First Day of Work

I was supposed to start work on January 2nd but due to complications with getting my fingerprints taken and with the facility/my company misplacing my Texas license, I wasn't able to start until January 9th. My birthday. Yaaaaay.

It was rough getting up at 6 instead of just sleeping in until whenever I wanted. Then I kind of had to guess where to go to get to the facility since my GPS couldn't find it. I know, #firstworldproblems right? Well at the time it was a big deal, haha.

I spent the last three years racing around as fast as I could to make sure my daily productivity was adequate to avoid getting fired, seeing 7-11 people a day, and spending maybe 20 minutes in the office total during the course of a day. At this job however, people kind of just mill about, see maybe 3-4 people a day, and spend a lot of time in the office on the computer or just talking. It's so bizarre to not have to be productive. Of course you can't just screw around and not do anything but the emphasis is way different. It's pretty awesome but I feel like I'm wasting the facility's money by not being as productive as I was at my last job. It's nice that the focus here isn't about making money.

I will be working with adult clients who have a wide range of developmental, cognitive, and physical disabilities who live on a campus funded by the state government. Diagnoses range from seizure disorders, profound mental retardation, cerebral palsy, and Autism spectrum. Most of the clients have lived at this state funded facility for the majority of their lifetime. A lot of them have behaviors, are nonverbal, and in wheelchairs. They remind me of my clients at the group home I used to work at and I LOVE IT! There is something so special with this population. I'm glad to be working with this population of people again.

When I get to work I usually will attend a meeting to hear what happened in the last 24 hours. Staff that work with people in their homes on campus can report to therapy if there are any concerns. They also talk about appointments, if people are in the hospital, if someone got into fisticuffs or had to be restrained. Sometimes it can be a pretty eventful 24 hours in these people's lives!

I will then work on my monthly evals, which instead of an hour or 2 in the skilled nursing facility, take 2-3 days at this place. This is because we evaluate every aspect of the client's life. How they are doing on the home, in the cafeteria, in the workshop, in the classrooms, in their wheelchair, etc. We assess their sensory needs, fine motor skills, if they have any contractures or other musculoskeletal issues,  activities of daily living, positioning, and mobility. We also assess their risk for choking, falls, injury, and skin issues. It takes a lot of time and the evals are very involved. I love being detailed so I definitely like this.

Some of my day will be spent trying out ideas that I think may help the clients. Such as if someone is having trouble feeding themselves I can spend several hours throughout the course of the week to try out different equipment. If someone is having more behaviors transitioning from work to home or whatever, I can try out as many sensory activities that I think could be beneficial. There are no limits or constraints here. IT'S AWESOME. I can order whatever I want (within reason) that could help the client. The client is truly the focus here.

About 1-2 times a week I will attend annual meetings for my clients to discuss therapy's recommendations to make their lives better in the next year. The rest of the team and usually the client and a family are there too to add input if appropriate.

The only thing I don't like so far is that because it's government run, there is a department for EVERYTHING. It's so confusing on who does what, and in my opinion a lot of positions are unnecessary because they are redundant and someone else could fill that role. There are also a lot of acronyms that all sound the same and no one knows what they stand for. It's like the army.

So that's my new job. I will write more as I fumble my way through this assignment. Hopefully this hasn't been too boring to read. If you got to the end, congrats!

Oh, I also wanted to say I wrote this while watching the Golden Globes so if something doesn't make sense that's why. I love Tina Fey.