Wheels

Last night at one of the group homes, a lady was very angry that she couldn't go out to the garage sale down her street. It was very difficult to help ease her disappointment. We tried validating her feelings, assured her that she could go tomorrow, came up with something fun for her to do at home (bake cupcakes or make a necklace) and reminded her that we take her out every weekend to do what she wants to do and had her recite all of the fun things she did last weekend. Our positive approaches toward helping her in her emotional moment did not help.

There is a reality that sometimes the individuals can't get out and do what they want exactly when they want. There is not enough staff to accommodate all requests. Almost all requests can be met eventually, just not on the spur of the moment. We often need to plan. We have to take turns, assure for staffing of home and the community outing, have to have a van available, and have to have money and bring their medications and necessary equipment.

The reason P was angry was likely because she knows that I can go out whenever I want and she can't. I can go out to a garage sale on the spur of the moment. Most of us in society can. We have wheels and know how to drive. We don't need someone to supervise us to make sure we are safe so we have a sense of freedom that P doesn't have but wants to have. I take my right to come and go as I please for granted most of the time.

When we work with a group of people, we get ourselves in a mindset of how to manage the group rather than how to meet individualized needs. Really, we should be trying to figure out how we can stop thinking of them as a group of people. Yes, they are a group, and we do have methods for helping us all get along together, but we should strive to treat them as individuals, too. Especially since our own society is so individual-oriented. We all fight for our individual rights here. I suppose we should fight for their individual rights, too, and support their fights for their own individual rights.

A while back, one of the heads of the U.S. Department of Transportation believed that all people should have the right to come and go as they please. He believed that society has an obligation to provide transportation to all, no matter what the disability, and that it needs to be efficient, accessible, safe, and affordable.


If he got his way, instead of waking up and wondering what was on the recreation calendar, a person with a disability would decide what they want to do and transportation and staffing would be provided. Instead of taking turns, they would be able to do what they wanted when they want. Just as I can.

All right, then. So last night, we probably could have accommodated P's request. We had at least 90 minutes before her housemates were due to leave for the evening event - the county fair.  The garage sale was down the street. One staff could have brought her and the whole outing would have taken 20 minutes, tops. It took us at least that long, probably longer, to calm her down. But our mindset was stuck on arbitrary rules that we set. We decided that there is one outing a night, it was someone else's turn to go out, it was almost dinner time and we all eat together, and that she should be happy that she goes out as often as she does.

Should we be trying to adjust our own thinking to help them make their lives as close to ours as possible? Or, at the very least, as close to what they want their lives to be?