The youngest resident at Nigel House, a Saanich complex-care facility, is also the most adept with computers — and is using his knowledge of programming to help two of his peers with physical challenges.
Twenty-four-year-old Kyle, who did not want to use his last name, has been at Nigel House since the summer of 2022 after an unknown condition left him unable to walk or stand.
It began with having trouble with co-ordination and movement while he was a student at the University of Victoria, majoring in computer science and psychology.
The precise cause of his symptoms has yet to be determined.
“We’ve kind of gone on a diagnostic odyssey,” Kyle said. “They’ve determined that there’s a problem with my spinal cord and it’s likely from a genetic disorder.”
He said he spends much of his time working with computers and electronics, and is currently trying to develop a system for a pair of residents so that they can write using their eyes.
“Right now it works with head movements by using a webcam, but I’m trying to expand that by tracking eye movements,” he said. “It’s coming along.”
The flexibility of staff to meet individual needs and depart from the daily schedule as things arise has been crucial to his efforts, he said.
“I very much want to underline this would not be possible in a lot of care facilities elsewhere.”
Life was normal before his symptoms began, Kyle said, although he had some minor issues that now seem to have been linked to his present state.
He said he was active and enjoyed running.
Kyle said his family is mainly in Edmonton, and while he has lived all over B.C., he considers Victoria his home.
He said he hasn’t decided whether he will try to get back to his studies.
“I probably need a little bit of time.”
Finding Nigel House was lucky, since people with his issues at his young age don’t have a lot of options, he said.
“There actually aren’t really places for people like me, not many at all, so I spent a long time in the hospital where I didn’t need to be,” he said. “I just didn’t have a place to go to.”
A few other Nigel House residents had a similar experience before arriving there, he said. “I’m not the only one in that boat.”
He said Nigel House is not what he originally thought of in terms of his long-term care, but it has worked out well.
“They have been very flexible in adapting to my evolving needs and they have also been supporting me in having a life apart from all of this.”
He has maintained a level of independence that some of his fellow residents don’t have, and gets out of the facility often in his electric wheelchair, using regular buses as well as HandyDART service to get where he wants to go.
His outings involve things like spending time with friends, some of them from his time at UVic, and getting to meetings of his chess club, he said.
Kyle said he accepts the direction his life has taken.
“I think humans are inherently extremely adaptable,” he said. “A situation presents itself and you just have to go with it.
“I don’t really think about my situation or even my disability during the day at all because I’m occupied with other stuff.”
The new, bigger, better-equipped Nigel House under construction adjacent to the current facility gives him optimism — and a few reservations.
“Mostly I hope that with the change we don’t lose the things about Nigel House that make it such a unique program, like how adaptive they are to people’s needs.”
He said some residents need help with all aspects of their day-to-day life while others, like him, need much less — and Nigel House has room for all of them.
For more information about the Nigel House project, visit broadmeadcare.com/nigel-house-donations.
