Gratitude - 2/3/19

I'm currently fighting a cold. It has left the fever behind but the mucus has settled into my chest. My body feels heavy and achy but not as weak as I would have thought it would be. So I don't like being sick, but I feel like I will recover quicker than normal... which is good as I am working six days this week.

1. I am thankful for fruit. I'm on a slightly restrictive diet and being able to eat fruit feels like I am being spoiled with dessert. So I am grateful for my dessert of peaches today. It was wonderful.

2. So thankful that the weather has warmed up a trifle. Going outside at thirty degrees feels much better than three degrees. I spent a little bit of time outside today because it was warmer and I am glad to have enjoyed a little bit of sun.

3. I am grateful for books to lose myself in when I am sick and need to rest.

4. I am super grateful for on-line church. I love listening to testimonies and the experiences of other people. Even when I don't understand or can't comprehend their experience I feel so edified listening to others and being able to share my own thoughts. I really appreciate inclusive areas when all can feel like they belong. Just feeling grateful for my Sabbath today.

5. I am grateful for Bug. I am blessed to have such an amazing son! He is going through another growth spurt again so I am watching him shoot up even taller and wondering when it will end. He is going to be a very tall man. I loved reading books with him today and enjoying videos too. It was a nice day.

6. It was wonderful for have such a nice lazy day. I really needed one.

Professional Participation Activity at the Birchwood Living Center

This is a paper I wrote on my experience last April of spending eight hours interviewing and learning about different ways of working to educate adult students with disabilities. It has been heavily edited for privacy concerns. I absolutely fell in love with this facility and I am grateful for the time I spent there. Without further ado, here it is. :)


Throughout this class we have discussed the many ways that education happens and how diverse challenges can be addressed to promote social parity and learning advancement in students. Our classwork has focused on school age individuals, public education, and uses and access to literature as many of us hope to work in the public education system. I was interested in how nursing or primarily medical facilities dealt with trying to stimulate and educate older individuals. After some research and discussion, I chose to observe and participate with teaching at the Birchwood Living Center located in Ellsworth, Maine. It is a program under the management of Yesterday’s Children, Inc. and is an inpatient nursing facility for individuals with intellectual disabilities and unique medical needs. The residential program can accept up to 15 clients at a time and the facility caters to all their medical, dietary, and educational needs. The clients that I observed in this facility were varied in diagnoses and medical needs, however, many were non-verbal and limited in many aspects of physical expression/ movement due to their specific disabilities.

I visited this facility on two separate occasions and participated in a few different activities- I will focus on day treatment and on understanding how this facility addressed the educational needs of its clients as well as the individuals specific medical needs that impact educational success (occupational therapy, sensory integration), as well as physical health.
All inpatients attend the Day Treatment program in a nearby building and this is where most of the group activities happen. A ratio of four staff members to eleven clients is maintained and it is this that makes this particular facility very different from other facilities who might care only for immediate medical needs. Clients are removed at different times from the group to complete some forms of therapy. I watched as a large group of clients was seated around a table making some get well cards for missing staff members. Some members were in regular chairs and some in specialized chairs while one slouched forward nearby wearing a helmet for their protection from potential falls. The majority of the physical work- picking up stickers and sticking onto card paper, bending, folding etc.- was completed by support staff. I observed questions and choices of stickers and designs asked by staff to different members of the group and eventual choices were made based on feedback received from group members. I am not knowledgeable enough to recognize how each member’s level of attention was focused. What I did observe was that I could start a conversation with someone, give them a marker or a pen, and suggest drawing, and I would get appropriate physical responses to my requests- a name written, a picture scribbled together. I rarely got verbal responses; if I did they were not usually words, but laughs, shrieks, and other noises. It was very apparent that the staff members could interpret correctly what was being said even if it was not clear to me; I still feel a bit of awe and wonder from watching that. I saw no behavioral difficulties that were out of the norm for each person- for some clients, aggression or self-abuse are common to their diagnoses and it is watched and redirected when appropriate.

Each individual who was removed from the group for therapy was removed for only a short time to a side room with a worker. Therapy available includes occupational and physical therapy to help promote functionality, mobility, and fitness for these individuals- many of whom are confined to specialized chairs due to poor physical independence. I watched therapy given to promote relaxation and encourage muscle use and development as well as sensory processing. Sometimes it was obvious that the person didn’t have any interest in participating in their therapy that day and they would make that abundantly clear in both physical and verbal ways. Redirection was kind and thoughtful and modifications in materials were sometimes made to achieve compliance without complaint. It is not required that all individuals must be in the group the whole time and I observed some patients removing themselves from the group for periods of time for their own comfort or privacy. Even with these wanderings (which were quietly supervised), it seemed that full inclusion was achieved to the best of each individual’s ability to participate.

As a potential future educator, I found this facility to be well- organized and primed to do the very best they can to help their clients progress in all aspects of their lives. Aspects of successful classroom activities were easily discernible in most parts of the facility: student pictures, artwork, and statements of patient rights were hanging on all public walls; teaching and therapy aids were easily seen and accessed; the day treatment facility has lots of natural light and appropriate ambient temperatures. There are areas for individual and group meetings, instruction, or medical or physical needs that are easily accessible. I also appreciated the other modifications that I saw all over the facility – such as color and areas for personal belongings- to attempt to soften the harshness and institutional flavor of what is an inpatient, residential facility- a difficult feat to achieve and not one that the center fully accomplished as evidenced by the obvious signs of institutional care and not home living. I look forward to learning more about this facility and its role in my community through future interactions.

A Conversation With a Friend

I spoke with an old friend a little bit ago. That conversation has been turning around in my head for days. A small piece of it was the casual sorrow that no one had been availed to dress her partner in his temple garments before he was cremated. I have heard so many stories of people who haven't been allowed to help because other family didn't wish it or even the possibility that so many people were available that some would simply be usable to help due to the quantity of volunteers. I have never heard of a church member passing who was unable to be dressed in his temple garments because there was no one who was willing or able to serve. To say that I am appalled suggests a simple emotional response whereas what I feel is much more complex and difficult. As I ponder on that thought and recall experiences of asking for blessings and being unable to get them because priesthood holders were too busy and watching others ask for help and not able to get it either. It's a bit disheartening to see it still happening. I'm a woman and can not given blessings so I can only watch others not get what they need. I am a woman and am limited in what roles I can have in my church. So here I sit and think about all this and wonder when will change happen. When will the church culture stop pulling people in so many different directions so that important service is unable to be performed or even seen as unimportant while decorating for church activities takes more precedence? When will a ward community itself look into each of their hearts and determine that what they want is not to focus on the minutia of culture details and calling desires, but the pure surrender to service. To set aside perfect sacrament programs and instead make sure that shut ins and those in nursing homes get the Sacrament. To have fewer exclusive events that focus on teaching about service and charity... and instead have events that ARE service and ARE Charity. How amazing would it be it the local organizations that support the most impoverished found themselves with no need of volunteers? That families in need were 'adopted' by other families who helped them to get basic needs met, but also mentored and worked with them to find the resources to become more stable on their own. there are some programs that do this- the program in Canada for Syrian refugees comes to mind- what can we as a community of Christ do to create the same amount of successful service? Instead of 'love bombing' people who start to fall away or shunning and ignoring others, what if our focus was pointed so strongly into understanding their needs and to love them that we lost ourselves in the joy of service and love?

I can't change the direction of a culture myself, but I can determine how I respond in it. My response at this point is to move my service and my focus into local groups that are focused on the impoverished.... something I understand a bit to well for my taste. Working with groups that are focused on trying to understand and meet immediate needs for those in my community has been wonderful and I have been amazed at how valued and needed I have felt and how much I have learned. The more I learn, the more I realize how little I have understood about specific topics and I hunger to learn more. This is the service that I feel called to perform. I can't make others see things the same way that I do, but I must confess that I am weary of hearing the stories of people who are not being served in the religious communities that they worship in and I am weary to think that I was one of them.

Dare I ask for all of us to do better... to be better... to reach out to someone everyday and to be the person they need that day? It is the resolution I have for this year and one I feel compelled and called to do. I have hope for a future where I don't hear so many stories of people who are unable to get the help they need. I intend to work as hard as I can to serve better and to seek out those who need me this year. Here's to a focused New Year for all of us!