When their son Adam became paralysed after a fall in May 2021, the Drummond family had to make some serious alterations to their home in Cork city.
The Irish international basketball star, who had played for five years on the national team, was on a basketball scholarship to the US and was there for nearly three years before his tragic accident.
His parents, Marguerite and Brian, initially thought about selling their home to find somewhere more suitable. Their two-storey end-of-terrace home in the heart of the city is built on a hill, and was no longer suitable for Adam’s needs.
But, having unsuccessfully attempted to buy four different properties, they decided to see what they could do to renovate their own home to make it more accessible for their son.
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“Following the accident, the whole of Cork, the country and the Irish basketball community came behind us,” says Marguerite, who works as a phlebotomist/clinical assistant. “We were approached by the programme DIY SOS, The Big Build Ireland to help rebuild our home and 3,000 people applied to help. It was so humbling and overwhelming, and in May 2022 our home was rebuilt.
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Due to a multitude of helping hands, the extensive renovation of the interior of the Drummond home took only nine days to complete, with between 100 and 120 people working on the house each day. The work involved creating an internal lift from Stiltz Homelifts, which goes from the kitchen to the basement room, so Adam can access this room, the outside garden and a garden room, which was built for him.
“Our whole house was redesigned by widening the hallway and making Adam’s bedroom, bathroom and study room on the ground floor. The upstairs was also redesigned and although Adam can’t go upstairs, he has seen a film of the changes made,” says Marguerite.
After the fall and a period of rehabilitation, the family moved to a friend’s ground floor apartment, as their home just wasn’t suitable.
But once the reconstruction work was completed on the family property, the 23-year-old, who is currently in his third year at college, returned to take up residence in his newly adapted home.
His mother says she and the rest of the family – father Brian, who is an upholsterer and furniture maker, and siblings Craig, and Niamh – couldn’t be more proud of how he has adapted to his new situation.
“Adam was in the National Rehabilitation Hospital for over three months,” says Marguerite. “Within two weeks [of discharge] he was shooting a basketball. Within nine months of the accident, he joined wheelchair basketball and played his first wheelchair match with the Irish team at the para athletics last summer. He recently did a talk in a school about disability, inclusion and diversity. He drives his own car, went back to college when he got home from Dublin, and is now coaching basketball with his own club and the wheelchair Irish team. And as well as being one of the top basketball players in Ireland, he is using his voice to bring more awareness to wheelchair basketball and other wheelchair sports.
“We will never know all the people who helped [to complete the new garden room], but we are so grateful. Apparently the build was a very positive experience for those involved and completely brought the community together. Adam returned home a year to the day following the accident – and it was the best thing for us all to be home and back in our community.
“Adam has amazed us in his achievements since the accident. It was obviously a very hard time and sometimes things can still be hard. But for him, being [able to be at] home meant being back with his family, friends and his sport.”
The ability to be at the heart of the family home was also crucial to Laura Costello, who was left partially paralysed following complications during the birth of her youngest son, Daniel, in 2020.
She spent a year in the National Rehabilitation Hospital as she learned to walk and talk again, before finally being able to return home to her husband David and their five children – Dylan, Thomas, Matthew, Sophie and Daniel.
However, as she would now need the assistance of a wheelchair, the house was no longer suitable for her needs – and as was the case with Adam Drummond, the situation was remedied by DIY SOS, The Big Build Ireland.
Really I can’t begin to explain what the lift [and home adaptation] has done for our family
— David Costello
“The renovation was carried out by a crew of local and national volunteers, most of whom we had never met before,” says David. “There were both big and small suppliers who stepped up and gave the volunteers everything they needed to get the job done – and the build itself took just nine days, with the entire house being renovated and extended to make it accessible for Laura. Now, there isn’t a single room in the house that she can’t access.
“And one of the most amazing pieces of the project was the home lift from Stiltz Trio Alta, which is built to take a full-sized wheelchair. Laura easily uses the lift 10 times a day, and this means that she can be with the kids wherever they are and whatever they are doing.”
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Laura adds: “As a mammy, I can be with the kids all day and night. I can put them to bed, read them a story, just be a mammy everywhere. And when they wake up at night I know they can come to me because I am upstairs.”
David already had experience of how inaccessible some areas of a family home can be to wheelchair users, as his father had MS and was “stuck downstairs”. And he says the transformation of their house has enhanced all of their lives.
“My Dad lived in an ‘island’ in our childhood home, so I can attest to the frustration we all experienced as a family when he couldn’t use the stairs,” he says. “Really I can’t begin to explain what the lift [and home adaptation] has done for our family, and the potential it holds into the future.”
