any material on our website.
4.5 Unless you own or control the relevant rights in the material, you must not:
(a) republish material from our website (including republication on another website);
(b) sell, rent or sub-license material from our website;
(c) show any material from our website in public;
(d) exploit material from our website for a commercial purpose; or
(e) redistribute material from our website.
4.6 Notwithstanding Section 4.5, you may redistribute our newsletter in print and electronic form to any person.
4.7 We reserve the right to restrict access to areas of our website, or indeed our whole website, at our discretion; you must not circumvent or bypass, or attempt to circumvent or bypass, any access restriction measures on our website.
5. Acceptable use
5.1 You must not:
(a) use our website in any way or take any action that causes, or may cause, damage to the website or impairment of the performance, availability or accessibility of the website;
(b) use our website in any way that is unlawful, illegal, fraudulent or harmful, or in connection with any unlawful, illegal, fraudulent or harmful purpose or activity;
(c) use our website to copy, store, host, transmit, send, use, publish or distribute any material which consists of (or is linked to) any spyware, computer virus, Trojan horse, worm, keystroke logger, rootkit or other malicious computer software;
(d) conduct any systematic or automated data collection activities (including without limitation scraping, data mining, data extraction and data harvesting) on or in relation to our website without our express written consent;
(e) access or otherwise interact with our website using any robot, spider or other automated means, except for the purpose of search engine indexing;
(f) violate the directives set out in the robots.txt file for our website; or
(g) use data collected from our website for any direct marketing activity (including without limitation email marketing, SMS marketing, telemarketing and direct mailing).
5.2 You must not use data collected from our website to contact individuals, companies or other persons or entities.
5.3 You must ensure that all the information you supply to us through our website, or in relation to our website, is true, accurate, current, complete and non-misleading.
6. Registration and accounts
6.1 You may register for an account with our website by completing and submitting the account registration form on our website, and clicking on the verification link in the email that the website will send to you.
6.2 You must not allow any other person to use your account to access the website.
6.3 You must notify us in writing immediately if you become aware of any unauthorised use of your account.
6.4 You must not use any other person's account to access the website, unless you have that person's express permission to do so.
7. User login details
7.1 If you register for an account with our website, we will provide you with OR you will be asked to choose a user ID and password.
7.2 Your user ID must not be liable to mislead and must comply with the content rules set out in Section 10; you must not use your account or user ID for or in connection with the impersonation of any person.
7.3 You must keep your password confidential.
7.4 You must notify us in writing immediately if you become aware of any disclosure of your password.
7.5 You are responsible for any activity on our website arising out of any failure to keep your password confidential, and may be held liable for any losses arising out of such a failure.
8. Cancellation and suspension of account
8.1 We may:
(a) suspend your account;
(b) cancel your account; and/or
(c) edit your account details,
at any time in our sole discretion without notice or explanation.
8.2 You may cancel your account on our website [using your account control panel on the website].
9. Your content: licence
9.1 In these terms and conditions, "your content" means [all works and materials (including without limitation text, graphics, images, audio material, video material, audio-visual material, scripts, software and files) that you submit to us or our website for storage or publication on, processing by, or transmission via, our website].
9.2 You grant to us a worldwide, irrevocable, non-exclusive, royalty-free licence to use, reproduce, store, adapt, publish, translate and distribute your content in any existing or future media.
9.3 You grant to us the right to sub-license the rights licensed under Section 9.2.
9.4 You grant to us the right to bring an action for infringement of the rights licensed under Section 9.2.
9.5 You hereby waive all your moral rights in your content to the maximum extent permitted by applicable law; and you warrant and represent that all other moral rights in your content have been waived to the maximum extent permitted by applicable law.
9.6 You may edit your content to the extent permitted using the editing functionality made available on our website.
9.7 Without prejudice to our other rights under these terms and conditions, if you breach any provision of these terms and conditions in any way, or if we reasonably suspect that you have breached these terms and conditions in any way, we may delete, unpublish or edit any or all of your content.
10. Your content: rules
10.1 You warrant and represent that your content will comply with these terms and conditions.
10.2 Your content must not be illegal or unlawful, must not infringe any person's legal rights, and must not be capable of giving rise to legal action against any person (in each case in any jurisdiction and under any applicable law).
10.3 Your content, and the use of your content by us in accordance with these terms and conditions, must not:
(a) be libellous or maliciously false;
(b) be obscene or indecent;
(c) infringe any copyright, moral right, database right, trade mark right, design right, right in passing off, or other intellectual property right;
(d) infringe any right of confidence, right of privacy or right under data protection legislation;
(e) constitute negligent advice or contain any negligent statement;
(f) constitute an incitement to commit a crime[, instructions for the commission of a crime or the promotion of criminal activity];
(g) be in contempt of any court, or in breach of any court order;
(h) be in breach of racial or religious hatred or discrimination legislation;
(i) be blasphemous;
(j) be in breach of official secrets legislation;
(k) be in breach of any contractual obligation owed to any person;
(l) depict violence in an explicit, graphic or gratuitous manner;
(m) be pornographic, lewd, suggestive or sexually explicit;
(n) be untrue, false, inaccurate or misleading;
(o) consist of or contain any instructions, advice or other information which may be acted upon and could, if acted upon, cause illness, injury or death, or any other loss or damage;
(p) constitute spam;
(q) be offensive, deceptive, fraudulent, threatening, abusive, harassing, anti-social, menacing, hateful, discriminatory or inflammatory; or
(r) cause annoyance, inconvenience or needless anxiety to any person.
11. Limited warranties
11.1 We do not warrant or represent:
(a) the completeness or accuracy of the information published on our website;
(b) that the material on the website is up to date; or
(c) that the website or any service on the website will remain available.
11.2 We reserve the right to discontinue or alter any or all of our website services, and to stop publishing our website, at any time in our sole discretion without notice or explanation; and save to the extent expressly provided otherwise in these terms and conditions, you will not be entitled to any compensation or other payment upon the discontinuance or alteration of any website services, or if we stop publishing the website.
11.3 To the maximum extent permitted by applicable law and subject to Section 12.1, we exclude all representations and warranties relating to the subject matter of these terms and conditions, our website and the use of our website.
12. Limitations and exclusions of liability
12.1 Nothing in these terms and conditions will:
(a) limit or exclude any liability for death or personal injury resulting from negligence;
(b) limit or exclude any liability for fraud or fraudulent misrepresentation;
(c) limit any liabilities in any way that is not permitted under applicable law; or
(d) exclude any liabilities that may not be excluded under applicable law.
12.2 The limitations and exclusions of liability set out in this Section 12 and elsewhere in these terms and conditions:
(a) are subject to Section 12.1; and
(b) govern all liabilities arising under these terms and conditions or relating to the subject matter of these terms and conditions, including liabilities arising in contract, in tort (including negligence) and for breach of statutory duty, except to the extent expressly provided otherwise in these terms and conditions.
12.3 To the extent that our website and the information and services on our website are provided free of charge, we will not be liable for any loss or damage of any nature.
12.4 We will not be liable to you in respect of any losses arising out of any event or events beyond our reasonable control.
12.5 We will not be liable to you in respect of any business losses, including (without limitation) loss of or damage to profits, income, revenue, use, production, anticipated savings, business, contracts, commercial opportunities or goodwill.
12.6 We will not be liable to you in respect of any loss or corruption of any data, database or software.
12.7 We will not be liable to you in respect of any special, indirect or consequential loss or damage.
12.8 You accept that we have an interest in limiting the personal liability of our officers and employees and, having regard to that interest, you acknowledge that we are a limited liability entity; you agree that you will not bring any claim personally against our officers or employees in respect of any losses you suffer in connection with the website or these terms and conditions (this will not, of course, limit or exclude the liability of the limited liability entity itself for the acts and omissions of our officers and employees).
13. Breaches of these terms and conditions
13.1 Without prejudice to our other rights under these terms and conditions, if you breach these terms and conditions in any way, or if we reasonably suspect that you have breached these terms and conditions in any way, we may:
(a) send you one or more formal warnings;
(b) temporarily suspend your access to our website;
(c) permanently prohibit you from accessing our website;
(d) block computers using your IP address from accessing our website;
(e) contact any or all of your internet service providers and request that they block your access to our website;
(f) commence legal action against you, whether for breach of contract or otherwise; and/or
(g) suspend or delete your account on our website.
13.2 Where we suspend or prohibit or block your access to our website or a part of our website, you must not take any action to circumvent such suspension or prohibition or blocking (including without limitation creating and/or using a different account).
14. Variation
14.1 We may revise these terms and conditions from time to time.
14.2 The revised terms and conditions shall apply to the use of our website from the date of publication of the revised terms and conditions on the website, and you hereby waive any right you may otherwise have to be notified of, or to consent to, revisions of these terms and conditions.] OR [We will give you written notice of any revision of these terms and conditions, and the revised terms and conditions will apply to the use of our website from the date that we give you such notice; if you do not agree to the revised terms and conditions, you must stop using our website.
14.3 If you have given your express agreement to these terms and conditions, we will ask for your express agreement to any revision of these terms and conditions; and if you do not give your express agreement to the revised terms and conditions within such period as we may specify, we will disable or delete your account on the website, and you must stop using the website.
15. Assignment
15.1 You hereby agree that we may assign, transfer, sub-contract or otherwise deal with our rights and/or obligations under these terms and conditions.
15.2 You may not without our prior written consent assign, transfer, sub-contract or otherwise deal with any of your rights and/or obligations under these terms and conditions.
16. Severability
16.1 If a provision of these terms and conditions is determined by any court or other competent authority to be unlawful and/or unenforceable, the other provisions will continue in effect.
16.2 If any unlawful and/or unenforceable provision of these terms and conditions would be lawful or enforceable if part of it were deleted, that part will be deemed to be deleted, and the rest of the provision will continue in effect.
17. Third party rights
17.1 A contract under these terms and conditions is for our benefit and your benefit, and is not intended to benefit or be enforceable by any third party.
17.2 The exercise of the parties' rights under a contract under these terms and conditions is not subject to the consent of any third party.
18. Entire agreement
18.1 Subject to Section 12.1, these terms and conditions, together with our privacy policy, shall constitute the entire agreement between you and us in relation to your use of our website and shall supersede all previous agreements between you and us in relation to your use of our website.
19. Law and jurisdiction
19.1 These terms and conditions shall be governed by and construed in accordance with English law.
19.2 Any disputes relating to these terms and conditions shall be subject to the non-exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of England.
21. Our details
21.1 This website is owned and operated by Changing Our Lives Ltd.
21.2 We are registered in England and Wales under registration number 4404093, and our registered office is at 34B, The Woodyard, Hall Drive, Stourbridge, West Midlands DY9 9LQ.
21.3 Our principal place of business is at 34B, The Woodyard, Hall Drive, Stourbridge, West Midlands DY9 9LQ.
21.4 You can contact us:
(a) by post, using the postal address given above;
(b) using our website contact form;
(c) by telephone, on the contact number published on our website; or
(d) by email, using the email address published on our website.

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Latest

Ordinary Life Approach
Got My Back

Young people and families putting themselves in control of postural care
Common Ground 2019 - 2021

Read our Common Ground report and arts brochure now!
Testimonials

Got My Back

Young people and families putting themselves in control of postural care
Common Ground 2019 - 2021

Read our Common Ground report and arts brochure now!
Charlie's story

When you meet Charlie, you don’t see disability; you see a charming and cheeky young man who is full of opinions and eager to make his mark on the world.
David's Story

Lockdown or no lockdown, with a direct payment and effective personalised care, David lives his life to the fullest.
From Hospital to Home

This collection of stories describes three people’s unique journey from hospital to home.
Caprice's Story

Caprice's passion for social justice has led to a career in law.
Short Black n Sides
My Life During Lockdown

David and his mom Helen share their creative ways of coping during lockdown
No one's too disabled to have a conversation

Sometimes people think that if disabled people don’t use words to communicate, they can’t have a conversation. This is not true.
Why do people commission us?

Our vision and values

Changing Our Lives is a rights-based organisation. We work alongside disabled people and people experiencing mental health difficulties, of all ages, as equal partners to find solutions to social injustice and health inequalities.
What is postural care?
Mental Health People's Parliament

The People’s Parliament is a strategic body led by MPs with recent lived experience of mental health difficulties. Its function is to hold decision makers to account for improvements in services and supports so that people who experience mental health difficulties can have an improved quality of life and be in greater control of their own mental wellbeing. The Parliament is located in the Metropolitan Borough of Sandwell, just outside Birmingham.
Where we work
Safe places

The Safe Places scheme is based on the belief that everyone has the right to feel confident and safe going out in their local community. Lots of people feel unsafe at times in the local area; this might be because they have experienced crime or because they simply feel unsafe. For disabled people, older people and others who feel vulnerable this often means they don’t go out at all. The Safe Places scheme enables people to feel more confident, access their local areas more and know what to do.
Our brand
Common Ground
Katy's Story

No one's too disabled, or too affected by mental health difficulties, to lead an ordinary life.
Jayne Leeson, MBE

Chief Executive Officer
Sonja's Story

Sonja has been employed in Sandwell council for 10 years and is flourishing in her career.