Self development and awareness.

 

https://open.spotify.com/episode/129WaeuujrkJqI3qR2D1GX?si=6cea097943904490 

This is an amazing podcast, and I haven’t talked about it for a while as I haven’t been listening to it as I have a let’s say electric level of tastes in podcasts, but this episode did resonate with me for a lot of complex reasons.

The first one is that it was something that I needed to hear, as recently I have been feeling as a person with a disability as a burden, but I realize that this is due to a complex situation in the supported independent living house (SIL house) I am in. There is a support worker that has a familiar relationship with the boss and she because of this relationship makes me ask for help (let’s be real taxpayers are paying for me to have quality care) can be sub-standard and when we have pointed this out due to her being related to managements family, we as a house weren’t believed as there was no “verifiable” evidence. 

 

When we spoke up to other support workers that have to pick up the physical slack and the emotional pieces, they collected the evidence to go toward a pattern of behaviors. We are being led to believe that this support worker will be transitioning out of our house. But it has led to major setbacks in our relationships in the house and within my family.

As I have a lot of family support and my housemates don’t due to either location of relatives or it’s not that healthy for the family to be in contact, so they have limited contact with their families, and we see that this can create tension.

However, my family has recently had some changes and I was feeling left out, and I realize that people and families get busy but it wasn’t until I had a really good support worker (as I have two teams a housing team and a community access team)  Who has been working with me to work through these feelings with me to see that feelings are not real and to ask the question have I have been showing up for other people.

The answer to this question was even a surprise to me being that I am slack in putting in the work in being present for other people as I am there for the big moments but not for the small ones and I realized that it wasn’t for lack of trying either, as I don’t drive due to my disabilities and health issues. I am always trying to be fair in handing over petrol money as well, but I see that not driving doesn’t make me less of a person. However, it does complicate logistics a lot.

So, in this area, I see that it can become, an issue and I do isolate myself due to this and a lack of funding that I hope to see remedied soon.

I also was doing a lot of volunteer work, and this was something that impacted the time I had to spend with family as well as I have stepped back from this group, I am still attending but, on my terms, not on everyone else’s. It became very apparent that I was showing up for people who were a combination of ungrateful to grateful as well. But in stepping back I have found time to show up for my family as well.

But I realized something as well I was damaging my physical health by trying to show up for everyone and not relying on myself and my care team as I need to ask for care and not expect it as I am “higher functioning.” So, asking for help for me isn’t easy as I have talked about in a previous post I have been abused by support workers that didn’t have my best interests at heart.

However, now having Mum advocate for me and having the support worker transition out of the house I feel that I will be a lot happier with myself. I also have realized that I am showing up in the little ways for some support workers who have gone above and beyond for me in doing some mending for them and it was something that even I surprised myself at being able to do it as well.

But I am discovering that isolation isn’t great for my mental or physical health so I do still push myself to be social but that now looks a bit different, and it will from here on out. As I was jealous of my sisters for having people whom they came home to each night and they weren’t paid to be nice to them at all they are both married and have children and I know that this isn’t my path but I am still trying to be true to myself and show up for others and myself as well, but without making myself unwell or getting into fiscal trouble.

I am hoping that things in my world do settle soon as well and that now my family knows and recognizes the dynamic of my family that I do at times get the shitty end of the deal as well and if you are aware of something you can work towards changing it.