The Importance of Feeling Needed

Do individuals with intellectual disabilities wake up each day feeling important? Like they have a purpose and a job? Like someone will need and value them today?

Years ago when my daughter S was getting ready to graduate high school, we had to look for a day program for her. She was unable to hold down any sort of paid job despite years of pre-vocational training. We ultimately found a nice day habilitation site where she continues to attend to this day. As the program worked with S to see what she would like to do with her life, she told them that she wanted to help people who use wheelchairs.

S has always had a fascination with wheelchairs,wheelchair lifts, wheelchair ramps, and people who use wheelchairs. She has a subscription to a magazine that specializes in disabilities with lots of photos of people who use wheelchairs. She also has many books and movies about people who use wheelchairs. In some ways this seems to be an obsession for her but her day program helps her to use that obsession productively. 

What they did then, was to set her up with her new 'job.' They gave her a name tag and showed her how to help the people who use wheelchairs in her program to get on and off their vans and to bring them to their activities in the building. S only helps people who can't wheel themselves on their own.

I got to watch S do her job yesterday. I was early to pick her up so I just watched her without her knowing I was there. When I pulled up, I saw her chatting with the staff members like she was one of the gang. When a van arrived, S would immediately get up and find the person who rides that van and bring them out. She knows all of the van drivers, all the routes, every person in the building and what van they ride. I was able to watch how proud she is and how important she feels that she is able to help. She feels needed and I could see it by her facial expression and how she interacted with the staff and her friends who use wheelchairs.

Individuals who receive services could be an active part of the running of the group home or day habilitation center. Rather than having staff and administrators setting everything up as the individuals with intellectual disabilities sit back and wait, they could each be given assignments according to their capability. The goal would be that staff would teach them the job of their choosing until they were independent, then leave them alone to do it. Each person would wake up and feel needed because their home or work site would not be able to run smoothly unless they were there to do their job. They would have an opportunity to be productive, feel included, and have increased social value.